I am a bit confused on the BFG LS550 part number. There appears to be two different ones, BFGR550WLSPSU and BFGR550WLPSU, listed on the BFG website. The former is listed in some places on the BFG website as the single 12v rail as tested here, the latter the typical 12v quad rail that is the most common BFG Tech PSU configuration. BUT when I look at retailers listing the part number for the single rail version, it's specified as a quad rail configuration and even BFG website has it listed as that on the website at http://www.bfgstore.com/ProductDetails.asp?Product...">http://www.bfgstore.com/ProductDetails.asp?Product... So where is this single 12v rail version in the wild? Was it made just for AnanTech to test?
Typo. They're actually BOTH BFGR550WLSPSU. The old one is made by Fore Point and has four +12V rails. The new one is made by Enhance and has a single +12V rail. The Enhance built one is the one reviewed here. They both have the same topology and grade of components (the Enhance built one does have a few better quality capacitors than the Fore Point built one) and in some cases the new Enhance built one actually reviewed better than the older one when reviewed by the same person:
I just got Tagan's SuperRock 600W edition(EU/de). I can confirm it has indeed very stable voltages.
But it's not that quite as yours obviously was. I can't hear my Sapphire 4870 1024 Toxic at all but the SuperRock's makes a hum noise.
My three year old Tagan TG420-U01 is still way less noisy then this SuperPiece of a power supply :)
There is one very important thing that you miss in your test is what computer it will be powering. If it is an Intel system, the three power supplies that you choose are OK for low to low-mid setups. For an AMD system, it will not. The 5 volt and 3.3 volt rails need to have a combined wattage of 150 watts or more. Only power supply units that you tested are OCZ and Sunbeam that provides this power requirement. You are providing false reviews and people rely on this review have to think twice. There are significantly better power supplies at this wattage level that equals or exceeds the combined power requirement for 3.3 volt and 5 volt rails. Please next time select models that are up today's standards.
A power supply unit that exceeds combined power requirement for 3.3 volt and 5 volt rails is the following.
Seasonic S12 Energy Plus SS-550HT
It does not work with European standards that requires over 80% of efficiency, but it makes just about any computer to power up with out any problems at a cheap price.
I have an AMD Athlon computer that has such requirement when I built it at the time. Also I had to recently replace the power supply in an HP computer that contains an AMD processor. The aged power supply was within the requirement. Majority of the motherboard manuals for AMD systems also states this requirement.
Yeah I agree, the poster above is purely speculating and his post is riddled with conjecture. I've yet to see a system that wouldn't power up correctly with in that rigid spec or not. A 400/500/600W PSU etc... will power just about any modern system. <--- Notice how vague that is? But it still holds true, irregardless of the so-called "spec." Unless you're running well below the minimum REQUIRED power ratings, it's going to work buddy lol!
Thank god PSU prices have started to drop to "reasonable" rates. No way in hell am I ever going to spend $100+ for a PSU unless I'm building a near-line/server machine. Luckily the gamer/addict fanboys have now priced themselves out of the common-sense market. Now we (less than zealous) can get back to building nice machines, w/o spending an arm and leg to power them with these (still) over sized square bricks called "PSUs." 2009 and we're still cramming in huge boxes with a bunch of wires surging out of them like snakes trying to escape a pit...
Lastly, Enhance has once again proven it's THE premier OEM, like I knew back in the E4300 days, while everyone else was fanboying hyped brands.
Sure high powered power supplies that are under spec for the combined wattage for 3.3 volts and 5 volts will work for now, Can you guarantee four to five years from now. I can guarantee the unit that I suggested will work for five years.
On AMD web site it saids "..Overall current usage limitation on the power supply should not exceed a combined system power output for the +5V and +3.3V outputs."
Any idea if the fan makers plan to move on to the present and switch to SATA power connectors? I haven't used a Molex connector for anything other than a fan in a few years, and it is annoying to have to install a Molex harness just to run a fan or two.
And on a related note, why does Antec use case fans which are only Molex powered? Wired to use motherboard headers is so much better, include an adapter like Cooler Master does if you think users want to run them off Molex.
Changing everything for the sake of change, thinking "present" SATA connectors would have any usefulness, is a bad idea. Change things when there is a good reason, only.
How is it annoying to use a connector when you still have to with (what, different connector is no less?) any option, or did you plan on transmitting power with a laser beam? It makes no sense, this is very basic easy inexpensive standard blah blah blah.
Case fans often use the large molex connectors because a case manufacturer can't be assured how many fan headers a board may have or where those are. They could just put very long cables on the fans, but then somebody comes along and says long cables are untidy.
Ultimately you seem to be opposed to seeing wires, want everything invisible. Esthetically I agree but practically speaking none of these issues really matter to the operation of the system, just be sure the wires are secured out of the way of fan blades.
I was pointing out that with the exception of fans, pretty much everything in the system which used to use Molex uses the SATA power connector now. No laser beams involved, Sata power cables for HDD and optical. The only place I have seen a Molex recently is on the occasional motherboard that uses it for additional power. I suggested that rather than maintain two connectors indefinitely, they migrate everything to one of them.
And for the case fans, check a Cooler Master (others might do this, but CM is where I have seen it). They come with fans with motherboard fan header connections, and an adapter to use Molex instead of a header.
I like the delta K chart, but I must ask, does it represent the temperature difference in Kelvins. Why not just use delta C since it is the same number and would be more consistent with how people (including yourself) typically measure temperature in computer systems. Also, while I do like the delta chart, I can always calculate my own deltas if I have the absolute temperatures. I would prefer some absolute temperature figures and then a delta chart if desired. It doesn't really matter if the exhaust temperature and the internal temperature are similar if the PSU puts out enough heat to boil water. Given the efficiency of these units, I doubt this is the case, but it would still be nice to know what the absolute temperatures of the exhaust and each heat sink is. Oh, and where did you measure the internal heat from?
"The efficiency charts make one thing very clear: Seasonic and Enhance deliver kickass efficiency with their products."
I'm not sure where this fits in. There is no Enhance unit on the chart in question. Further, the Seasonic unit is not exactly at the upper end of efficiency in this chart. One might say it got its ass kicked by some of the units here. I ask that you avoid comments that seem this out of place in the future. We already have enough people spamming "Anandtech reviews are just advertisements for Company X" as it is. Don't encourage them.
