I recently purchased a 5070 Ti and I'm using a Corsair RM850x power supply. It only has one daisy-chained PCIe cable that provides two 8-pin connectors. I noticed that these connectors can be split into 6+2 pins. I'm wondering if this daisy-chained cable can work with my 5070 Ti, where I plan to use the two 6-pin connectors to connect to the 12-pin slot of the GPU.
4 Answers
Your GPU should have included an adapter that converts 8-pin cables to a 12VHPWR cable. For a 5070 Ti, you'll usually need three 8-pin connectors to boot properly. Sometimes people use a pigtail connector for additional power, but I've seen that not work before.
Corsair power supplies can supply 300W per 8-pin connector, which is plenty even for high-end cards like the 5090. While separate cables are generally recommended for lower wattage PSUs, you can use two cables and daisy-chain if you want. For cleaner cable management, consider buying the dedicated Corsair 12VHPWR cable.
I've always gone with two separate cables for my GPUs to reduce stress on the individual rails. I'm not sure if it's strictly necessary, but it seems safer to me. Plus, dealing with cable management can be a hassle with more cables.
You can't plug that daisy-chained PCIe cable directly into the GPU since the plug sizes are different. You’ll need to use the special adapter cable that comes with your 5070 Ti. It typically requires three 8-pin connectors, so even though using two from a daisy chain might seem okay, it’s better to follow the adapter's recommendations.
The adapter I have does include three 8-pin connectors and suggests using them separately from the PSU, but since I only have that one daisy-chained cable, I’m worried it might not work.