300W to 450W: 20 Power Supplies on the Test Bench
by Christoph Katzer on December 31, 2008 6:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Cooler Master Real Power Pro 360W & 400W
Cooler Master sent us their new Real Power Pro units with very low wattages of 360W and 400W. There is an additional 500W unit in the series for those that want a bit more oomph. The housing comes in plain black with a very nice looking green sticker on the side. A 120mm fan cools these units. The backside is totally perforated, even around the main switch and AC jack.
Before opening the unit you can already tell who the ODM is, which is why we wanted to have these two new power supplies in our roundup. We have seen many power supplies made by Enhance before, but they are always in the 750W+ market. Cooler Master's Silent Pro series was one of the first to use a newer design from Enhance, and now brings they are the first to use this lower wattage design. Of course, we shouldn't expect too much from such a low-end unit, but Enhance builds nice power supplies. We see a well-equipped power supply with the typical large coils. Teapo makes the capacitors, which we often see on the secondary sides of power supplies. This unit has Teapo on the primary side, which is certainly more for pricing considerations rather than quality.
All but the main ATX cable harness come without sleeving. We have four SATA connectors and five Molex connectors, which is enough for these wattages, and the single 6-pin PEG connector will power your graphics cards if needed. Most companies think if you have a small wattage power supply you will also have a small case; while that is certainly true for many users, we don't understand why many of these power supplies come with harness lengths of around 35cm (14"). The extra 15cm would certainly be beneficial for larger cases, and it wouldn't present a problem for smaller cases either. Cooler Master at least makes the 4-pin 12V connector 50cm long, which is good for people with the jack in unreachable corners of the motherboard. A good motherboard layout will avoid such a problem, but we still see such layout snafus on some of the budget motherboards.
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Christoph Katzer - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
We cannot run after every brand there is and if those companies don't come to us... there are surely many more missing but we can only test products from companies that are actually interested in us testing their stuff. We had an Akasa unit before though...boboko - Sunday, January 4, 2009 - link
>"We cannot run after every brand there is and if those companies don't come to us..."I guess that is the problem with almost all review sites. And the worst thing is not that you skip the smaller guys, but that what you are reviewing is not off the shelf, it's sent to you buy a company that wants a good review. So even if they have rotten quality control, and half their stuff is DOA, you know the one they send you has been triple checked and fine tuned. Not your fault, but to me the reliability is MUCH more important than a few extra watts or a few less decibels, and there's just no way to get good data on that.
Griswold - Wednesday, January 7, 2009 - link
If you read the reviews here, you'd know that this assumption is false in general. AT has had junk on their bench on more than one occassion - if every supplier would do what you claim, all reviews would take place in happy bunny land where everything is dandy and no negative notion is possible. But thats not the case.Surely there will be those who go the extra mile to make their product look better than it is off the shelf, but you just cant hide every trace of incompetence and bad quality.
Much like we cant expect a review site buy every piece of hardware to test it and hope they can re-sell it without a loss.
marc1000 - Thursday, January 1, 2009 - link
wow, I know it was said before, but you guys really do listen to us. that's the reason I come here everyday to know the news! keep up the good job at 2009! regards!C'DaleRider - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
I'm just curious why the "old" version of the Antec Earthwatts 430 was dug out and retested since Seasonic is no longer the OEM for it but now has Delta as the OEM supplier and has been for many months now.Seems it'd be only fitting that the "new" version would be tested instead of a version no longer being made or sold, except as NOS (new old stock).
Christoph Katzer - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
If only "someone" could send it to us :] I will make sure to get new revision on time, you're totally right.sprockkets - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
What were those bad things happening to the SII Seasonic PS?JarredWalton - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
I believe Christoph is just saying that he's received an increase number of email messages from people saying that their Seasonic PSUs have failed. It's anecdotal at best, and it could just be a case of more people buying their PSUs and thus a small fraction that fails can still result in more complaints than before.Christoph Katzer - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
Yes ;)There was a revision in the beginning that had problems with certain motherboards somehow, something to do with the "power good" signal. They've upgraded the series long time ago though.
Lonyo - Wednesday, December 31, 2008 - link
I'd just ordered some new parts, including a CX400 about 30 minutes before I saw this article come up.Nice to see that my choice seems fairly solid.
I'm sure this article will be relevant for other people as well.