Now that the negatives are out of the way, I have to say, this one of the best review format I've seen for a large number of PSUs. Comparison is pretty easy and intuitive. I still prefer the power efficiency curves used in single supply reviews, but for a large number of PSUs like in this round up, the chart you put up is much better.
On a side note:
Looking at the various amounts of ripple and noise on the rails of each power supply, I asked myself a few questions:
1) How much ripple can I take before if effects my system?
I think the spec is 12v < 120mVpp ripple and 5V/3.3V < 50mVpp ripple, but I'm wondering about differences in system stability if I decide to overclock my CPU, GPU, RAM, etc.
2) Does the quality of ripple make a difference? I.E. would you rather have sinusoidal ripple (Like BFG's 5V rail) or thin spikes (like Arctic Cooling's 5V rail)?
3) Assuming the noise is at most half the ripple, does it make a difference to system stability?
4) Assuming they are implemented correctly, can more phases on a motherboards VRMs make up for a PSU with higher ripple in comparison to a 3 phase board with a PSU that has low ripple? Alternately, how much voltage ripple actually gets to the processor, north bridge, etc.?
I'm not expecting a separate review or anything, but I'd be interested in your thoughts on these topics (objective or subjective).
As for the rest of the questions JPForums, I can use C next time of course. I just thought of using this to save space. I could include a plain table with the results of each heatsink and other temps but I am a fan of graphics you can understand instantly. Maybe I can think of another way when the tested PSUs are less. There will be three more roundups coming in spring: 620-650W, 850W, and 1200-1250W. Plenty occasions to make it better each time ;)
Enhance fits in that particular sentence because four of the units are made by Enhance and four by Seasonic. The meaning was that if you are looking for high efficiency you should look out for products that are made by one of those two companies regardless of what name is written on it...
To be fair, I like the graphics as well and wouldn't want you to get rid of them as yours are very well done. I'd be happy if the hard data was in an excel sheet link in a sentence like "For absolute values, see this spreedsheet".
I must have had a brain fart. I can see where you mention the units that use Enhance and Seasonic in the article. Sorry about that.
1) Spec is (+-) 5%? 12V = 1.2Vpp, 5V = 0.5Vpp. Seems like a lot doesn't it? The thing is, any properly designed hardware being powered is designed to run stably within this range.
Parts effected when overclocking are using (re)regulated power on their respective parts or motherboard, ripple from the PSU makes far less difference than you might suspect, so long as the minimal voltage isn't excessively low (excessive response time with changes in load, power state changes from CPU or GPU, etc, as often the case when a PSU barely has enough capacity for the load).
2) Sinusoidal or spikey don't in themselves matter, you still have an impedance and capacitance downstream at the powered parts, reregulation for most critical voltages, decoupling at the chips, etc.
3) What are you calling noise? There's switching noise, environmental/EMI/RF, digital switching noise, etc. The noise that effects a part the most is the noise that part produces itself. Given a theoretically perfect PSU with 0.00V ripple, you still have noise created in the system from the powered parts.
4) More phases in the VRM would reduce PSU ripple more, but these phases themselves create noise. Practically speaking, the fewer stages or slower each switches, the more capacitance you'll need per current. Either increases costs, has different layout/space factors, and a tradeoff of efficiency versus max power handling capability.
Until the PSU is performing much more poorly than you seem to be thinking about, the design of the VRM itself causes the issues, not minor differences from PSU supplying power to it (within the context mentioned previously, that the PSU at least doesn't have very slow response time).
If your concern is what to do to get the best o'c, the answer is better heatsinking to keep parts cooler, then with this addt'l thermal margin you have less restraints in giving the part a higher (average) voltage, meaning whatever the largest depressed voltage is, stays high enough to retain stability at the operational frequency. To this extent, a shorter spike depression would be better than a longer period sinusoidal depression at same voltage, merely because the shorter period means downstream capacitance is buffering better.
Thanks for the explanations. I didn't realize that the VRMs would create so much noise. Since noise adds in quadrature and the oscilloscope graphs don't show nearly as much noise as ripple, the VRMs must put out nearly as much noise as the PSUs ripple to be comparable to the ripple.
Does it really matter what noise I was talking about? I was mostly thinking about switching noise. Since the PSUs are fully encased, they shouldn't be very susceptible to background noise (I.E. there should be far more noise in the PSU case). The oscilloscope graphs show the noise from all the sources you mentioned. All of that noise is still on the line when it reaches what is powering it, so it doesn't make sense to me to distinguish between them.
Given what you were saying about critical circuits being reregulated and excessive response time with changes in load being a problem, I think more phases (faster response) would be of benefit up to a certain point. As you eluded to, fewer phases require more capacitance to make sure the voltage doesn't droop while switching between phases. Which leads to what you mentioned about fewer and/or slower stages requiring more capacitance per current. More capacitance slows the response of the circuit to load changes. However, switching from more phases causes more noise (apparently a lot). It would be important to make sure that this noise is kept as low as the voltage droop between changes. Do you agree with this assessment?
With modern boards I have been avoiding 3 phase VRMs, but I also don't really see the merits of the boards with more than 8 phases. I know this depends heavily only switching rate and capacitance as well, but I'd be interested in how many phases you think would be best (assume the switching rates, capacitances, and topologies currently implemented by manufacturers).
It seems that you missed posting the 12V Ripple & Noise screenshot for the Corsair HX520, any chance you could post it?
From your graph it seems that the Corsair is quite a bit worse in the 12V department than many other PSUs here, would you say that this has a negative impact on overclocking?
Hate to nitpick, but I really do wish one of the more common Antec's was thrown into the mix (500Watt earthwatts ect) Moreso because they are considered common in many builds due to casing/psu combo's and it wouldn't be surprising to see them in many standard builds.
Excellent!! I am curious as to how those solutions compare to standalone "standouts". I think the days where we see some no name powersupply that isn't very good in systems (as a general rule) are gone. That's been replaced (in North America) now with seeing solutions by Antec, Fsp, ect as the standard. So the comparison's are of interest.
