Greetings

  I can't help but wonder why everyone seems so concerned about CPU brands
and power supply demands when wattage requirements vary according to each
entire system taken as a whole.  Both Intel and AMD have produced CPUs that
are on the market at the same time that have different cores and
architecture and therefore power requirements as well as thermal
characteristics.  It is not accurate to broad brush either company as
specific models vary considerably.  One way to determine this is to check
any website that posts "overclockability" of various models of
each manufacturer.  Some can be nearly doubled in speed beyond
manufactuerer's spec while others can barely run with stability at spec. 
There is obviously a wide variation in electrical and thermal
characteristics in CPUs by all manufacturers.  Know what you have or what
you are about to buy.

  One major advantage of the drives mentioned in this thread is that they
are scsi and therefore amenable to longer cable lengths.  This makes it
possible to house one or several in a separate enclosure, either one of the
many commercially available units or an easily constructed homebuilt unit. 
These have or can have their own power supplies thus requiring no
additional load from the "mother" system.  This is often a good
idea even with drives of lesser power requirement since so many power
supplies are spec'd at ridiculous temperatures that never really exist in a
working system.  At working temps these power supplies often produce only
half of their rated power.  This is very common which is why it is possible
to buy cases with power supplies for under $50 US when a decent power
supply can cost 50% more than that all by itself.  If you have any reason,
and hopefully that is from observing the real world specs ( if available -
if not, there's probably a very good reason to hide such 
specs as too embarassing to be public ) to doubt your present power
supply's ability to provide real working condition stable power, whether
adding on or not it is a simple matter in most cases to add a second power
supply to share the load.  AT power supplies are cheap if not free and can
handle drives, fans, lights, etc since only motherboards themselves require
ATX supplies.  One additional advantage in such an arrangement is the
separation allows switching ( or not ) any of the devices on that AT chain
apart from the motherboard's state.  Simply put it is possible to keep
drives spinning permanently, leave fans on for a time after system
shutdown, etc. If you have a large case the added supply can be housed in a
drive bay for example but there are numerous advantages to keeping the new
supply in a separate case, thermal being only one advantage.  It really
doesn't take much in the way of expertise to accomplish this especially
considering the low voltages and availability of off the
 shelf Molex or other kinds of connectors.  

  Many people do not realize that random reboots and many other forms of
instability, including poor performance and speed, are due to power starved
systems.  Because cheap power supplies fail first from losing spec'd output
due to load caused heat, it is possible to gang a couple cheapies and get
performance close to what high quality/high cost single units provide.  If
these or other low cost drives interest you or if you are plagued by poor
performance and/or instability you might try scheduling a weekend DIY
project that presently at little or no cost can solve these problems
easily.

Jimmy





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