Progress ongoing – I have a few questions and would appreciate some guidance.
Progress ongoing – I have a few questions and would appreciate some guidance.
Hello guys! Me and my friend are building a new pc for him right now and we have some questions just to make sure everything is fine. First question would be: We have a Corsair HX1000i and a Zotac 4090 OC Trinity. The PSU has 3 pigtail PCIE cables, while the GPU adapter has 4 connections. We want to connect 2 pigtail PCIE cables to 2 connections, and the last pigtail PCIE cable connected in the last 2 connections for the 4090 adapter. Is this a good idea? Here's a picture to make it clearer:
Anyone? We're kinda freaked out to connect the GPU only with 3 cables, even though they all provide 450 W (3x150) + PCIE 75W and we just need some confirmation/advice. Thank you in advance!
Hello everyone! The solution is clear: for the Zotac 4090 OC Trinity you must use four distinct PCIe cables. We set up the card as shown in the diagram, using three cables and one pigtail for the fourth connection. After booting, everything worked fine. But when we tried to run Unigine Heaven, the system crashed because the power draw exceeded 320W. Our reasoning points to the 12-pin adapter having four connections. We assumed it splits the load evenly—about 80W per cable. Since the third cable was connected normally plus a pigtail, it was drawing 160W, surpassing the PSU’s 150W limit for that cable. This triggered protection mechanisms on the PSU, causing the crash. We also tested with only three cables and no pigtail, which would have been sufficient (450W total vs. the card’s 80W per cable). The conclusion is that for this model, you need four PCIe cables from the power supply. Be careful not to be misled by PSU manufacturers—some claim six cables, but they actually provide three with one pigtail each. From our research and troubleshooting, avoid using the pigtail connection.
Corsair mentions 6 PCIe connectors. Each cable holds 2 connectors, so 3 cables give 6. The SATA connectors seem excessive—how did they include 16 when only 2 SATA cables are shipped? Possibly you need extra PCIe cables or Corsair's 12V power cable if it’s available again. Pigtails work for low-power or non-high-power GPUs.
It seems like you're considering a fourth cable. The GPU supports dual BIOS versions, so it's unclear which one is currently running. It's possible that using the standard configuration could work with three cables, but to be cautious, ordering a fourth would be wise.