PSU Tier List [OLD]

[Dabombinable]

Just out of curiosity, just how well would a VS650 hold up under a cross load (more used on the 5+3.3V rails than the 12V rail)?

[STRMfrmXMN]

6 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

Just out of curiosity, just how well would a VS650 hold up under a cross load (more used on the 5+3.3V rails than the 12V rail)?

An old group-regulated one? Poorly. A newer one? Probably not as horribly. Why, what are you powering?

[Dabombinable]

3 hours ago, STRMfrmXMN said:

An old group-regulated one? Poorly. A newer one? Probably not as horribly. Why, what are you powering?

After I replace it I was going to see if it's 120W combined across the 5 and 3.3V rails was enough to power my dual s370 motherboard (non overclocked), with a far lighter load on the 12V rail in the form of a Geforce FX5500 (or lower power Geforce 6200A) and a few HDD+ODD.

[S James]

Cooler Master MWE 550W Power Supply (MPW-5502-ACABW) - http://www.coolermaster.com/powersupply/80-plus/mwe-bronze-550/
On which tier does it fall under? Is it good for a build with GTX 1060 6GB + i5 8400? 

[seon123]

18 minutes ago, S James said:

Cooler Master MWE 550W Power Supply (MPW-5502-ACABW) - http://www.coolermaster.com/powersupply/80-plus/mwe-bronze-550/
On which tier does it fall under? Is it good for a build with GTX 1060 6GB + i5 8400? 

With a 1060, you should be looking at a tier 1-3 PSU. The MWE 550W is optimistically tier 4, most likely lower. There aren't any reviews of it that I could find, so probably closer to tier 6-7. 

Don't cheap out on the PSU, get a decent one. What country do you live in and what's your budget?

[S James]

1 minute ago, seon123 said:

With a 1060, you should be looking at a tier 1-3 PSU. The MWE 550W is optimistically tier 4, most likely lower. There aren't any reviews of it that I could find, so probably closer to tier 6-7. 

Don't cheap out on the PSU, get a decent one. What country do you live in and what's your budget?

Hello.
Which one would you pick?
1. Corsair CX Series CX450 450 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified ATX PSU 

2. Corsair VS Series VS650 650W High Performance Power Supply

3. Corsair VS Series VS550 550W High Performance Power Supply

I have been recommended the first one. I only need one that can help in overclocking the GTX 1060 6GB GPU only.

[LienusLateTips]

24 minutes ago, S James said:

Hello.
Which one would you pick?
1. Corsair CX Series CX450 450 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified ATX PSU 

2. Corsair VS Series VS650 650W High Performance Power Supply

3. Corsair VS Series VS550 550W High Performance Power Supply

I have been recommended the first one. I only need one that can help in overclocking the GTX 1060 6GB GPU only.

CX450 all the way.

[awesomegamer919]

26 minutes ago, S James said:

Hello.
Which one would you pick?
1. Corsair CX Series CX450 450 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified ATX PSU 

2. Corsair VS Series VS650 650W High Performance Power Supply

3. Corsair VS Series VS550 550W High Performance Power Supply

I have been recommended the first one. I only need one that can help in overclocking the GTX 1060 6GB GPU only.

The CX is by far the best

[STRMfrmXMN]

1 hour ago, S James said:

Hello.
Which one would you pick?
1. Corsair CX Series CX450 450 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified ATX PSU 

2. Corsair VS Series VS650 650W High Performance Power Supply

3. Corsair VS Series VS550 550W High Performance Power Supply

I have been recommended the first one. I only need one that can help in overclocking the GTX 1060 6GB GPU only.

The CX450 for sure.

[Stefan Payne]

1 hour ago, S James said:

Hello.
Which one would you pick?
1. Corsair CX Series CX450 450 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified ATX PSU 

2. Corsair VS Series VS650 650W High Performance Power Supply

3. Corsair VS Series VS550 550W High Performance Power Supply

I have been recommended the first one. I only need one that can help in overclocking the GTX 1060 6GB GPU only.

Not the VS...

[Dabombinable]

4 hours ago, S James said:

Hello.
Which one would you pick?
1. Corsair CX Series CX450 450 Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified ATX PSU 

2. Corsair VS Series VS650 650W High Performance Power Supply

3. Corsair VS Series VS550 550W High Performance Power Supply

I have been recommended the first one. I only need one that can help in overclocking the GTX 1060 6GB GPU only.

None of them, because they are all poor value. That being said, avoid the VS series like the plague. You can get PSU far better for the same price.

