I just got in on a deal for some cheap(er) WD 2tb Green Power drives. I am looking to order the Zotac Ion 330 mitx board for my upcoming htpc build. My only remaining concern lies with power.
I am debating between ordering the Zotac set with the 90 watt psu included, or ordering a separate Pico-PSU which should be good for about 150 watts. As an added benefit the picopsu is supposedly more power efficient than the Zotac solution, however not enough so to justify the purchase alone. The Zotac adapter comes with the board, and buying the kit instead of the seperate parts would save me $40.
I was going the buy the Zotac bundle and save the cash, but now I am concerned with whether or not the 90 watt psu will be enough to spin up a total of 4 2tb WD Green Power drives. I've looked all over for numbers on spin up power draw for the green drives, and have had no luck.
All I know is that they draw 6 watts idle, 9 watts read/write, which the 90 watt psu could do easily even with the dual core atom going full tilt which would consume ~40 watts.
Will a 90 watt external psu be enough to spin up 4 2tb disks reliably, or should I go with the Pico PSU setup, which claims to be 96% efficient under most loads?
I am debating between ordering the Zotac set with the 90 watt psu included, or ordering a separate Pico-PSU which should be good for about 150 watts. As an added benefit the picopsu is supposedly more power efficient than the Zotac solution, however not enough so to justify the purchase alone. The Zotac adapter comes with the board, and buying the kit instead of the seperate parts would save me $40.
I was going the buy the Zotac bundle and save the cash, but now I am concerned with whether or not the 90 watt psu will be enough to spin up a total of 4 2tb WD Green Power drives. I've looked all over for numbers on spin up power draw for the green drives, and have had no luck.
All I know is that they draw 6 watts idle, 9 watts read/write, which the 90 watt psu could do easily even with the dual core atom going full tilt which would consume ~40 watts.
Will a 90 watt external psu be enough to spin up 4 2tb disks reliably, or should I go with the Pico PSU setup, which claims to be 96% efficient under most loads?