PSU review including blue storm and Ultra-X

[BeerCan]

http://www.trustedreviews.com/article.aspx?head=64&page=2279
Good article. Some surprises in here. Although there are a lot of PSU we can't get in America. I only wish it had a little more. One thing, it should answer all questions about the Ultra-X :) Even more disappointingly, after about one minute at full load the X-Connect blew up.

[schismspeak]

I knew those xconnects were no good, thanks for the link.

[Mdogs444]

It didn't perform that badly in comparison with alot of other expensive power supplies. The only downside was the full load on the 12V rail....but that could just be 1 faulty unit. Im not a huge fan of their quality...but for the price - the looks & functionality take the cake. Sure, the FSP perfomed better....but anyone who buys an Ultra is NOT buying it for the soul purpose of a top notch functioning power supply.....

[Ice Czar]

another article worth reading

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/other/display/psu-methodology.html

specifically the crossload section (starts on page 13)

there are few enthusiast sites even able to approach reviewing a PSU
the best are Mike Chin (http://www.silentpcreview.com/section4.html) spcr
Lee Garbutt (http://www.leesspace.com/Published_reviews.htm) (various sites)
and Oleg Artamonov (now a Xbit, but also some other sites)

one of thses days someone is going to get a full blown Chroma (http://www.chromaate.com/english/company/detail.asp?gid=3) or FatAuto (http://www.fastauto.com.tw/frame/e-products.htm) stack and start to do comprehensive testing, till then these guys are the best Ive found and at least understand their limitations and the spec, which is more than can be said for 99% of the "reviewers" out there :rolleyes:

[schismspeak]

It didn't perform that badly in comparison with alot of other expensive power supplies. The only downside was the full load on the 12V rail....but that could just be 1 faulty unit. Im not a huge fan of their quality...but for the price - the looks & functionality take the cake. Sure, the FSP perfomed better....but anyone who buys an Ultra is NOT buying it for the soul purpose of a top notch functioning power supply.....
Thats right all people really care about is it's looks, it is just average, MaxPCMag gave it a 3 I believe, though the system they used it on had a ton of stuff, I bet any of the psu's that are recommended on these forums by me and others that know(atleast to some extent) about powers supplies, would of done just fine.(or did, as I dont recall all the psu's tested by them) Two bad reviews so far, there can only be more, I really wish ultra or whoever makes them proves me wrong in the longterm, but I don't think that is going to happen. I predict people will have problems with these down the road.

[dicecca112]

Thats right all people really care about is it's looks, it is junk, MaxPCMag gave it a 3 I believe, though the system they used it on had a ton of stuff, I bet any of the psu's that are recommended on these forums by me and others that know(atleast to some extent) what they speak of, would of done just fine.(or did, as I dont recall all the psu's tested by them)

This is not the first review where the X-Connect blew up. It caught fire in the MaxPC Mag review too I believe.

[schismspeak]

This is not the first review where the X-Connect blew up. It caught fire in the MaxPC Mag review too I believe.

Hehe, your quote is now wrong since I edited it to be more fair, I didn't know it blew up or anything for them, I just thought they had stability problems because of voltage flutcuations, i'll have to try and find the review quoted.(Maybe they have it on their site now.:rolleyes: )

[Oklahoma Wolf]

till then these guys are the best Ive found and at least understand their limitations and the spec, which is more than can be said for 99% of the "reviewers" out there :rolleyes:

Amen on that - Tom's just went out and upgraded their load testers, but it remains to be seen if they'll actually put them to good use. Been a while since they did any PSU testing, and even then it was little more than loading the PSU's down and seeing how far they went before shutting down or blowing up.

There are way too many sites out there putting up reviews of a PSU based on little more than a screenshot of MBM and a paragraph gushing about how nice it looks. I've seen a couple that bragged about using a DMM, which is a little better, but then went ahead and used MBM anyway. The sites/reviewers you listed are about the only ones I frequent for PSU reviews. I'd like to see Mike over at SPCR add ripple testing, but at the moment I think his methodology is the best of all of them so far. X-bit has a pretty good setup there too though - can't wait to see them put it to use.

[Ice Czar]

That is the main flaw I see with Mike's Test proceedure as well
Lee Garbut turns in some good AC Ripple work
and the sooner oleg get a database of crossloading charts done the better, man will that be useful

hell its useful now when I have to explain why someone has a POWmax or Deer that is running their rig perfectly, its loaded withion the Green, stray outside that, or throw it a curveball with variable VAC and watch it burn :p

If you couldnt tell my home forum is down today, and Im having a "fun day" :p

Id also like someone to start testing EM Fields with all these damn window PSUs
think there would be some suprises, of course they obey the inverse square law, and the typical mounting location is pretty far away from data cables and components

[Oklahoma Wolf]

Just saw a roundup over at X-Bit with an Antec, Tagan, and two OCZ's... I'm really impressed with Oleg's reviews :)

The crossloading charts will indeed be very useful. Dunno about EM field testing... I don't really care about flashy PSU's myself so I'm not sure I'd find that useful for myself. Probably lots of other people would though.

I'd like to see a few other manufacturers get behind the independant regulation designs... I can only imagine how formidable Fortron would be if they added their reputation for build quality to that technology.

