How important is a good PSU?

my knowledgdge of computer hardware is a rather limited one, and I used to believe that when putting a box together, as far as a power supply went, you simply needed one powerful enough to drive all the components, and maybe have some surge protector deal to make sure your stuff stays... not burnt.

Now I'm getting the impression that this isn't the case. I was browsing the forums and people are willing to invest alot of money in PSUs, leading me to ask the question: how important are these guys anyways? Can they significantly affect the performance of your rig, and if so, then how?

They're important because they supply all the power to your parts. If they fail they can take down other components with it. Shitty PSU's supply unstable voltages, which is not a good thing, especially when you're going to overclock. But if you're just a casual comp user, I doubt it'll matter that much. Asides from making sure it pumps enough power, it's probably fine.

I see, thanks for your response.

When I put together the box I'm on now, I picked up a power supply for around 30 dollars, and it has served me well for all my computer needs (mainly gameing). Never had any parts die on me.

Now What I'm wondering is this: I see people on the forums recomending PSUs that are +100 dollars, so what do these PSUs offer that a cheap 30 dollar one doesn't? Just reliability that it won't provide an unsteady voltage, or does it have extra features that I'm unaware of?

Good PSU's also last longer themselves, run cooler, and look cooler

A good one may also come with a fan speed controller, so you can adjust cooling/noise accordingly.

I don't see a reason to spend 100+ on a PSU. Mine was 80 dollars CAD and it works fine.

The expensive ones do tend to provide consistant safe voltages well. They have higher efficency, so put out less heat. They do look cooler sometimes. The long life of a PSU is definately a good thing too. Sometimes you get lucky with the cheap ones though.

Ryan

I just had my hard drive catch on fire at a friends house, due to him having a cheap PSU. His PSU went with it, and a cathode that was on the same cable also went. That is how bad cheap PSU's are. This could happen to all of your hardware. Think how much stress that would cause. And if you had important information on the hard drive that wasn't backed up. It would be long gone. (I lost alot of skins I made for GTR.)

Also to add, with high end graphics cards, you need one of these expensive PSU's to power them, as they will have 2 or more 12v lines, with 18+ amps on each, which is what 2 7800gtx's require.

I have always taken for granted the psu myself, I am aware that not all parts supliers represent there product honestly, that goes for psu's, I have been fortunate in the fact that all the buids I have done, I have simply used popular brands through the supliers I trust, they all have worked well over time, and been inexpensive. As far as high end builds go, you will need a good psu and posibly an expensive one. I recently had an issue with my old one I had on my home computer, I knew it was a little stressed and dated, blew my mother board and video card on me, cost me a bit there, the new one I have is a more recent model, 70$ or so, Im sure there is better, but this one will handle my system well without issue for a few years; Im runing a Fairly good motherboard(865PE-87), 1.5gigs compatible ram, Radeon x700, 3gh pcu, couple hardrives, an optical drive, 1 floppy, soundcard; as far as the growing importance of them, games are requiring better hardware to run by far, hence the higher end parts, need more juice, and thus better manufacturing, it can cost a bit, youll also find the high end supliers to exagerate there prices, no big revelation there. There are some usefull posts on these boards that go into some detail, it would be worth your time to read through a some.