I'm looking for a cheap 450W - 550W Powersupply (cheap but still a bit decent, around 50 euro), so I was really interested in this article...
Unfortunatly the only PSU in pricerange, the Artic Cooling, is unfindable in the Benelux (EU). Also the next in price (Tagan Superrock), which actually is too expensive already, is unfindable here...
The XClio STABLEPOWER 500W really should have been included it's a great PSU and very silent it's also relatively inexpensive for the quality especially if you can find one on sale.
I know a good PSU is important, but the margins are so close - and for the most part the choice is very simple; OCZ, Cooler Master, Corsair, Ultra, Antec, etc, etc, etc...
Just give people a little list of what to look for, what’s new on the market and what your top 3 recommendations are.
Use the extra energy to dive further into the different i7 platforms, or give us some updates on TOP tier i7 systems with Uber Graphics solutions, we like to see and read about the over the top most powerful computer systems and gaming systems, not yet another review about mediocre low power PSUs...
As always, thanks for the info on the site, and for being one of my favorite tech update daily visits.
We want graphics reviews from YOU. (not the other guys...)
What i want to see is a i7 system OCed to hell running 3 GTX 285s, vs. quad sli (2xGTX295) vs. quad ATI (x24870x2)
Or other insight into the i7, or Geforce 9300/9400 or how much apple and the iphooled suck…
i care, because most of us here can't afford a 3,000+ system, let alone be stupid enough to buy one.
i am actually rather sick of these "uber" high platforms and never any midrange stuff like most of us use, what i would actually like to see is a e8400 with a 4870 or gtx260 compared to see what real world performance i will actually get, not some 1,000+ cpu with a 400+ graphics card.
I see - your point is taken. There are other sites that have lots of reviews like this one, another site is fudzilla, guru3d, and toms hardware - but they dont have the same level of inteligence (for the most part) as Anandtech.
I imagine if your looking for a mid range PSU, and your on a budget, some of these PSUs recommended here cost almost the same amount as 1000W PSUs... So - I am not sure what to say other than, if I am on a budget, I look for the CHEEPEST PSU that qualifies to my standards... - knowing the standards is more important than micro analizing 500/550 and 600 watt PSUs for their oh so slight differences, and when your on a budget, who really cares, as long as its a quility built and reputable company, bottom line is bottom line... and as I said, some of the "best" mid range PSUs go for the same or little less than quality 1000w PSUs... So - so.
On the other hand, insight as promissed into the i7 platform, more coverage of the multitude of systems as prommised would be nice, though I know its all very time consumming, and repetitive, because just when your done with one major review, an entire new platform is already on its way out! So, it kinda sucks, but thats why we come back and keep reading...
With so many full ATX PSU to choose from and most systems not built for gaming using under 300W, it seems there is still a gap in what many of us need.
Which mATX PSU can deliver, since their upper limits tend to be a lot closer to the peak load a system might place on it, and their construction often economized to their price-points not just the available space inside?
Speech recognition software sometimes gets it wrong and since Jarred was up all night he just wanted to finish up at some point. We'll make sure to correct it all.
Nicely done review. However I find it disappointing that an exhaustive PSU review leaves out such a major player as PC Power & Cooling. Yes, OCZ was represented and I know they now own, PCP&C, but the ModStream line is not from PCP&C. If the Silencer 500W had been included in your review, I think your awards would be very different.
There are reviews there, but it would be good if you could include PSUs you already reviewed in the conclusion to say how they measure up to the currently reviewed units.
Most people just don't know enough about PSUs to judge how good that PSU in the single review is compared to the ones in the round-up.
No details on whether the SATA power connectors are right-angle or straight. For each power supply it would be very useful to detail the distribution of right-angle vs straight.. even to the extent of picturing or sketching the cables. In many of the mid-sized or uATX cases in which these power supplies might be used, the hard-disks may overhang the motherboard components or might bump into the rear of a video card. Remember that the SATA hard-disk power-port is much closer to the motherboard and its mounted components than the 4-pin Molex on PATA units. A right-angle SATA power connector might make all the difference between a comfortable fit and having to purchase a 4-pin Molex to right-angle SATA power adapter. I have run into this problem several times with computer cases where the hard-disks are mounted cross-wise and with little clearance between the rear of the hard-disk and the side-cover. Also my latest experience of this problem was on a recent uATX build that required 3-disk storage. The clearance space between one of the hard-disks and the motherboard memory DIMMS required a right-angle SATA power-connector. I had to satisfy that requirement with a 4-pin Molex to right-angle SATA power adapter.... If I had known in advance how many right-angle SATA power connectors came with the power-supply, I could have ordered the adapter in advance.....
The Corsair HX520W Modular Power Supply has 2 modular SATA cables, each with one right-angle and one straight connector - a reasonable compromise.
Btw, the fact the Corsair HX520W was entirely missed from your 500-550W roundup is rather odd, with its high quality (HardOCP Review Gold Star, Dec 2007), 2-year-production quality history (now up to over 400 customer reviews on Newegg - 5 stars, uniquely unusual for a power-supply) It also has triple 18A max 12V outputs --- unlike those less expensive to manufacture with only one 12V rail and umpteem amps on that rail. The single-12V high-wattage power-supplies totally ignore Intel's SAFETY recommendation of a maximum of 20A per 12V output. An internal quasi-short - dendrite growth, fine metallic bits, loose wire-clippings etc - involving the 12V rail and with one of these 40-50amp 12V current power-supplies can potentially turn your PC instantly into a very handy radiant heater/fire-source.
Oops !!! MANY APOLOGIES to both you and Christopher. I was speed-reading the Introductory page and read the following :- "We have four units manufactured by Enhance, four more from Seasonic, two by Sirtec, one Enermax, and one Topower. " I did not realize that Christopher was referring there to the original power-supply OEMs and not the retail labels. It would have been nice to have a list of the actual retail model numbers of the 12 power-supplies on the intro page. As it was, I only read the first few reviews and quit before I got down as far as the Corsair..... Again, many apologies. Long day, late night reading, insufficient reading stamina....
First off, great job on the performance review part! The graphs are great and much easier to understand than the usual screenshots from the measuring software.
