Here you can share your thoughts and opinions on Corsair's budget PSU. (-Warning, many images-)
I ordered one of these on afternoon of the 7/7/10 and it was on my doorstep the very next morning. Brilliant service as I've become accustomed to from OcUK.
As you can see, the PSU was packaged quite well and arrived in mint condition, a good start. Nothing worse than opening up a box to find your precious contents have been manhandled or dropped by the postie/courier.
The front of the box shows an image of the PSU and an 80 Plus certification, all presented in the usual attractive fashion in fitting with the rest of the Corsair PSU products.
The back is fairly standard, boasting a selection of features of the unit as well as mentioning the 3 year warranty that comes with it. Although a couple of years shorter than the normal warranties from Corsiar, it's still very respectable for a unit in this price range. One thing to note however, is that the European Corsair RMA centre is in the Netherlands, so shipping charges back there if it does fail can easily be touching £20, depending on method. That's more than half the cost of the PSU, so something to bear in mind. Having dealt with Corsair support, I can say their good reputation is deserved.
The side of the box details the connectors that the PSU sports. Pretty standard affair on paper:
1x 60cm 24 pin ATX (20 pin compatible)
1x 60cm 4+4 pin ATX 12V (splits in two for 4 pin motherboards)
1x 65cm PCI-E 6 pin
6x SATA, connectors at 45cm, 60cm and 75cm
6x 4 pin peripheral (or molex to most of us!) with connectors at 45cm, 60cm, 75cm
2x floppy at end of molex cables (90cm)
Notable is perhaps the inclusion of floppy power when next to nobody uses floppy disks. However, certain sound cards and even fan controllers use floppy power connectors, so they're still included. Also, the target market here isn't completely enthusiast (think low price), and so there may be a few seasoned users out there still saving to 3.5". 6 sata connectors should be plenty, perhaps even 2 too many, but it gives options. Just one PCI-E connector may disappoint some, however many graphics cards come with 2x molex to PCI-E, so this isn't a disaster, and with 400W of power you'd be ill advised to use too powerful a card (or cards) anyway.
This side of the box shows the more detailed power specifications. Note 30A (and a total of 360W max) on the 12V, which is a very large percentage of the total power available. Nothing much more interesting here.
Here you can see the whole package out of the box, including manual, black cable ties (to help hide that massive bundle of cables!), black screws, case badge, power cable and finally the unit itself. One thing I did note was that the bubble wrap that packs the PSU in the case felt like it had quite a static charge as I slid out the PSU. This isn't a problem as such, since the PSU case etc should all be earthed fine, but if you're quickly building a machine, make sure you're earthed too, and don't even think about using the bag for any other components. Anti-static bags are a must for any naked PCBs.
The rear of the unit itself is fairly normal, a label just in case we forgot which model it is and a rocker power switch (something often missing on cheap generic units). There's some familiar looking components in the inside there.
Here you can see the whole unit, complete with 120mm fan (model is ADDA AD1212MB-A71GL, a popular PSU fan for many higher end manufacturers), which is rated at 38 dB @2050RPM, though in reality is very quiet, and thermally controlled).
With the cables undone, you can see that there's plenty of length (as detailed above) to play with. This may be somewhat of a double edged sword in very basic systems, as there's a lot more cable to hide than some cheaper units. The braiding is good, and goes all the way into the unit, if a little loose on the cables. The molex connectors have arches on both sides which can be pushed in for easy release from devices. This is a nice addition at this price point, and I for one wish all PSUs had these as I've had to painfully extract more tight molex plugs than I can dare count over the years.
One final shot illustrates best the feel of the PSU. Compared to your run of the mill sub £40 unit, this one oozes quality. A lot of this is probably to do with the excellent design borrowed from Seasonic's S12II, albeit with several external (and indeed internal) modifications by Corsair, which reaches an average of around 84% efficiency according to various internet sources. This isn't the best (this PSU is now around a year old now in it's Corsair form, the design much older besides), but for the overall wattage that's not much wasted leccy, and for the money you're getting an awesome quality piece of kit. I can't see why anyone wouldn't buy one of these for a budget machine, or even to replace faulty generic units. This model can output a sustained true 400W, I challenge anyone to find a generic '400W' unit that can match that. In fact, if you're the type who shops on the high st, you'd barely be saving any money by going down the cheap generic route when the Corsair is this well priced. It really seems like brilliant value for money, and many of us are aware of the pitfalls of using cheap PSUs. I just today wrote off a machine myself because of a poor PSU damaging the motherboard, and it isn't the first time, nor will it be the last.
So far, my first impressions of this unit are extremely good. Once it's properly installed into a machine I can comment more on performance, noise, ease of installation etc. Of course I welcome any further input from anyone else using this model, so discuss away. I'm happy to answer any questions when I can too. Hopefully the information so far can help someone with their purchase.
