Graphics card connector question.

[altwight]

I'm trying to put together a PC for my GF with spare parts laying around.

I have a Radeon 4870 graphics card ( I think ) it has 2 6pin pcie connectors and the PSU I'm using only has one.

My friend said it will work at full power with only 1 and the second is only needed for crossfire.

I need to know if this is true or not.

The reason I say I think it's a 4870 is because I got a new GTS 480 for my current computer and it only has 1 6pin connector to it but it's better than the 4870 so I'm confused as to which is actually better and if the 4870 only needs 1 connector to run fully on.

[Karinastar]

I have a 4870 in my second PC, and it took two pcie connectors. I probably wouldn't try with just one. It miiiiight boot up and work but you'd probably either get reduced performance or it'd just crash when sufficient load was put on it.

[Zerocool]

Get some of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16812189120

[Dmitry]

It should work with only one connector, but it will definitely crash when load is put on and it can't draw enough power. I don't know if AMD cards have this feature, but we used to have a computer in my area to display our call statistic board, and it wasn't getting enough power. It would display a message that it was turned down due to that fact.

[Kerberoz]

https://www.google.com/search?q=molex+4+pin+to+6+pin

[Niya]

You can try with just one 6pin or use Molex-to-6pin adapters, but best choice would be to replace the PSU with one that has 2 6-pins.
I can't speak for this exact model but only general for graphic cards, but normally the manufacturer has a reason for adding additional power ports.

Each of those 6-pin lanes from the PSU can deliver 75W of power, plus the 75W from the PEG slot would mean that your card is designed for consuming up to 225W.

With only one 6-pin the GC might work, but when you stress it the power won't be enough and the card with probably shut down.
Molex-to-6pin are always a bad idea... There's a reason why PSUs have seperate lanes for the 6-pins, the molex/sata power lanes aren't designed for that high loads. A friend tried a while back to use an old nVidia 7900 card with molex-adapters, and his PSU died after a month.

And i highly doubt your friends comment. Crossfire just connects 2+ cards and the driver distributes the rendering load on the cards, but it doesn't raise the power consumption of the individual cards.