Is there a difference between 20+4 Pin and 24 Pin ATX PSU Connector when the Mainboard has a 24 Pin Connector?

Question

I was just wondering if there was a difference between the 20+4 Pin ATX Connector and the 24 Pin ATX Connector? I am purchasing an ASUS P5L-MX Mainboard and it has a 24 Pin ATX Connector. I was just wondering if I could use either the 20+4 or the 24?

Answer 1

PSU Power Connections
Once upon a time, PSUs didn't extend a veritable mass of cables to their installers for installation and use. A motherboard cable bundle with an AT or ATX modular connector, and up to half a dozen Molex connectors for hard disks and floppy drives was just about it. But today's modern PCs and their constituent components demand considerably more. Here's what you're likely to see provided on most higher-end PSUs nowadays:

* 20-pin "old standard" ATX motherboard connector or 24-pin "new standard" ATX motherboard connector (the four pins added are to provide power to the PCI-E port for a graphics card). Most newer motherboards sport 24-pin connectors, so buy a compatible PSU (this standard is called ATX 2.0, and its latest version is the ATX 2.2 specification; be sure to look for 24-pin ATX connector support especially if your motherboard has a PCI-E X16 graphics slot and you plan to use it).

Caution: You can indeed buy an adapter to plug a 20-pin connector from a PSU into a 24-pin connector on the motherboard (in fact, they only cost about $4). But this puts a serious strain on your power supply and its electrical connections to the motherboard. It might do in a pinch, but it's not recommended. The absence of a 24-pin connector may mean that the PSU conforms to an earlier specification (ATX12V v1.3, for example), which has considerably different requirements than the latest specification.
* 6-pin PCI Express power cable for a PCI-E X16 graphics card. If your PSU doesn't have one, nor a 24-pin motherboard connector, you can buy an adapter that will let you draw power from two unused 4-pin Molex outputs from your PSU (assuming you've got them to spare) and then plug into the 6-pin power input on the graphics card.
* 4-pin Auxiliary 12 V ATX power cable for square motherboard connector. This provides power to the CPU and should never be used to make up for the four "missing pins" on a 20-pin connector.
* One or more small 4-pin power connector(s) for floppy drive(s). If there's more than one, they may be daisy-chained on one or more power cables (often with 4-pin Molex connectors for hard or optical disks).
* Four or more 4-pin Molex connectors for hard or optical disks (the 500 W power supply under examination as we write this article has eight such connectors and can handle eight drives with ease).

Answer 2

20 4 Pin Vs 24 Pin

Answer 3

theres a difference in compatability the 24 pin PSUs have a fixed amount of pins for the motherboard (24 pin motherboard power connections are the modern ones) the 20 +4 pins are daul compatible with the modern 24 pin ones (you attach the 4 pins to the existing 20 pins and plug it in to the motherboard) and the older PCs (usually 6 years or older) wich use 20 pin motherboard power connections so generally there are no big differences in the performance of the PC unless you only have 20 pins plugged into a 24 pin socket then you get allot of strain on the PC and constant bluescreens and error messages because of lack of power. hope that is clear.

Answer 4

Don't you love it when they copy and paste a whole bunch of text, and then don't even answer the question. You can use a 20+4 in a 24 pin motherboard. The purpose of a 20+4 is for it to be compatible with both 20 pin and 24 pin motherboards. On 24 pin, you use both connection 20 and 4, while on a 20 pin, you would just use the 20 part.