At the bottom of the Seasonic S12 II 500W power supply is a 120mm intake fan behind a recessed wire grill fan guard. It is the only fan in the unit. The fan moves air through the power supply, and out the rear. A warranty sticker covers one of the screw holes, if you open up your power supply Seasonic will know, and the warranty will be void. As mentioned earlier, the matte black rough textured finish is a nice change from gloss... it also seems to handle scratches a little better.

The back of the S12 II 500W power supply is pretty plane. There is the connector for the main power cable and the hard power switch. Missing is the 115/230V switch because the Seasonic S12 II 500W power supply supports Active PFC. A honeycomb vent allows air to flow through much of the rear panel with little resistance. Intel apparently did some studies on this a few years back. It found that of all the sheet metal vent patterns in use, the honeycomb offered the best mix of EMI shielding, noise reduction and ease of airflow. Thin vertical vents, for example, can be restrictive to airflow and generate noise as air passes through.

All cables from the Seasonic S12 II 500W PSU are wrapped in black wire loom sleeves, the ends are zip tied and covered with heatshrink tubing. The Seasonic power supply has six Serial ATA power connectors (split over two lines), one eight-pin 12V PCI Express videocard connector, one six-pin 12V PCI Express videocard connector, nine molex power connectors, a four-pin ATX12V, an eight-pin ESP12V connector and the main 24 pin ATX power line.

The unit comes with a molex to dual FDD power connector. The standard isn't used much anymore, so it is nice to be able to insert it anywhere along the string of power connectors if needed.

The main ATX power connector is ~55cm long as are the other cables to the first connector on the daisy chain.

We really wish the manufacturer had provide two eight-pin PCI Express power connectors (each in the 6pin+2pin way), and two six pin PCI Express power connectors. On the other hand, if Seasonic had done just that I suppose the power rating would have to be in the region of 750W to actually support such a dual videocard configuration that would require that much juice. Up next PCSTATS breaks the warranty right open for a peek inside the Seasonic S12 II 500. We'll gaze in marvel at the first of what is bound to be a flood of power supplies utilizing polymer aluminum capacitors.