Power Consumption

humbletech99 · 04-27-2006, 07:48 AM

Hi,
I've had so many problems with scsi disks over the last few months that I think there may be an issue with the amount of power some of my servers are getting.

I need definitive answers regarding how many watts a hard drive needs at full load, also I would like to know how many watts I should have for each opteron/pentium/xeon processor so that I can work out how fat a power supply there should be in the boxes.

Does anybody know this stuff or know a good website or something with these details on?

michaelk · 04-27-2006, 08:18 AM

Here is a good starting point. There is a link for a simple calculator.
http://www.pcworld.com/howto/article...,119585,00.asp

The average load for a typical hard drive is 25 watts but you need look at the electrical specifictions for your drive for the exact numbers. It takes more current at start then it does just to idle.

With SCSI drives make sure the cable is terminated correctly and the total length does not exceed the maxium for the type bus. SCSI-II is different then SCSI-III. Besides making sure the devices IDs are correct.

humbletech99 · 04-27-2006, 11:48 AM

thanks, i'm reading that now...

J.W. · 04-27-2006, 11:05 PM

Great reference article - thanks for the link michaelk.

What's interesting is that even with a generous buffer of 30%, a 400W PSU should be sufficient for just about any regular desktop PC.