Performance Tests
Considering that the Pentium 4 test system draws a
lot of power, I'd say the TruePower 330 handled the load pretty well. While the
12V rail dipped to 11.96V, this was within fluctuation specs. Serious dips in power
could the route cause of spontaneous reboots your PC, but
differences of +/- 5% are typically expected, and should not cause that type of
problem.
 |
| PCStats Test System Specs: |
| processor: |
intel pentium 4 3.0c |
| clock
speed: |
15 x 200 mhz = 3.0 ghz |
| motherboards: |
gigabyte 8knxp, i875p |
| videocard: |
ati radeon 9800xt |
| memory: |
2x 256mb corsair twinx 3200ll |
| hard
drive: |
40gb wd special ed |
| cdrom: |
nec 52x cd-rom |
| powersupply: |
antec truepower 330w |
| software setup |
windowsxp build 2600
intel inf 5.02.1012
catalyst
4.6 | |
*all voltages were read from the motherboard
bios.
| Listed Voltages |
AMP |
Lower Voltage |
Upper Voltage |
Jitter |
|
| +3.3V |
28A |
3.3v |
3.31 |
0.01v |
|
| +5.0V |
30A |
4.94v |
5.01 |
0.07v |
|
| +12V |
22AA |
11.96v |
12.03v |
0.07v |
|
| -12V |
1.0A |
11.99 |
12.00v |
0.01v |
|
| -5.0V |
0.5A |
5.00v |
5.00v |
0.00v |
|
| +5.0Vsb |
2A |
4.99v |
5.00v |
0.01v |
With a system connected to the power supply voltages
do not fluctuate very much. The fluctuations are noted above, and if they vary too much
there may be stability problems.
When looking at the Seasonic Power Supply test
results we see two values, wattage and volt-amps. Since it might not be
clear what they measure here's a brief overview.
The volt-amp value is actually how much real power
is being consumed by the power supply being tested. The higher that value is,
the more electricity is being consumed by the power supply. Because no
electrical device is 100% efficient, there will always be some loss at
converting AC to DC. The closer the volt-amps and wattage figures are to each
other, the more efficient a power supply is. This is called the Power Factor:
wattage / volt-amps = PF.
Since we're testing with a 120W dummy load, the
load on the power supply should be as close to this figure as possible.
Anything above this load describes the overhead and wasted energy (as heat) for
the particular power supply being tested.
For the unloaded tests, the wattage and volt-amp
figures should be as close as possible to one another first off. Secondly the
lower the figures are, the less power is being used.
|
Seasonic Load Tests |
| Power
Supply |
Wattage |
Test |
Load |
Unloaded |
| Seasonic SuperTornado |
400 W |
Active Power |
177 W |
6 W |
| Apparent Power |
182 VA |
7 VA |
| Vantec iON2 |
350 W |
Active Power |
192
W |
10
W |
| Apparent Power |
277 VA |
21 VA |
| Antec TruePower 330 |
330 W |
Active Power |
195 W |
22 W |
| Apparent Power |
289 VA |
38 VA |
Here in
the Seasonic loaded and unload tests,
we can see that the Antec TruePower 330W is not the most power efficient
PSU, especially when unloaded. In both the loaded and unloaded tests, Antec's PSU
draws more power than the competition. A lot more energy is wasted as heat on the Antec PSU as well.
A Good PSU for the money...
 It can be
argued that the power supply is one of the most important features of a computer
next to the processor and motherboard, yet most people overlook what powers
their systems. When it comes to selecting the right power supply, if pays to
make the right choice, and that never involves flashing lights or bright LEDs.
While Antec is probably better known for its cases, the companies line
of power supplies quite popular these days. The Antec
TruePower 330W we tested here today is a fine example of what
they're capable of, and when you consider the power supply is only $73 CDN ($57 US)
things couldn't be sweeter!
Those of you with larger cases will be happy to see that Antec equips the
TruePower 330 with nice long cables, and just in case you run devices outside of
the case, there is a solution for that too. The Antec TruePower 330
has a molex at the back of the power supply, quite an innovative feature if
you have to run power to an external pump, or fan.
The Antec TruePower 330's electrical
characteristics when hooked up to a system were excellent, and voltages
remained very stable. When running the Seasonic load tests, we found that the
that Antec is not as power efficient as other models tested. This aspect does
not affect PC reliability, but rather how much energy is wasted as heat. In the
long term, this wasted energy can lead to higher electrical bill than a more
efficient PSU will draw.
Related
Articles
Here are a few other articles that you might enjoy
as well...
1. Belkin Universal 1000VA UPS Review
2. Powerware 5125 1000VA UPS Review
3. Seasonic Super Tornado 400W Power Supply Review
4. Vantec ION 400W VAN-400B Power Supply
5. PC Power &
Cooling Turbo-Cool 510-PFC Power
Supply
|
Seasonic Load Tests
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