I ordered one of these on afternoon of the 7/7/10 and it was on my doorstep the very next morning. Brilliant service as I've become accustomed to from OcUK.
As you can see, the PSU was packaged quite well and arrived in mint condition, a good start. Nothing worse than opening up a box to find your precious contents have been manhandled or dropped by the postie/courier.
The front of the box shows an image of the PSU and an 80 Plus certification, all presented in the usual attractive fashion in fitting with the rest of the Corsair PSU products.
The back is fairly standard, boasting a selection of features of the unit as well as mentioning the 3 year warranty that comes with it. Although a couple of years shorter than the normal warranties from Corsiar, it's still very respectable for a unit in this price range. One thing to note however, is that the European Corsair RMA centre is in the Netherlands, so shipping charges back there if it does fail can easily be touching £20, depending on method. That's more than half the cost of the PSU, so something to bear in mind. Having dealt with Corsair support, I can say their good reputation is deserved.
The side of the box details the connectors that the PSU sports. Pretty standard affair on paper:
1x 60cm 24 pin ATX (20 pin compatible)
1x 60cm 4+4 pin ATX 12V (splits in two for 4 pin motherboards)
1x 65cm PCI-E 6 pin
6x SATA, connectors at 45cm, 60cm and 75cm
6x 4 pin peripheral (or molex to most of us!) with connectors at 45cm, 60cm, 75cm
2x floppy at end of molex cables (90cm)
Notable is perhaps the inclusion of floppy power when next to nobody uses floppy disks. However, certain sound cards and even fan controllers use floppy power connectors, so they're still included. Also, the target market here isn't completely enthusiast (think low price), and so there may be a few seasoned users out there still saving to 3.5". 6 sata connectors should be plenty, perhaps even 2 too many, but it gives options. Just one PCI-E connector may disappoint some, however many graphics cards come with 2x molex to PCI-E, so this isn't a disaster, and with 400W of power you'd be ill advised to use too powerful a card (or cards) anyway.
This side of the box shows the more detailed power specifications. Note 30A (and a total of 360W max) on the 12V, which is a very large percentage of the total power available. Nothing much more interesting here.
Here you can see the whole package out of the box, including manual, black cable ties (to help hide that massive bundle of cables!), black screws, case badge, power cable and finally the unit itself. One thing I did note was that the bubble wrap that packs the PSU in the case felt like it had quite a static charge as I slid out the PSU. This isn't a problem as such, since the PSU case etc should all be earthed fine, but if you're quickly building a machine, make sure you're earthed too, and don't even think about using the bag for any other components. Anti-static bags are a must for any naked PCBs.
The rear of the unit itself is fairly normal, a label just in case we forgot which model it is and a rocker power switch (something often missing on cheap generic units). There's some familiar looking components in the inside there.
Here you can see the whole unit, complete with 120mm fan (model is ADDA AD1212MB-A71GL, a popular PSU fan for many higher end manufacturers), which is rated at 38 dB @2050RPM, though in reality is very quiet, and thermally controlled).
With the cables undone, you can see that there's plenty of length (as detailed above) to play with. This may be somewhat of a double edged sword in very basic systems, as there's a lot more cable to hide than some cheaper units. The braiding is good, and goes all the way into the unit, if a little loose on the cables. The molex connectors have arches on both sides which can be pushed in for easy release from devices. This is a nice addition at this price point, and I for one wish all PSUs had these as I've had to painfully extract more tight molex plugs than I can dare count over the years.
One final shot illustrates best the feel of the PSU. Compared to your run of the mill sub £40 unit, this one oozes quality. A lot of this is probably to do with the excellent design borrowed from Seasonic's S12II, albeit with several external (and indeed internal) modifications by Corsair, which reaches an average of around 84% efficiency according to various internet sources. This isn't the best (this PSU is now around a year old now in it's Corsair form, the design much older besides), but for the overall wattage that's not much wasted leccy, and for the money you're getting an awesome quality piece of kit. I can't see why anyone wouldn't buy one of these for a budget machine, or even to replace faulty generic units. This model can output a sustained true 400W, I challenge anyone to find a generic '400W' unit that can match that. In fact, if you're the type who shops on the high st, you'd barely be saving any money by going down the cheap generic route when the Corsair is this well priced. It really seems like brilliant value for money, and many of us are aware of the pitfalls of using cheap PSUs. I just today wrote off a machine myself because of a poor PSU damaging the motherboard, and it isn't the first time, nor will it be the last.
So far, my first impressions of this unit are extremely good. Once it's properly installed into a machine I can comment more on performance, noise, ease of installation etc. Of course I welcome any further input from anyone else using this model, so discuss away. I'm happy to answer any questions when I can too. Hopefully the information so far can help someone with their purchase.
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