How to Choose A Power supply

this is a thread that i made for another forum and i decide to post it here because nilpo wanted people to post more content
First off, I have to thank Komet (he's not on this forum)
and Snod blatter
This is the PSU thread for all of you who want/need to buy a new Power Supply.
The first thing you want to notice, when you see on a videocard box or something , that the psu requirements are like 450watts with 34amps on the 12v rail. It doesnt mean that the card needs all that
for the graphics card itself, its normally for the entire system that you have.


Calculating your minimum power needs for a power supplie
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Go here to calculate your wattage needs:
Power Supply Wattage Calculator

The point of having more than one rail for the +12v is thus:
Manufacturers did the dual,triple etc rail because having lots of amps (like say more than 34a with 70% efficiency could blow up the transistors), so they made the dual rails to balance the load on the transistors.
see how much you need and add about 35-50watts and you will be able to see how much wattage you will need.
Good power supply brands(the ones that people know):
---------------------------------------------------------
Seasonic
Antec
Enermax Liberty
Fortron (FSP Group)
OCZ
PC Power & Cooling
Silverstone
Tagan
Sparkle
Scythe
Zippy
Emacs

The crappy ones:
---------------------------------------------------------
Q-Tec(all over ebay)
Powmax & Diablotek(both made from Leadman)
Powerup(more like power down)
ATADC
JPAC
Atrix
Just PC
any generic psu
Logisys
Raidmax(cheap ones)
Ultra
Xion
Turbo links (the ones that comes in the Aspire cases)
Okia
Apex
Deer
Allied
Achieve
Allied
Codegen
Demon
Devanni
Dynapower
Eagle
Epower
L&C
Linkworld
MGE
Turbo
X-superalien
X-treme
Magna

The OK ones:
---------------------------------------------------------
Cooler Master
Enermax
Thermaltake (the cheapest ones,the costy ones are much better, but have weak +12 rails)
Aerocool (not bad at all)
Sunbeam
Rosewill
Kingwin
epower/tagan(the tagan series)
TOPOWER
Channelwell

Power Supplies that no one knows of, but are good:
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Super Flower
In Win (power man series, made with fortron parts)
Sytrin Nextherm
Enhance
I-Star

Between ok and crap:
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Aspire(rated at high wattage with low rails and a bit low on the voltages)
Enlight
Coolmax
Rosewill


Problems with some good psus out there:
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Antec: a little low on the voltages on rails
Enermax: they tend to die instantly without any unstability before
Power PC & Cooling: Real loud!
Sunbeam: (Sunbeam NUUO), fans may develop noisy/raspy bearings.


Find The real maker of your Power Supply :
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Like for example, if it says its an antec it doesnt mean its made from antec.
So i found a list on www.extremeoverclocking.com of some popular psu numbers
so on the psu sticker theres a kind of backward RU with a little code under it that starts with a E
so i got this L&C psu it says:

RU
e164554
so on the list it says it made from L&c

The list of popular psus:
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E104405 Sea Sonic Electronics Co Ltd
E104407 Leadman Electronics Co Ltd
E119368 Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co Ltd
E126556 Taiwan Youngyear Electronics Co Ltd
E130843 Topower Computer Industrial Co Ltd
E131500 Pc Power & Cooling Inc
E131881 Delta Electronics Inc
E134014 Enermax Technology Corp
E134129 Powertech Systems Co Ltd
E138711 Moretec Electronics Industrial Co Ltd
E141182 Morex Information Enterprise Co Ltd
E141400 Seventeam Electronics Co Ltd
E142789 Nidec Potrans Corp
E143709 Hipro Electronics Co Ltd
E143756 Zippy Technology Corp
E144195 Sirtec International Co Ltd
E147055 Mapower Electronics Co Ltd
E156513 Power-Win Technology Corp
E161451 Channel Well Technology Co Ltd
E161557 Fortrex Electronic Co Ltd
E161936 Nipron Co Ltd
E164554 L & C Technology Inc
E166947 Enhance Electronics Co Ltd
E172499 Win-Tact Electronics Corp
E175472 Fore Point Industrial Ltd
E175856 Delta Electronics Inc
E176105 Antec Inc
E176239 Etasis Inc
E178102 Jou Jye Electronic Co Ltd
E178768 Wintech Electronics Corp
E181356 Shenzhen Chi Yuan Industrial Co Ltd
E185650 King Case Industrial Co Ltd
E186010 Atng Power Co Ltd
E190414 Fsp Group Inc
E191395 Delta Electronics (Thailand) Public Co Ltd
E193726 Ablecom Technology Inc
E193807 Powertech Systems Co Ltd
E199068 Delta Electronics Inc
E199442 Heroichi Electronic Co Ltd
E199529 Macron Power Technology Ltd
E203196 Deer Computer Co Ltd
E211481 Codegen Technology Co Ltd
E217431 Delta Electronics Inc
E242429 Super flower and TTGI
E243823 OCZ Technology
E313881 Delta Electronics Inc

Measuring voltages on psu rails :
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this is a how to measure voltage rails to see if your psu is giving correct votages. if the voltages are too low your system could be unstable and if it is to high the parts could die faster.
im taking this article off a devhardware thread (Devhardware Forum) it was made by madhyena.(yeah i stole some of your pictures sorry)
yes some motherboards out there can measure rails and you can see them with speed fan but they are not always accurate. so with this test you will be sure if its giving the correct voltage.