I'm a little disappointed by the acoustics part though. dB measuremeents are pretty much useless since they don't really reflect subjective sound perception. PSUs with "more" dBs will often be considered quieter, in fact, dB measurements don't reflect the ranking of PSUs that you will find on silentpcreview.com
Measurements in Sone would be much better, but I guess the testing equipment is somewhat expensive :(
Since you're also from Germany, wouldn't some kind of cooperation with PCGH or even c't be possible?
Something else that I'm missing here is a Be Quiet! unit, but I think they're pretty similar to the Tagans, are they not?
One more comment:
What happened to the fan speed/load curves?
Those were really useful fo judging acoustics. If you know the fan that was used in there then you can judge the subjective noise at a certain RPM pretty well.
I bookmarked this article because I want to have it around next time I'm shopping for computer parts. Unlike processors and similar components, where every extra dollar spent usually comes with a little more perforamnce, PSUs are an area where price and quality come apart. I want a stable, cool, QUIET PSU, and I want to pay as little as possible to have that. Every dollar I save getting a PSU that will do just what I need is another dollar I can spend on a video card. This article is going to help me build a better machine.
Any good PSU review need to include reliability test when two PSu are joined by soldiering the green cable (and one black).
It allows to use two cheap units as one more powerful one, saving lots of money for value overclockers. But is not ever safe. Not all power supplies are reliable when joined this way.
If the two PSU is bad, there are a risk of getting a burned (and costly) video card, or BSOD by electric instability.
But value overclockers take risks to save money, and spent scarce money in the right components.
That is the reason for which that hard to find and very valuable info is so useful.
Please, consider it next time you do a PSU review.
I'd like to see a few tests done that would show the variation between identical units. These powersupply builders rely on other manufacturers for the components, so the chances for a bad component to make it into a unit is a lot higher than for some other computer equipment.
That is a very good point. And it wouldn't be too difficult in terms of additional testing since only the major tests (ripple, voltage flux, etc.) would need to be tested.
I'm really upset with the Tuniq's poor showing. I built a system last month using the Tuniq after recommendation by Mr. Katzer in the comments section and had thought it would have performed much better. I ended up only paying $40 (if the $40 rebate actually comes in) which is about as low as you can get for a 550psu, but I would not have chosen it if this review had been available.
It seems that PSU reviews dominate the reviews here at AT lately. Where did all the memory and CPU shootouts go? What about comparing panel sizes and reviewing them?
I don't want to take anything anything away from this PSU review, it was excellent. Just give us more review variety!
DDR3 Roundup - 3/3 (nine sets, 1066~2000)
DDR2 Roundup - 3/10 (eleven sets, 800~1150)
Interspersed each week for the next month will be various motherboards in the under $150 price range, budget CPUs, storage (external, NAS, internal HDD/SSD), and even some GPU action showing what you get for under a $100 compared to integrated graphics. We just went through a major overhaul of our base test suites, start rolling out the new stuff next week.
This is easily the best presentation of material I've ever seen on Anandtech. Furthermore, it's a survey of mainstream components which is probably what 95% of your readership is going to buy. Those two things easily make this the best article I've ever seen on Anandtech.
As someone who does technical presentations all the time, I know how difficult it is to condense large amounts of data into easily understandable formats. You really did a fantastic job. Thank you, and I look forward to more articles.
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whpromo - Wednesday, March 11, 2009 - link
I am a bit confused on the BFG LS550 part number. There appears to be two different ones, BFGR550WLSPSU and BFGR550WLPSU, listed on the BFG website. The former is listed in some places on the BFG website as the single 12v rail as tested here, the latter the typical 12v quad rail that is the most common BFG Tech PSU configuration. BUT when I look at retailers listing the part number for the single rail version, it's specified as a quad rail configuration and even BFG website has it listed as that on the website at http://www.bfgstore.com/ProductDetails.asp?Product...">http://www.bfgstore.com/ProductDetails.asp?Product... So where is this single 12v rail version in the wild? Was it made just for AnanTech to test?jonnyGURU - Wednesday, May 13, 2009 - link
Typo. They're actually BOTH BFGR550WLSPSU. The old one is made by Fore Point and has four +12V rails. The new one is made by Enhance and has a single +12V rail. The Enhance built one is the one reviewed here. They both have the same topology and grade of components (the Enhance built one does have a few better quality capacitors than the Fore Point built one) and in some cases the new Enhance built one actually reviewed better than the older one when reviewed by the same person:NEW: http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReview...">http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReview...
OLD: http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReview...">http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReview...
OSJF - Wednesday, March 4, 2009 - link
Hallo Christoph,I just got Tagan's SuperRock 600W edition(EU/de). I can confirm it has indeed very stable voltages.
But it's not that quite as yours obviously was. I can't hear my Sapphire 4870 1024 Toxic at all but the SuperRock's makes a hum noise.
My three year old Tagan TG420-U01 is still way less noisy then this SuperPiece of a power supply :)
greetings from good old europe
OSJF
jmurbank - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
There is one very important thing that you miss in your test is what computer it will be powering. If it is an Intel system, the three power supplies that you choose are OK for low to low-mid setups. For an AMD system, it will not. The 5 volt and 3.3 volt rails need to have a combined wattage of 150 watts or more. Only power supply units that you tested are OCZ and Sunbeam that provides this power requirement. You are providing false reviews and people rely on this review have to think twice. There are significantly better power supplies at this wattage level that equals or exceeds the combined power requirement for 3.3 volt and 5 volt rails. Please next time select models that are up today's standards.A power supply unit that exceeds combined power requirement for 3.3 volt and 5 volt rails is the following.
Seasonic S12 Energy Plus SS-550HT
It does not work with European standards that requires over 80% of efficiency, but it makes just about any computer to power up with out any problems at a cheap price.
Christoph Katzer - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
What "AMD"-system we are talking about?jmurbank - Wednesday, February 25, 2009 - link
AMD Athlon processors and up.I have an AMD Athlon computer that has such requirement when I built it at the time. Also I had to recently replace the power supply in an HP computer that contains an AMD processor. The aged power supply was within the requirement. Majority of the motherboard manuals for AMD systems also states this requirement.
Christoph Katzer - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
"There is one very important thing that you miss in your test is what computer it will be powering."I am running the BFG LS-550 with the a Core i7-965 on an Asus P6T Deluxe with a Geforce 9800GX2 graphics card.
