Power Supply Advice Please

[Morriah]

Hello,

I am currently running Windows XP Pro, Dell Dimension 8300 2.8 gig, P4, 2gig ram, 2 - 80gig hard-drives, Asylum 5200 AGP video card, and G-Force 4000 pci card, duel flat panel monitors and running all this on a 250w power supply for gaming (World of Warcraft) and other things.

With all this going on, I was told that I needed to update my power supply to 500w to get better performance. But, I cant seem to find a 500w for a Dell computer. Does anyone know of this issue and maybe where I could find one if there is one out there to fit a Dell Dimensions 8300 computer?

Also, I was wondering, if I cant find one, can I take what I have listed here, and just put it into a new case? If so, what would be a good case and motherboard? Can the hardrives be put on a new system even though they have some Dell software on them?

I figure I have the guts of a good system, but just need to update the power supply. And I figure, it would be cheaper to buy a case (tower) and motherboard and a power supply then it would to find a power supply for Dell.

Any advice for this gamer would be very much appreciated.

Thank you

Morriah

[ANZAC_ELITE]

Hi Morriah,
Unless you are experiencing problems with your pc I'd leave it as it is. 500w's is overkill for your system.
I'm running a similar system to you (not Dell) my cpu is bigger, my hdd's are bigger, my agp card is a 6800ultra (requires two molex connectors) no pci card and dual 19" CRT monitors as well as six case fans all on a 450w psu with no problems.
The main thing about the psu is amps on the 12v rail(s) if they are up around the 20-30amp mark you should be fine.
If you do decide to go ahead and get a new psu is it not possible to buy a larger one from Dell itself? I know they use a lot of specific gear in their pc's so they may be able to point you in the right direction. It would be a lot cheaper than a new case etc.

[Morriah]

Hi,

Thank you for the fast and again, most reliable reply. All I know is Dell has one from what I checked to only go up to 320w. What I am noticing is, the game seems to be slowing down on me some. If your familiar with World of Warcraft, my zoning times and loading times seem to be slowing down considerably. I was told that if I upgrade the power supply to help aid my video card, it might speed things up.

Now, I just recently re-formatted my hard drive and was getting a little faster loading time with Windows, and then my game, but, it seems to have fallen back into the slow loading time again. For instance, loading my system from power up, was over 3 minutes to load completly, then, when I reformatted, it went down to about 1 minute 30 seconds, so, more than half. Now, 3 months later, with no added software or anything, its gone back up to over 3 minutes. I ran all my spyware, adware and so on programs, and they found nothing. Then my game started running slower as well. So, I downloaded the lastest video card upgrades and drivers, but still having a slow time. Then i was told that my power source may need updating.

So, as you can see, its starting to be confusing.

Thank you for all your help.

Morriah