SilenX 400W PSU Review - Putting the SilenX to the Test
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This power supply was put into my main rig, which consists of the following pertinent bits: - Intel 2.4C processor
- Soltek 86SPE-L "Springdale" motherboard
- 2x512MB Infineon PC3200
- ATi Radeon 8500LE
- Silicon Image PCI SATA Raid controller
- 2x60GB IBM 120GXP hard drives
- 10GB Fujitsu hard drive
- 3x92mm Sunon fans
- 3x92mm Panaflo fans
- Sony 40x12x40 CDRW
- Pioneer 106S DVD
- 2x Intel Pro/100 PCI LAN cards
- 2x CCFL's
For comparison numbers, I did all testing on my Enermax 431W PSU as well. The system was overclocked to 280MHz FSB, or 3.36GHz for the length of testing to increase the load on the power supply.
My testing routine consisted of creating a Divx version of a recorded episode of "Trailer Park Boys," while making a CD copy of The Tragically Hip album "Road Apples," while listening to an MP3 playlist consisting of Blue Rodeo's "Greatest Hits" album. I figure this should have put an appropriate load on the system by running the CPU at 100%, while exercising the disk subsystem and optical drives. All fans were running at full voltage as well. Since I know better than to trust BIOS hardware monitoring or Windows based software to tell me the voltages of the various rails, I busted out a trusty Canadian Tire digital multi-meter. Voltages for the 12V and 5V lines were taken from the furthest molex connector relative to the PSU, and the 3.3V from the ATX connector.
Testing the 3V line, the results for the SilenX were identical under both load and idle. On the 5V line, however, there was a slight variance between load and idle that my multi-meter picked up.
The picture on the left is the idle voltage; the one on the right is the load. This variance is pretty much insignificant.
And now onto the 12V line, the one I was worried about.
Obviously, there was nothing to fear. A bit of variance between idle and load, however they were solidly at those values once the transition was complete, with only a slight fluctuation of +/- 0.01V under load from that 12.23V value. Considering this isn't the world's greatest multi-meter, this could be due to experimental error.
The results can also be seen in the chart below:
It's pretty obvious that the voltages were all above spec for both power supplies. Even a rather heavy load on these units did not seem to faze them. Neither had much variance in the steady state values to speak of. Just what you would expect out of a high end PSU.
Next: Conclusion >>
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