OMEN HP 880-051ng --> RTX 2070 Super

[Piqudo]

Hello dear community,

I have read a lot the last months from this community and learnt big time from you. Thank you for sharing your knowledge. Now is the first time I actually post here.

I currently own an HP OMEN 880-051ng desktop (hello from the past), from 2017, model sold in Central Europe. It has done an amazing work so far but after all these years, performance with newer games is not what it used to be (oh...Moore's law...). Link to desktop specifications (to components, I just added a Samsung 2Tb SSD in one of the frontal bays): https://support.hp.com/ee-en/document/c05533277

First, I thought about changing the motherboard as I honestly love this case and would like to keep it, but found out is quite hard as the Naples motherboard is HP's custom and hard to substitute for newer ones. Then...I thought I had to let go of my beloved desktop and build a new one, but considering the strange supply situation for new CPUs and GPUs in the market, I am looking to give it a last update to keep it alive longer. And for that, I surely could use your greater knowledge.

My idea is to swap the original GTX 1070 with a RTX 2070 Super, which seems a perfect match for the i7 7700 (non K - not planning to overclock) in terms of bottlenecking. The PSU of my rig is 500W, according to NVIDIA's specifications, minimum for that GPU should be 650W, however we all know that NVIDIA makes an estimate based on components from an average PC (I would say mine is below current market average).

Some people claim that 500W is enough for a RTX 2070 Super, nevertheless, it depends on the quality of your PSU. Honestly, I have no idea of the quality of my PSU 😫

Where it gets complex to me is to understand how can really this custom HP PSU handle it. I attach a picture from the sticker on the PSU, in case it could be of help:

https://ibb.co/5FR5vzJ

I also run a test on power supply calculator with the following results:

https://outervision.com/b/7lGR3I

So my questions are:

• Being theoretically below by around 35W, could I switch GPUs safely? 
• Does this custom HP's PSU have any safeguard if power requirements go over 500W at some point? (ie. not killing my desktop)
• What is your general opinion on this move?

Please consider that I am not looking into changing the PSU...for that matter I might as well build a new PC. But I would really like to give this one some more time before letting it die. 

Thank you all for your time and help in advance!

[hwsense]

HP's OEM power supply's are very good and made by some of the best companies out there, like Delta, CWT, Lite-On, etc. So the quality of it is not an issue, I am personally running RTX2070 (none super) on 400W stock HP power supply with no issues, so my personal advise is, if you have the card, just give it a try, the worst that it can do is not to power up. Nothing will burn or fail, if the card is underpowered its not going to start or it will give you a message on the screen that needs more power.

The other thing is, make sure that your stock PSU has the necessary PCIe power cables, some have only 6+2 and some have 2x6+2, and of course some 2070S require only one 8 pin and some require more, so depends on the card.   

[Piqudo]

Thank you so much for your kind answer!

Wow, a 2070 with a 400W? That’s impressive. Are your system specs similar to mine? Both 2070 and 2070 Super have a Max power consumption of 215W.

I unfortunately don’t have the card with me to try, I would need go make the purchase based of making it work.

Thank you for your input, I did not think about the pin from the card. I believe the GTX 1070 has 8 pin connector, but I better open the case just to check

[hwsense]

I have Pavilion gaming desktop, yes one of those smaller 17L desktops, with i7 9700F, 16gb ram, RTX2070, 256nvme and 1TB sata3 ssd - the total power draw at the wall while gaming and running Cinebench is around 280W. 

[Piqudo]

Hi there!

Thank you for your input. Then I guess my knowledge is truly falling short in this aspect...why would Nvidia ask for these minimum PSU if you get so little power requirements when gaming with a 2070? I also don’t understand why I am getting 465W on the online PSU calculator when a superior rig like yours consumes way less.

Sorry, I am just surprised power consumption can be so low with these GPUs. I guess this is good news though, as I shouldn’t have issues when switching the 1070 for a 2070 Super.

In terms of pins, current 1070 uses 8 but the PSU has an extra 6+2 unused, so that should be solved as well...

[hwsense]

Just get a Kill-A-Watt meter and you can measure your own power draw at the wall, that way you can see exactly how much are you using. 

[Prométhée]

Hello
there is what nvidia indicates, and what is requested by the manufacturers
Nvidia is based on one graphics card model, and on a certain computer configuration!
A manufacturer type msi asus can have different graphics cards, more or less powerful / fast!
Then you have to compare what is comparable, the power supply of an HP computer may not be the same on another model.
I advise you if you do not want to buy another power supply, and a graphics card which will have to wait for a power supply if necessary for nothing, to check the manufacturer's requirements!
Because it could work very well indeed, because the required power supply is mainly based on a moment when the maximum power is in progress!
so if you're playing a poorly performing game, okay that's fine.
But if you play a very greedy game, you may end up with saturation, the power supply will not be powerful enough, and the game will not work properly, or its simply crash.
I have already seen the case, with hp laptops, hp provided users with a more powerful power supply, because the one supplied was not sufficient, and bam, it was crashing!
Up to you

[Piqudo]

Hello Prométhée,

Thank you for your feedback! Yes, I understand power variations are present depending on the current needs of the PC. As a matter of fact I am thinking perhaps the RTX 3060 Ti is probably a better choice as its max power draw is 200W instead of the 215W of the RTX 2070 Super.

However, my main doubt is still present: theoretically, as it has been already commented in this post, 500W should suffice for this components power needs, but will the PSU have the quality to withstand the high degree of power required? I mean, it will run quite continiously around 80-90% its total capacity. It has also been mentioned that HP custom PSU have a good quality overall, but do they have safety measures like automatic shutdown if the energy demand peak surpasses the PSU ability to delivery power?

I just ask this, so if I make the move to purchase the RTX 3060 Ti, I will not destroy the motherboard or catch fire in case of the PSU overloading.

Thank you for all your support!

[wb2001]

@Piqudo,

It is better to let a PSU idle at a lower load. I prefer no more than 75% load.

[Prométhée]

I have already answered that for this type of graphics card, the motherboard is not suitable!
I find it unfortunate to buy a card of this range, which will not function at the maximum of these capacities, pci gen3 instead of gen 4, and if the power supply does not follow, that will not help!
You may not risk screwing up the motherboard, but what good is having a high-end model, so that it is not 100% usable