[awesomegamer919]

3 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

None of them, because they are all poor value. That being said, avoid the VS series like the plague. You can get PSU far better for the same price.

The CX series iis usually pretty decent value, especially the 450w one.

[Dabombinable]

1 minute ago, awesomegamer919 said:

The CX series iis usually pretty decent value, especially the 450w one.

In Australia, for the price you can still get better quality units (a lot of the time for less). Still don't know if the new white label CX series have had the coil whine fixed either

[awesomegamer919]

2 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

In Australia, for the price you can still get better quality units (a lot of the time for less). Still don't know if the new white label CX series have had the coil whine fixed either

Umm, no?

 

Right now, a CX450 is $65 ( https://au.pcpartpicker.com/product/Q7L7YJ/corsair-cx-2017-450w-80-bronze-certified-atx-power-supply-cp-9020120-na.), the next "good" unit is a CX450m at $75 ( https://au.pcpartpicker.com/product/FQ648d/corsair-power-supply-cp9020101na ), please find me a unit in that price range that is comparable to a CX/CXm, and MSY (the one store that isn't on PCPP)  has nothing good on that price range either (Masterwatt 550 is closest at $85)

[SpencerC]

On ‎5‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 9:57 PM, awesomegamer919 said:

Given the fact that of the 3 G3 reviews Aris has done so far 1 died during OPP test at ~127% (1000w), 1 gave 11V on the 12V rail before OPP/UVP kicked in (650w) and the last one (850w) had some... strange behavior with the minor rail OCP, and had stupidly high OTP (And had as much of an OPP gap as the 650w, though Aris did not record the voltages) I'd have to vote that it either be placed in T2/3+ or taken off the list entirely until we get more reviews that have the protection features tested...

 

650w review: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/evga-supernova-650-g3-psu,5533-6.html

 

850w Review: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/evga-supernova-850-g3-psu,4930-6.html

 

1000W Review: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/evga-supernova-1000-g3-psu,4941-6.html

That's quite odd.....possibly a bad batch of power supplies? The G3 has been on T1 for so long, it does make one scratch their head wondering how these imperfections just came to light.

[awesomegamer919]

2 hours ago, SpencerC said:

That's quite odd.....possibly a bad batch of power supplies? The G3 has been on T1 for so long, it does make one scratch their head wondering how these imperfections just came to light.

G3 1000w died under OPP which is fair enough - sometimes lemons happen, and it worked well when tested anywhere else. For the G3 850w, no one checked the protections, they were just looking that the horrendous fan curve and otherwise stellar performance.

 

G3 650 review is somewhat relatively recent and is the first to mention the 11V on the 12V rail...

[STRMfrmXMN]

4 hours ago, SpencerC said:

That's quite odd.....possibly a bad batch of power supplies? The G3 has been on T1 for so long, it does make one scratch their head wondering how these imperfections just came to light.

EVGA has been caught giving reviewers golden samples of their PSUs (kinda like Intel giving a really well-binned chip to Linus for overclocking). It doesn't surprise me.

[Biggerboot]

18 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

In Australia, for the price you can still get better quality units (a lot of the time for less). Still don't know if the new white label CX series have had the coil whine fixed either

If you're comparing it to the green labelled ones, it's a significant improvement.  I haven't heard coil whine on any of the new CX units myself. 

Coil whine can also happen on any PSU.  Some people are more sensitive to it than others, so it can go unreported a lot.  But I do think it was more common on the legacy CX/CS units.

[Guest]

11 hours ago, SpencerC said:

The G3 has been on T1 for so long, it does make one scratch their head wondering how these imperfections just came to light.

Because the tier list is constructed based on assumptions and not actual failure rate or test data.

 

Also, as STRMfrmXMN pointed out:   Most review units were "golden samples", including the ones reviewed at jonnyguru.com

6 hours ago, Biggerboot said:

If you're comparing it to the green labelled ones, it's a significant improvement.  I haven't heard coil whine on any of the new CX units myself. 

Coil whine can also happen on any PSU.  Some people are more sensitive to it than others, so it can go unreported a lot.  But I do think it was more common on the legacy CX/CS units.

That's mostly because the CX uses an LLC topology and CX-M is double forward.  Most of that heavy-loud buzzing and/or whining noise comes from the main transformer in the CX-M.

[turkey3_scratch]

8 minutes ago, jonnyGURU said:

Because the tier list is constructed based on assumptions and not actual failure rate or test data.