You can pretty much power up everything that fits the number of connectors ;)
v12v12 - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
Yeah I agree, the poster above is purely speculating and his post is riddled with conjecture. I've yet to see a system that wouldn't power up correctly with in that rigid spec or not. A 400/500/600W PSU etc... will power just about any modern system. <--- Notice how vague that is? But it still holds true, irregardless of the so-called "spec." Unless you're running well below the minimum REQUIRED power ratings, it's going to work buddy lol!Thank god PSU prices have started to drop to "reasonable" rates. No way in hell am I ever going to spend $100+ for a PSU unless I'm building a near-line/server machine. Luckily the gamer/addict fanboys have now priced themselves out of the common-sense market. Now we (less than zealous) can get back to building nice machines, w/o spending an arm and leg to power them with these (still) over sized square bricks called "PSUs." 2009 and we're still cramming in huge boxes with a bunch of wires surging out of them like snakes trying to escape a pit...
Lastly, Enhance has once again proven it's THE premier OEM, like I knew back in the E4300 days, while everyone else was fanboying hyped brands.
jmurbank - Wednesday, February 25, 2009 - link
Sure high powered power supplies that are under spec for the combined wattage for 3.3 volts and 5 volts will work for now, Can you guarantee four to five years from now. I can guarantee the unit that I suggested will work for five years.On AMD web site it saids "..Overall current usage limitation on the power supply should not exceed a combined system power output for the +5V and +3.3V outputs."
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResou...">http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Tec...es/0,,30...
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/SellAMDProduct...">http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Sel..._4458_35...
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResou...">http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/Tec...rces/0,,...
strikeback03 - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
Any idea if the fan makers plan to move on to the present and switch to SATA power connectors? I haven't used a Molex connector for anything other than a fan in a few years, and it is annoying to have to install a Molex harness just to run a fan or two.And on a related note, why does Antec use case fans which are only Molex powered? Wired to use motherboard headers is so much better, include an adapter like Cooler Master does if you think users want to run them off Molex.
mindless1 - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
Changing everything for the sake of change, thinking "present" SATA connectors would have any usefulness, is a bad idea. Change things when there is a good reason, only.How is it annoying to use a connector when you still have to with (what, different connector is no less?) any option, or did you plan on transmitting power with a laser beam? It makes no sense, this is very basic easy inexpensive standard blah blah blah.
Case fans often use the large molex connectors because a case manufacturer can't be assured how many fan headers a board may have or where those are. They could just put very long cables on the fans, but then somebody comes along and says long cables are untidy.
Ultimately you seem to be opposed to seeing wires, want everything invisible. Esthetically I agree but practically speaking none of these issues really matter to the operation of the system, just be sure the wires are secured out of the way of fan blades.
strikeback03 - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
I was pointing out that with the exception of fans, pretty much everything in the system which used to use Molex uses the SATA power connector now. No laser beams involved, Sata power cables for HDD and optical. The only place I have seen a Molex recently is on the occasional motherboard that uses it for additional power. I suggested that rather than maintain two connectors indefinitely, they migrate everything to one of them.And for the case fans, check a Cooler Master (others might do this, but CM is where I have seen it). They come with fans with motherboard fan header connections, and an adapter to use Molex instead of a header.
JPForums - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
I like the delta K chart, but I must ask, does it represent the temperature difference in Kelvins. Why not just use delta C since it is the same number and would be more consistent with how people (including yourself) typically measure temperature in computer systems. Also, while I do like the delta chart, I can always calculate my own deltas if I have the absolute temperatures. I would prefer some absolute temperature figures and then a delta chart if desired. It doesn't really matter if the exhaust temperature and the internal temperature are similar if the PSU puts out enough heat to boil water. Given the efficiency of these units, I doubt this is the case, but it would still be nice to know what the absolute temperatures of the exhaust and each heat sink is. Oh, and where did you measure the internal heat from?"The efficiency charts make one thing very clear: Seasonic and Enhance deliver kickass efficiency with their products."
I'm not sure where this fits in. There is no Enhance unit on the chart in question. Further, the Seasonic unit is not exactly at the upper end of efficiency in this chart. One might say it got its ass kicked by some of the units here. I ask that you avoid comments that seem this out of place in the future. We already have enough people spamming "Anandtech reviews are just advertisements for Company X" as it is. Don't encourage them.
Now that the negatives are out of the way, I have to say, this one of the best review format I've seen for a large number of PSUs. Comparison is pretty easy and intuitive. I still prefer the power efficiency curves used in single supply reviews, but for a large number of PSUs like in this round up, the chart you put up is much better.
On a side note:
Looking at the various amounts of ripple and noise on the rails of each power supply, I asked myself a few questions:
1) How much ripple can I take before if effects my system?
I think the spec is 12v < 120mVpp ripple and 5V/3.3V < 50mVpp ripple, but I'm wondering about differences in system stability if I decide to overclock my CPU, GPU, RAM, etc.
2) Does the quality of ripple make a difference? I.E. would you rather have sinusoidal ripple (Like BFG's 5V rail) or thin spikes (like Arctic Cooling's 5V rail)?
3) Assuming the noise is at most half the ripple, does it make a difference to system stability?
4) Assuming they are implemented correctly, can more phases on a motherboards VRMs make up for a PSU with higher ripple in comparison to a 3 phase board with a PSU that has low ripple? Alternately, how much voltage ripple actually gets to the processor, north bridge, etc.?
I'm not expecting a separate review or anything, but I'd be interested in your thoughts on these topics (objective or subjective).
Christoph Katzer - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
Thanks Mindless1 for that great explanation!As for the rest of the questions JPForums, I can use C next time of course. I just thought of using this to save space. I could include a plain table with the results of each heatsink and other temps but I am a fan of graphics you can understand instantly. Maybe I can think of another way when the tested PSUs are less. There will be three more roundups coming in spring: 620-650W, 850W, and 1200-1250W. Plenty occasions to make it better each time ;)
Enhance fits in that particular sentence because four of the units are made by Enhance and four by Seasonic. The meaning was that if you are looking for high efficiency you should look out for products that are made by one of those two companies regardless of what name is written on it...
