You might have the most powerful gaming components on your rig. But if you choose a substandard or faulty PSU, you won’t get the optimum performance. In extreme cases, your expensive components will likely get fried during a power surge or intensive usage. Hence we have put together some notable factors to help you choose the perfect PSU for your gaming PC.
Power Wattage
Gamers often have a misconception about the power to performance ratio. While they think more PSU wattage will result in better performance, that is not always the case. On the contrary, it costs you a ton of money to get a PSU with massive wattage power.
A gaming rig with a mid-level graphics card, processor, and RAM will do just about right with 600 watts of power and still have plenty more for future expansion.
There are plenty of wattage calculators available online to help you determine precise calculations about your system’s power requirements. Once you figure out the power requirement of your system, aim a little higher than that, so you stay rest assured for future upgrades.
Efficiency Rating
PSUs with higher efficiency ratings not only come with effective components but also produce less heat and have greater power efficiency. As a result, they save you a lot of money on electricity bills.
Always look for an 80 Plus certified PSU as these are currently the highest standard on the market. These PSUs are 80% efficient and lose as much as 20% heat. Though these PSUs are often expensive and worth the safety of your expensive gaming components.
Form Factor
As PC chassis vary in size, so does the PSU. For compact gaming PC builds, you will find plenty of SFX power supplies available on the market. They are smaller in size and consume very little space on your rig. However, we recommend going for PSUs with bigger form factors as they usually have better, stronger, and more advanced components. Bigger PSUs also have large fans that help with heat regulation and maintaining the durability of your PSU.
Cabling
PSUs come in three types of cabling options. Hard-wired, Semi-Modular, and fully Modular. Hard-wired ones are those where cables are permanently attached to the PSU. They offer no customization at all and are bad for cable management. The only positive side is that they are cheaper compared to the other two.
Fully Modular PSUs, on the other hand, are fully customizable and make customization easier. However, they are the expensive ones.
The sweet spot between these two is the Semi-Modular PSUs. They come with all the necessary attached cables and have plenty of room for other components without requiring you to spend too much on them.
Manufacturers
Lastly, you should spend a considerable amount of time researching a PSU brand. Look for how much warranty they are offering and research on the customer feedback. Popular brands on the market are Seasonic, EVGA, and Corsair.
And that concludes the factors that you should look out for while buying a new power supply. At the end of the day, it all comes down to the type of gaming Rig that you are planning to build and selecting a PSU that is sufficient for that system.
