You learn that wattage isn’t just a number. It’s a promise. And not all promises are kept. A $20 700W PSU is a fire in a box. A $100 450W unit from a trusted brand can run a system that draws 440W, because it’s built to deliver its rated power continuously, not just for the first five minutes. The sticker tells you peak wattage or sustained? Most don’t say. You have to know.
The first time your PC shut down mid-game, you blamed the game. Corrupted save, bad patch, who knows. You restarted, loaded back in, and made it forty-five minutes before the screen went black again. No warning, no blue screen, no flicker—just nothing . Like someone had pulled the plug. how to tell power supply wattage
Your PSU had +12V @ 28A. 336W. You’d been running a 395W system on a 336W rail. For a year. The fact that it only shut down occasionally was a miracle, not a malfunction. You learn that wattage isn’t just a number
You remember the graphics card you installed last year. The one the forums said needed “at least 500W.” You’d read that. You’d nodded. Then you’d told yourself it would probably be fine, because people online exaggerate, right? A $20 700W PSU is a fire in a box
You don’t ask how to tell power supply wattage because you’re curious. You ask because something has gone wrong.