JPForums - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
To be fair, I like the graphics as well and wouldn't want you to get rid of them as yours are very well done. I'd be happy if the hard data was in an excel sheet link in a sentence like "For absolute values, see this spreedsheet".I must have had a brain fart. I can see where you mention the units that use Enhance and Seasonic in the article. Sorry about that.
Can't wait for the upcoming articles.
mindless1 - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
1) Spec is (+-) 5%? 12V = 1.2Vpp, 5V = 0.5Vpp. Seems like a lot doesn't it? The thing is, any properly designed hardware being powered is designed to run stably within this range.Parts effected when overclocking are using (re)regulated power on their respective parts or motherboard, ripple from the PSU makes far less difference than you might suspect, so long as the minimal voltage isn't excessively low (excessive response time with changes in load, power state changes from CPU or GPU, etc, as often the case when a PSU barely has enough capacity for the load).
2) Sinusoidal or spikey don't in themselves matter, you still have an impedance and capacitance downstream at the powered parts, reregulation for most critical voltages, decoupling at the chips, etc.
3) What are you calling noise? There's switching noise, environmental/EMI/RF, digital switching noise, etc. The noise that effects a part the most is the noise that part produces itself. Given a theoretically perfect PSU with 0.00V ripple, you still have noise created in the system from the powered parts.
4) More phases in the VRM would reduce PSU ripple more, but these phases themselves create noise. Practically speaking, the fewer stages or slower each switches, the more capacitance you'll need per current. Either increases costs, has different layout/space factors, and a tradeoff of efficiency versus max power handling capability.
Until the PSU is performing much more poorly than you seem to be thinking about, the design of the VRM itself causes the issues, not minor differences from PSU supplying power to it (within the context mentioned previously, that the PSU at least doesn't have very slow response time).
If your concern is what to do to get the best o'c, the answer is better heatsinking to keep parts cooler, then with this addt'l thermal margin you have less restraints in giving the part a higher (average) voltage, meaning whatever the largest depressed voltage is, stays high enough to retain stability at the operational frequency. To this extent, a shorter spike depression would be better than a longer period sinusoidal depression at same voltage, merely because the shorter period means downstream capacitance is buffering better.
JPForums - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
Thanks for the explanations. I didn't realize that the VRMs would create so much noise. Since noise adds in quadrature and the oscilloscope graphs don't show nearly as much noise as ripple, the VRMs must put out nearly as much noise as the PSUs ripple to be comparable to the ripple.Does it really matter what noise I was talking about? I was mostly thinking about switching noise. Since the PSUs are fully encased, they shouldn't be very susceptible to background noise (I.E. there should be far more noise in the PSU case). The oscilloscope graphs show the noise from all the sources you mentioned. All of that noise is still on the line when it reaches what is powering it, so it doesn't make sense to me to distinguish between them.
Given what you were saying about critical circuits being reregulated and excessive response time with changes in load being a problem, I think more phases (faster response) would be of benefit up to a certain point. As you eluded to, fewer phases require more capacitance to make sure the voltage doesn't droop while switching between phases. Which leads to what you mentioned about fewer and/or slower stages requiring more capacitance per current. More capacitance slows the response of the circuit to load changes. However, switching from more phases causes more noise (apparently a lot). It would be important to make sure that this noise is kept as low as the voltage droop between changes. Do you agree with this assessment?
With modern boards I have been avoiding 3 phase VRMs, but I also don't really see the merits of the boards with more than 8 phases. I know this depends heavily only switching rate and capacitance as well, but I'd be interested in how many phases you think would be best (assume the switching rates, capacitances, and topologies currently implemented by manufacturers).
Thanks
Nickel020 - Sunday, February 22, 2009 - link
It seems that you missed posting the 12V Ripple & Noise screenshot for the Corsair HX520, any chance you could post it?From your graph it seems that the Corsair is quite a bit worse in the 12V department than many other PSUs here, would you say that this has a negative impact on overclocking?
just4U - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
Hate to nitpick, but I really do wish one of the more common Antec's was thrown into the mix (500Watt earthwatts ect) Moreso because they are considered common in many builds due to casing/psu combo's and it wouldn't be surprising to see them in many standard builds.Christoph Katzer - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
I'll have an Antec case review soon which came with an Earthwatts. Will test that one too of course.just4U - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
Excellent!! I am curious as to how those solutions compare to standalone "standouts". I think the days where we see some no name powersupply that isn't very good in systems (as a general rule) are gone. That's been replaced (in North America) now with seeing solutions by Antec, Fsp, ect as the standard. So the comparison's are of interest.vailr - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
Any idea when any "Gold certified" ~500W PSU's will be available (on Newegg, or another online vendor)?Such as:
Thermaltake W0338 TP-500AH3NCG 500W
Seasonic SS-550LT 550W
Channel Well PUK500V-G 500W
Discussed here:
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid...">http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid...
Christoph Katzer - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
I think we will see first units in summer.Mastakilla - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
I'm looking for a cheap 450W - 550W Powersupply (cheap but still a bit decent, around 50 euro), so I was really interested in this article...Unfortunatly the only PSU in pricerange, the Artic Cooling, is unfindable in the Benelux (EU). Also the next in price (Tagan Superrock), which actually is too expensive already, is unfindable here...
so I still don't know what to get
Kiijibari - Sunday, February 22, 2009 - link
Buy an Enermax 525W, they were tested earlier here on anandtech and are very good PSU.They should be available easily in Europe :)
cheers
Kiiji
Mastakilla - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
Thanks for the tip, but those enermaxes are again waaaaaaaay above budget (89+ euro!!)The Corsair CX400 is 43 euro
That Artic Cooling 550W is 68 euro (shipped from DE)
I'm looking for something in between... (around 50-55 euro)
like a decent 450-500W Powersupply...
MadMan007 - Wednesday, August 19, 2009 - link
Corsair VX450 or HX450 (we unfortunately do not get the HX450 in the States :( Sad because it's 80+ Bronze)Kiijibari - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
Sounds like you are looking for a (very) good *and* cheap PSU.That is imo impossible. You either get cheap China crackers or good, expensive ones.
Do you *really* need ~500W ?