NOOB CAUTION :
if you are a total noob i do not recommend doing this because if you short something out, it could damage your psu.


ok thats with what connectors you'll be measuring rails, now if you dont know how to use a multimeter well i dont think your supposed to have one.


now to measure the voltages set your multimeter to 20 , put the black wire in a ground in the molex or mobo connector(in a black wire) and the red in the voltage wire you will be measuring and the multimeter will give you the voltage
so boot your comp and measure the voltages in post,windows loading,idleing,and gaming and if there too low or too high i recommand you to change your psu.

motherboard :

now to measure curent on the motherboard connector, do it like this :


a molex :



ok these are the voltages that your supposed to have between the minimum and the maximum


power supply suggestions
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Cheap range :
1.IN WIN PowerMan 410 watts 39.99$
Link
2.Fortron 400watts pci-e ready 41.50$(good choice)
link
3.Antec smartpower 350watts 44.99$
link

Mid range
1.Fortron 500watts pci-e ready 89.99$
Link
2.Schythe 450watts 83.00$(good buy)
Link
3.Enermax noisetaker 485watts 74.99$
Link

High end
1.Seasonic 600watts SLI ready 159.99$
Link
2.PC Power & Cooling sli ready 510watts 229.99(good buy)
Link
3.OCZ 700watts sli ready 174.99$
Link

SLI Mid range
1.Enermax All In One Noisetaker 600watts 129.99$
Link
2.Antec NeoPower 550watts 118.00$(good choice)
Link
3.Fortron 600watts 139.99$(great choice)
Link

SLI High end
1.ISTAR USA 215.00$
Link
2. PC Power & Cooling 510watts 229.99
Link

Crossfire
Mushkin 650watts 209.99$
Link



i'm open to suggestions and if you want to add some psu's in there well tell me.

I like it, definitely going on my bookmark list for when I buy a PSU or suggest one.

What about "APEX" PSUs? I've got a link to one I might get.

if it helps

That "APEX" is made by Allied, who are the same as Deer. Stay away at all costs. Seriously.

Mages - Add Allied, Deer and APEX to the "crappy ones" list....

Apex isn't on that list, theres a chance they use someone else's parts.

On what list?

Sticked thread.

@mages: Maybe you should talk to pandaking and try and merge his thread with yours so we can have one comprehensive list of PSUs?

Anyway, excellent job nonetheless!

-Psus added

yeah last night i was thinking about that,but i dont think i have the time now because today i got some party and sunday im leaving for a week at motocross camp .

thanks, how'd ya find out that apex was crappy? That PSU got good reviws on the egg.

internet, i wouldnt trust new egg reviews too much, looked at the internet and i see that they are low powered and most of them die in less than 1year.
EDIT: added some psu's

Magna should be added to the crap list - unstable 3.3v rail

EDIT: E number 'E242429' is a Super Flower PSU.

It's also a TTGI number.. heh.

Found out that Apex is crap by the Allied part in the name of the category. The AL at the beginning of the part name also makes it Allied. And Allied are crap...

I once had a Magna unit, but it died in about 3 weeks of use powering my old Tualatin build... I wish I'd kept it, as then I could see who made it. If you've got one, jazzy, what's the UL number on it?

added some psu suggestions.

How is Enermax in the "OK ones" list and the Enermax Liberty (a specific PSU) in the "Good ones" list? I'd put Enermax in the good list and take it out of okay. I've had nothing but good experiences with Enermax for the past five years since 350W PSUs were awesome...

And just one last innacuracy which I found. Right before the image that shows how to measure the 3.3V line your said "how to measure the current. It is voltage. Not too important, but it could be misleading, considering that people reccommend to have at least 20A on the 12V line, etc.

Great sticky, good job

The Enermax Liberty is indeed an awesome PSU, if a tad pricey. However, your average run-of-the-mill Enermax is not actually that great... they're pretty damn good, but they're not the greatest. Enermax used to rate their older PSU's at temperatures of 0*C, thus in a case they never lived up to their wattage claims...

The newer ones are better though, and the Liberty is the best of them all. Thus, having the Liberty in the same category of PCP&C and Seasonic and the like seems right to me, and having your average Enermax in the same category as Topower/Tagan/Channelwell also seems right to me. People don't generally have problems with any of those, either...