Well it's largely impossible for us consumers to know real failure rates, and an argument cannot be made that without knowing failure rates you are incapable of making reasonable judgments on what power supplies are more or less reliable, for that would nullify the whole point of reviews.

 

But the list is constructed on test data in the reviews; what test data is more or less important, though, seems to be the largest point of debate.

 

I'd also assume "failure rate" is the same thing as RMA rate, but the actual failure rate goes unknown, we only know about reported failings. Is it possible that certain power supplies just have more or less reported failures than others, therefore hindering actual data pertaining to failure rates? I would assume if a $30 PSU fails somebody might just forget about going through and RMA process and decide to simply buy a new power supply. That would be an unreported failure, which would keep the RMA or "failure rate" for that PSU a lower percentage, making it look better than it may really be. Whereas, a $100 PSU probably has a higher number of reported failures.

 

I can say on a personal note that when my power supply dies I will probably just buy a new one and be done with it.

[Dabombinable]

16 minutes ago, turkey3_scratch said:

I can say on a personal note that when my power supply dies I will probably just buy a new one and be done with it.

That's probably what I'll end up doing, though I'd still be buying a spare since its definitely not working quite as well as it used to (that being said-it's at least electrically safe unlike the "500W" unit it replaced). After all my rig is organised now and I shouldn't lack connectors when my new case arrives with the spare PSU (only 3x sata being used, and I found an extra Molex to SATA adapter):

Spoiler

 

[Guest]

18 minutes ago, turkey3_scratch said:

Well it's largely impossible for us consumers to know real failure rates, and an argument cannot be made that without knowing failure rates you are incapable of making reasonable judgments on what power supplies are more or less reliable, for that would nullify the whole point of reviews.

 

But the list is constructed on test data in the reviews; what test data is more or less important, though, seems to be the largest point of debate.

 

I'd also assume "failure rate" is the same thing as RMA rate, but the actual failure rate goes unknown, we only know about reported failings. Is it possible that certain power supplies just have more or less reported failures than others, therefore hindering actual data pertaining to failure rates? I would assume if a $30 PSU fails somebody might just forget about going through and RMA process and decide to simply buy a new power supply. That would be an unreported failure, which would keep the RMA or "failure rate" for that PSU a lower percentage, making it look better than it may really be. Whereas, a $100 PSU probably has a higher number of reported failures.

 

I can say on a personal note that when my power supply dies I will probably just buy a new one and be done with it.

I totally agree. I'm just saying that without proper insight (that none of us have... myself included 99% of the time), you can't have all the proper data.  It would be really nice if ALL computer hardware stores accumulated and published RMA data like LDLC does.

 

When the review at jonnyguru.com was done, it wasn't known that Super Flower contracted out building PSUs to four different factories in China.  Also, it makes sense that Aris would find problems where Jeremy doesn't because Aris strives to be as thorough as possible while Jeremy tries to crank them out as fast as possible.

 

[awesomegamer919]

1 hour ago, jonnyGURU said:

When the review at jonnyguru.com was done, it wasn't known that Super Flower contracted out building PSUs to four different factories in China.  Also, it makes sense that Aris would find problems where Jeremy doesn't because Aris strives to be as thorough as possible while Jeremy tries to crank them out as fast as possible.

 

Whilst I am unsure of the situation now, especially with the resurgence of mining, for a while Jeremy did not want to test OPP/OCP on many PSUs as it could potentially damage his equipment and he was not in a situation where he could replace it.

[Guest]

4 hours ago, awesomegamer919 said:

Whilst I am unsure of the situation now, especially with the resurgence of mining, for a while Jeremy did not want to test OPP/OCP on many PSUs as it could potentially damage his equipment and he was not in a situation where he could replace it.

Yes.  I didn't want to come right out and say it.. but Jeremy's reviews have gotten a bit "slack" because of time and money constraints and fear that the test equipment will fail.  Correct.

 

[ATFink]

Last time I checked the cx550m and masterwatt 550 were selling for about the same price.

 

Which one is quieter and/or more reliable? IIRC the masterwatt 550 uses an LDB bearing and the cx550m uses a rifle bearing, but I'm not terribly familiar with fluid dynamic bearings so that doesn't mean much to me. I can't quickly find a good review of the cx550m (only the cx750m, but it may be a different platform than the cx550m, I don't know). Are there miscellaneous aspects about these units I should be aware of?

 

Are there better units for similar prices (US) right now?

 

I'm not building anything, this is just a question out of curiosity since I like keeping updated PCPartPicker lists.