If not then try the Enermax 425W. That is my last idea, otherwise I would suggest to raise your budget :)
cheers
Kiiji
Mastakilla - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
no, you're wrong...the Corsair CX400 apparently isn't that bad and is VERY cheap...
I'm willing to pay a little more for a little better, but it seems like paying a little more will only get me worse :(
Paying A LOT more does get better though, but then I'm over my budget for the pc i'm composing...
Christoph Katzer - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
Try Caseking.dehttp://www.caseking.de/shop/catalog/Netzteile/Arct...">http://www.caseking.de/shop/catalog/Net...0R-80Plu...
Mastakilla - Sunday, February 22, 2009 - link
thanks a lot for the tip, but after adding shipping costs, this is waaaaaaaaaay above my budget (68 euro)knowom - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
The XClio STABLEPOWER 500W really should have been included it's a great PSU and very silent it's also relatively inexpensive for the quality especially if you can find one on sale.orionmgomg - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
How many PSU reviews are you going to do?I know a good PSU is important, but the margins are so close - and for the most part the choice is very simple; OCZ, Cooler Master, Corsair, Ultra, Antec, etc, etc, etc...
Just give people a little list of what to look for, what’s new on the market and what your top 3 recommendations are.
Use the extra energy to dive further into the different i7 platforms, or give us some updates on TOP tier i7 systems with Uber Graphics solutions, we like to see and read about the over the top most powerful computer systems and gaming systems, not yet another review about mediocre low power PSUs...
As always, thanks for the info on the site, and for being one of my favorite tech update daily visits.
We want graphics reviews from YOU. (not the other guys...)
What i want to see is a i7 system OCed to hell running 3 GTX 285s, vs. quad sli (2xGTX295) vs. quad ATI (x24870x2)
Or other insight into the i7, or Geforce 9300/9400 or how much apple and the iphooled suck…
Snarks - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
i care, because most of us here can't afford a 3,000+ system, let alone be stupid enough to buy one.i am actually rather sick of these "uber" high platforms and never any midrange stuff like most of us use, what i would actually like to see is a e8400 with a 4870 or gtx260 compared to see what real world performance i will actually get, not some 1,000+ cpu with a 400+ graphics card.
orionmgomg - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
I see - your point is taken. There are other sites that have lots of reviews like this one, another site is fudzilla, guru3d, and toms hardware - but they dont have the same level of inteligence (for the most part) as Anandtech.I imagine if your looking for a mid range PSU, and your on a budget, some of these PSUs recommended here cost almost the same amount as 1000W PSUs... So - I am not sure what to say other than, if I am on a budget, I look for the CHEEPEST PSU that qualifies to my standards... - knowing the standards is more important than micro analizing 500/550 and 600 watt PSUs for their oh so slight differences, and when your on a budget, who really cares, as long as its a quility built and reputable company, bottom line is bottom line... and as I said, some of the "best" mid range PSUs go for the same or little less than quality 1000w PSUs... So - so.
On the other hand, insight as promissed into the i7 platform, more coverage of the multitude of systems as prommised would be nice, though I know its all very time consumming, and repetitive, because just when your done with one major review, an entire new platform is already on its way out! So, it kinda sucks, but thats why we come back and keep reading...
mindless1 - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
With so many full ATX PSU to choose from and most systems not built for gaming using under 300W, it seems there is still a gap in what many of us need.Which mATX PSU can deliver, since their upper limits tend to be a lot closer to the peak load a system might place on it, and their construction often economized to their price-points not just the available space inside?
tynopik - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
ok, so english might not be katzer's native language, but that's what editors are forComparison: PCI-E Cable Lengths - Arctic Cooling is only company to provide >>for<< PCI-E connectors.
> BFG LS-550 manages just 1.5% regulation - poor phrasing, sounds like that's a bad thing
> spend the fans faster -> spin
> which up to keep temperatures in check.
> which were some people is far and away
> pleased to present >>taken<< with our Bronze Editors' Choice award
Christoph Katzer - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Speech recognition software sometimes gets it wrong and since Jarred was up all night he just wanted to finish up at some point. We'll make sure to correct it all.JarredWalton - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Thanks - I think I got all of the typos (speechos) fixed now. It's pretty rough doing final edits at 3-4AM some times!AMDfreak - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Nicely done review. However I find it disappointing that an exhaustive PSU review leaves out such a major player as PC Power & Cooling. Yes, OCZ was represented and I know they now own, PCP&C, but the ModStream line is not from PCP&C. If the Silencer 500W had been included in your review, I think your awards would be very different.Christoph Katzer - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
You can find the review herehttp://www.anandtech.com/casecoolingpsus/showdoc.a...">http://www.anandtech.com/casecoolingpsus/showdoc.a...
There are tons of others in the Cases/Cooling/PSUs section you might want to check out.
Nickel020 - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
There are reviews there, but it would be good if you could include PSUs you already reviewed in the conclusion to say how they measure up to the currently reviewed units.Most people just don't know enough about PSUs to judge how good that PSU in the single review is compared to the ones in the round-up.
kilkennycat - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
No details on whether the SATA power connectors are right-angle or straight. For each power supply it would be very useful to detail the distribution of right-angle vs straight.. even to the extent of picturing or sketching the cables. In many of the mid-sized or uATX cases in which these power supplies might be used, the hard-disks may overhang the motherboard components or might bump into the rear of a video card. Remember that the SATA hard-disk power-port is much closer to the motherboard and its mounted components than the 4-pin Molex on PATA units. A right-angle SATA power connector might make all the difference between a comfortable fit and having to purchase a 4-pin Molex to right-angle SATA power adapter. I have run into this problem several times with computer cases where the hard-disks are mounted cross-wise and with little clearance between the rear of the hard-disk and the side-cover. Also my latest experience of this problem was on a recent uATX build that required 3-disk storage. The clearance space between one of the hard-disks and the motherboard memory DIMMS required a right-angle SATA power-connector. I had to satisfy that requirement with a 4-pin Molex to right-angle SATA power adapter.... If I had known in advance how many right-angle SATA power connectors came with the power-supply, I could have ordered the adapter in advance.....Christoph Katzer - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Quickly done, Akasa has the only angled SATA connectors and I Don't see that too often either...kilkennycat - Sunday, February 22, 2009 - link
Thanks for the reply.The Corsair HX520W Modular Power Supply has 2 modular SATA cables, each with one right-angle and one straight connector - a reasonable compromise.
