PSU questions

[artoodeeto]

1) is there ANY PSU out there 650W or higher that's smaller than the standard ATX style?
2) just how bad an idea is it to dismantle the PSU and stick its component parts wherever is most convenient (assuming their connections reach)? Keep in mind, this is just a thought that'd popped into mind, personally I seriously doubt it's anything but a horrendous idea, but I thought I'd ask :P

Basically, my ATX size PSU can only go one place in my case, and it's blocking access to some m/b plugs, so ideally I'd love to have a smaller one in there. After a lot of online hunting, I haven't come up with anything (darn those standardized computer case makers!) ;) you can see from the below image that the ATX PSU fits...but smaller would be oh so much nicer...

http://i597.photobucket.com/albums/tt53/artoodeeto/09--07-19computernotopbackview.jpg

[x88x]

Actually that PSU is deeper (160mm) than the ATX standard (140mm). How much shorter do you need it to be?

As for taking the board out of the enclosure, sure; no problem there. Just make sure that everything that's supposed to be grounded is grounded, and no wires are touching the heatsinks, and you should be fine. You'll be kissing your warranty goodbye, but no electrical problems.

[artoodeeto]

ok, good to know, thanks! as far as how much smaller, really it's a matter of the smaller the better - it barely fits as-is, and in fact I have that semi-unusual 90-degree angled power cord to lessen the horizontal dimension because of the video card's extra length that I hadn't planned on. As for taking it apart, glad to know it's at least feasible. I've often wondered if I could get it to fit better, if I dismantled it and stuck each component where it fit best. Cooling might be an issue though, if everything is scattered hither and yon. :) i'll keep the idea on the back burner for now...and hopefully will never post photos of a burned out crawler husk LOL

[x88x]

Well, inside the casing is almost always just a single PCB, and the only thing you'll have to worry about is keeping a good airflow over the mosfet heatsinks on it (you'll know them when you see them).

If you want to get a smaller sized PSU, what I would recommend doing is getting a killawatt (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16882715001&Tpk=kill%20a%20watt), and monitor how much power your system actually uses under full load (like, join a couple distributed computing groups, and let the client push your CPU and GPU at 100% for a while). I would be surprised if you pull more than 400W.

EDIT: sorry, forgot the point of that...
Once you know how much power you actually use, add ~25% to that, and that's about where I would say is the minimum power to look for in a PSU (the lower power you can go with, the smaller you'll be able to find).