Dell 2400 - only 200w PSU - can I add hardware ?

[driver8]

I'm on a tight budget and my PC has died. Just ordered a cheapie dimension 2400 from DO. It's very basic to get me on the web - 2.6ghz/256mb/80gb/cd + onboard vid/aud, and only a 200w psu.

Is the PSU powerful enough for me to add my CDRW drive ? And my wireless card ? And an extra HD ? Has anyone had experience of this ? What symptoms will I see if I overload - instability ? Or should I not risk it, and swap the cd for my cdrw, and get a USB external HD 'caddy' ? (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?rb=3496446430&action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=74821 ?)

And my scanner & printer are USB; any advice on a powered USB hub ? (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?rb=3496484082&action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X3Jldmlld3M=&product_uid=55658 ?)

Sorry for so many questions ! Any helpful pointers appreciated ! :)

[abbott]

I can't see there being any problems

[Ravenger]

Would be fine for those peripherals, just don't think of adding a state-of-the-art graphics card - they require a huge amount of power.

[mgb_dvd]

The Dell PSUs are pretty good quality ( it would cost them too much on warranties not to be ) All our non home-made systems are dell and we haven't had a dead PSU yet.
They can put out much more reliable power than the supposedly 500W ones for £7.50 at computer fairs !

The only problem so far with the 2400 is that it only has mountings for 1x3.5 drive.

[driver8]

thanks for the replies guys - fitted the wireless card, swapped the cd for cdrw and added a dvd.

there's no room for a 2nd HD anyway (as mgb said) so I may as well get an external usb caddy and powered hub rather than squeezing it in.

[Ds3]

Chuck em all in there :) I've always very wary of PSUs but I sell Dell PCs and the PSUs seem infalible, I'm amazed at how much hardware they can handle for the spec - I've not managed to make one crash out yet! :D

[saif]

There is a really good power wattage calculator on this site which lets you choose all of you hardware and it adds up the wattage for each and tells you how powerful a PSU you should have....

http://www.jscustompcs.com/power_supply/

this is a guideline only I guess... but a useful tool nevertheless.....


S

[stevejm]

Plop the extra drive in the spare 3.5" bay :)

[john.chelle6]

It's very basic to get me on the web - 2.6ghz/256mb/80gb/cd + onboard vid/aud, and only a 200w psu.


Since when was that sort of spec very basic?!? :)

I'm doing web design, photo editing, basic video editing/conversion, halflife2 and a million other things on the old 'Bitsof' PC downstairs, and it's only 1.2GHz/512MB/30GBx2/Radeon7500, built up SLOWLY and cheaply over the last few years.

I do get flack from my brother though, who upgrades his video card if he hears rumours of someone in the same city getting a faster card than him.

Ah, how wonderfully cheap PC's have become!