Btw, the fact the Corsair HX520W was entirely missed from your 500-550W roundup is rather odd, with its high quality (HardOCP Review Gold Star, Dec 2007), 2-year-production quality history (now up to over 400 customer reviews on Newegg - 5 stars, uniquely unusual for a power-supply) It also has triple 18A max 12V outputs --- unlike those less expensive to manufacture with only one 12V rail and umpteem amps on that rail. The single-12V high-wattage power-supplies totally ignore Intel's SAFETY recommendation of a maximum of 20A per 12V output. An internal quasi-short - dendrite growth, fine metallic bits, loose wire-clippings etc - involving the 12V rail and with one of these 40-50amp 12V current power-supplies can potentially turn your PC instantly into a very handy radiant heater/fire-source.
strikeback03 - Monday, February 23, 2009 - link
Are you talking about this roundup? The Corsair is in there.kilkennycat - Tuesday, February 24, 2009 - link
Oops !!! MANY APOLOGIES to both you and Christopher. I was speed-reading the Introductory page and read the following :- "We have four units manufactured by Enhance, four more from Seasonic, two by Sirtec, one Enermax, and one Topower. " I did not realize that Christopher was referring there to the original power-supply OEMs and not the retail labels. It would have been nice to have a list of the actual retail model numbers of the 12 power-supplies on the intro page. As it was, I only read the first few reviews and quit before I got down as far as the Corsair..... Again, many apologies. Long day, late night reading, insufficient reading stamina....Nickel020 - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
First off, great job on the performance review part! The graphs are great and much easier to understand than the usual screenshots from the measuring software.I'm a little disappointed by the acoustics part though. dB measuremeents are pretty much useless since they don't really reflect subjective sound perception. PSUs with "more" dBs will often be considered quieter, in fact, dB measurements don't reflect the ranking of PSUs that you will find on silentpcreview.com
Measurements in Sone would be much better, but I guess the testing equipment is somewhat expensive :(
Since you're also from Germany, wouldn't some kind of cooperation with PCGH or even c't be possible?
Something else that I'm missing here is a Be Quiet! unit, but I think they're pretty similar to the Tagans, are they not?
That's all :)
Thanks again for the article!
Nickel020 - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
One more comment:What happened to the fan speed/load curves?
Those were really useful fo judging acoustics. If you know the fan that was used in there then you can judge the subjective noise at a certain RPM pretty well.
philosofool - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
I bookmarked this article because I want to have it around next time I'm shopping for computer parts. Unlike processors and similar components, where every extra dollar spent usually comes with a little more perforamnce, PSUs are an area where price and quality come apart. I want a stable, cool, QUIET PSU, and I want to pay as little as possible to have that. Every dollar I save getting a PSU that will do just what I need is another dollar I can spend on a video card. This article is going to help me build a better machine.marraco - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Any good PSU review need to include reliability test when two PSu are joined by soldiering the green cable (and one black).It allows to use two cheap units as one more powerful one, saving lots of money for value overclockers. But is not ever safe. Not all power supplies are reliable when joined this way.
If the two PSU is bad, there are a risk of getting a burned (and costly) video card, or BSOD by electric instability.
But value overclockers take risks to save money, and spent scarce money in the right components.
That is the reason for which that hard to find and very valuable info is so useful.
Please, consider it next time you do a PSU review.
drank12quartsstrohsbeer - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
I'd like to see a few tests done that would show the variation between identical units. These powersupply builders rely on other manufacturers for the components, so the chances for a bad component to make it into a unit is a lot higher than for some other computer equipment.7Enigma - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
That is a very good point. And it wouldn't be too difficult in terms of additional testing since only the major tests (ripple, voltage flux, etc.) would need to be tested.Even an N=2 would be a good quality check.
marc1000 - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
congrats for including Arctic Cooling and Akasa units. will ready more carefully later. cheers.7Enigma - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
I'm really upset with the Tuniq's poor showing. I built a system last month using the Tuniq after recommendation by Mr. Katzer in the comments section and had thought it would have performed much better. I ended up only paying $40 (if the $40 rebate actually comes in) which is about as low as you can get for a 550psu, but I would not have chosen it if this review had been available.Really disappointed.
Exar3342 - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
It seems that PSU reviews dominate the reviews here at AT lately. Where did all the memory and CPU shootouts go? What about comparing panel sizes and reviewing them?I don't want to take anything anything away from this PSU review, it was excellent. Just give us more review variety!
Gary Key - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
DDR3 Roundup - 3/3 (nine sets, 1066~2000)DDR2 Roundup - 3/10 (eleven sets, 800~1150)
Interspersed each week for the next month will be various motherboards in the under $150 price range, budget CPUs, storage (external, NAS, internal HDD/SSD), and even some GPU action showing what you get for under a $100 compared to integrated graphics. We just went through a major overhaul of our base test suites, start rolling out the new stuff next week.
crimson117 - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
What are you talking about? There's plenty of that kind of coverage...http://www.anandtech.com/guides/showdoc.aspx?i=347...">Holiday Memory Guide - several choice DDR2 and DDR3 modules are listed with OC results.
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?...">Phenom review, with lots of benchmarks comparing almost every current AMD and Intel CPU.
http://www.anandtech.com/displays/showdoc.aspx?i=3...">24" LCD Roundup is a little outdated, but monitor models don't change over as often as CPUs do.
Ditiris - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Christoph,This is easily the best presentation of material I've ever seen on Anandtech. Furthermore, it's a survey of mainstream components which is probably what 95% of your readership is going to buy. Those two things easily make this the best article I've ever seen on Anandtech.
As someone who does technical presentations all the time, I know how difficult it is to condense large amounts of data into easily understandable formats. You really did a fantastic job. Thank you, and I look forward to more articles.
homerdog - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Agreed, excellent article. Now give XClio some love!JarredWalton - Saturday, February 21, 2009 - link
LOL... funny you mention them, as my XClio PSU just bit the dust today. :-(lemonadesoda - Friday, February 20, 2009 - link
Excellent article. Keep up the thorough and objective (and structured) content! Top marks.