While I'm thinking about it, I'd also like to see more reviewers pay attention to the way these are put together and inspect them physically to see that all solder joints are well done, all components are decent quality, and things of that nature. The OCZ units for example are very impressively designed, as the X-Bit reviews show, but Topower still doesn't quite seem at the top of the reliability game yet. Oleg's own crossload charts of the 520w indicate to me his review sample was having some issues, and I'd like to know why exactly.

Speaking of Deer, did you see Oleg's chart of the L&C in that article? Amusing in a way how badly it did.

[schismspeak]

If you couldnt tell my home forum is down today, and Im having a "fun day" :p
Well maybe you could post a little more often, we need all the knowledge we can get. :) Your links and opinions on reviewers are appreciated.

[Ice Czar]

well I'll try, generally Im pretty busy keeping the peace
Im one of Kyle's minions :p

[BeerCan]

I like SPCR myself. Pretty much what I relied on before I started forming my own opinion :) Its evident their influence on me because I am a Seasonic fanboy.

I realized early that the PSU is one of the most important and the most overlooked items in a PC. I was frustrated early on at the lack of credible reviews out there. I don't mean for the o/c community either.

I used to build whitebox pc's and often would get a run of "bad" psu. Let me tell you that can wipe out your profit margin rather quickly. So I started doing my own impromptu testing. A little science and a little emperical data. 1 of my first lessons? Stay away from deer :D 2nd was eagle. I ended up using enhance and sparkle/fsp.

Right now I probably have 8 psu from about 5 different companies actually working (good comapnies) and I have a closet full of what i consider crap. Right now its mostly enlights and eagles.

I look forward to some really good posts here on PSU's. For some strange reason I find them quite facinating.

Ahh well

[Oklahoma Wolf]

Stay away from deer :D 2nd was eagle.

Eagle is one of Deer's aliases ;)

Forgot who makes Enlight, if I ever knew. I probably should hang out more on other parts of OCForums, but I'm too fascinated myself with PSU technology. Outside this subforum, I practically have no life anymore :D

[bobburn]

This is not the first review where the X-Connect blew up. It caught fire in the MaxPC Mag review too I believe.

not even. In the maxpc review it simply failed because its 12v rail was at 12.5 something or another. Nice try. I burnt in my pc for about 72 hours and my psu never "blew up". In fact, my 12v rail started at 12.05 and dropped to 12.01, wow so bad.

[schismspeak]

well I'll try, generally Im pretty busy keeping the peace
Im one of Kyle's minions :pOh ok, no problem I can understand you being pretty busy then lol, I know ours are, have fun! :burn:

[Ice Czar]

Oh I'll definately be around, there arent many dedicated PSU forums about
and all sorts of information can be had, each has its own take on things
like at spcr, where the objective is to run it tight and lean, far closer to the edge than Im used to

I got into power supplies early running enough HDDs in one box to brownout the local grid when I spin em up :p

I was lucky I dont have a closet of junk supplies, the guy that recommended me a supply for my first computer (which I built) set me up with the old Antec PP403X
Ive still got it pulling duty, pretty much have stuck with Zippy, Ablecom (Supermicro rackmount cases) Antec, Topower, Fortron and PCP&C

so I dont really have any dead supplies :p
But Ive a wonderful collection of older Redundant supplies
all the way back to an Antec AT 1+1 I picked up off ebay

[Oklahoma Wolf]

I was lucky I dont have a closet of junk supplies, the guy that recommended me a supply for my first computer (which I built) set me up with the old Antec PP403X
Ive still got it pulling duty, pretty much have stuck with Zippy, Ablecom (Supermicro rackmount cases) Antec, Topower, Fortron and PCP&C

so I dont really have any dead supplies :p


I have the Channel Well CWT-420ATX12, which is the OEM equivalent of the Antec PP412X and a redesign of yours... I would suggest popping the top off and inspecting it for bulging/leaking caps. CWT models of this vintage are known for using some of those bad caps from the electrolyte scandal a couple years back. On the bright side, CWT told me I could use caps with slightly higher values to replace the oddball ones that are failing in mine. Mine is out of service until I stop being lazy and replace the 3 bad ones in there, but is still running quite well.

BTW - feel free to help me talk more people around here into giving Zippy a try... not enough enthusiasts have heard of them ;)

[Ice Czar]

my PP403X predates the "caps" scandal by about 2 years
the incorrectly stolen recipe was still safely ensconced in Japan when it was made ;)
even more suprising, Im still using an Abit KR7A :p
one of the good ones, no sign of any bad caps Im watching a DVD with it right now

re Zippy
Its sort of strange how a company so well respected in the enterprise market is so unknown in the enthusiast market, but not that suprising given the typical inflated claims, bells and whistles that segment displays

[Oklahoma Wolf]

my PP403X predates the "caps" scandal by about 2 years
the incorrectly stolen recipe was still safely ensconced in Japan when it was made ;)

lol - you're probably going to have a hard time waiting for that one to die then... I have an 11 year old CWT 235w unit that's still powering a K6-2 system quite well. Bad caps aside, CWT units can last a long time indeed.