PC Power & Cooling Silencer 750 Quad CF-Edition
by Christoph Katzer on July 18, 2007 1:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Introduction
PC Power & Cooling has been in the US-market for a long time, but for people in Europe it is a new name. Since the recent acquisition of PCP&C by OCZ Technology Group their channels have been extended into the European market, et voila they are available throughout Europe a week later. Since OCZ will keep the name PC Power & Cooling (PCP&C) we will continue to use their current name. OCZ will make no changes in the power supply lineup of PCP&C and therefore the power supplies from today are the same as those from half a year ago.
Today we will have a look at the Silencer 750 Quad in the Crossfire-Edition which comes in a bright red color. It is advertised as the godfather of silence and comes rated at 750W, which is more than most PCs need. Because a 750w power supply will become very hot if fully loaded, we have to express doubt that it is possible to keep it cool while remaining "silent" - especially if there is only a single 80mm fan installed like in this PSU.
The voltage input can handle everything from 100 to 240V, so the power supply can work in any region of the world. The label tells us that this unit comes with a single 12V rail. PCP&C was one of the first companies to introduce this new method, while many others continue with designs that include four separate 12V rails rated at only 20 amps each. The 750 Quad delivers up to 60 amps on the 12V rail which then supports all of the various system components.
A single 12V rail doesn't come without issues though. At first you might think you will never encounter problems with OCP (Over Current Protection) kicking in if you load one rail too high. This could happen if you connect one of the latest graphics cards to a 12V rail that only delivers 15 amps for example. The result is often a blue screen and/or the PC shutting down. This problem is solved with a single 12V rail that will have enough juice for everything - provided you don't need more than 60 amps, of course.
The problem with this alignment is basically the danger it brings. The latest Power Supply Design Guide states that no 12V rail should exceed more than 20 amps (240VA). If certain types of damage occur to the power supply or cables, such a high amperage could be dangerous to the end users. Electricity will always come with some risks, though, and as another manufacturer informed us the likelihood of a PSU being damaged in such a way that a 60 amp rail becomes a risk is very slim. Still, it is technically against the PSDG specifications and could be dangerous in certain instances.
PC Power & Cooling has been in the US-market for a long time, but for people in Europe it is a new name. Since the recent acquisition of PCP&C by OCZ Technology Group their channels have been extended into the European market, et voila they are available throughout Europe a week later. Since OCZ will keep the name PC Power & Cooling (PCP&C) we will continue to use their current name. OCZ will make no changes in the power supply lineup of PCP&C and therefore the power supplies from today are the same as those from half a year ago.
Today we will have a look at the Silencer 750 Quad in the Crossfire-Edition which comes in a bright red color. It is advertised as the godfather of silence and comes rated at 750W, which is more than most PCs need. Because a 750w power supply will become very hot if fully loaded, we have to express doubt that it is possible to keep it cool while remaining "silent" - especially if there is only a single 80mm fan installed like in this PSU.
The voltage input can handle everything from 100 to 240V, so the power supply can work in any region of the world. The label tells us that this unit comes with a single 12V rail. PCP&C was one of the first companies to introduce this new method, while many others continue with designs that include four separate 12V rails rated at only 20 amps each. The 750 Quad delivers up to 60 amps on the 12V rail which then supports all of the various system components.
A single 12V rail doesn't come without issues though. At first you might think you will never encounter problems with OCP (Over Current Protection) kicking in if you load one rail too high. This could happen if you connect one of the latest graphics cards to a 12V rail that only delivers 15 amps for example. The result is often a blue screen and/or the PC shutting down. This problem is solved with a single 12V rail that will have enough juice for everything - provided you don't need more than 60 amps, of course.
The problem with this alignment is basically the danger it brings. The latest Power Supply Design Guide states that no 12V rail should exceed more than 20 amps (240VA). If certain types of damage occur to the power supply or cables, such a high amperage could be dangerous to the end users. Electricity will always come with some risks, though, and as another manufacturer informed us the likelihood of a PSU being damaged in such a way that a 60 amp rail becomes a risk is very slim. Still, it is technically against the PSDG specifications and could be dangerous in certain instances.
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31 Comments
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rick5127 - Friday, February 12, 2010 - link
Thanks for the nice review.I am an enthusiast as I always push the envelope. A few years back I was running an ASUS PC-DL (dual socket 604 system) and started having flaky problems. After much testing we finally found it was a PSU problem. As I was running several of these machine 24/7 at 100% load (Folding at home project) I started eating power supplies. After much research we, several of us worked together on this, finally settled on a minimum spec of 30a for the 12v rail. This was about the time the dual rails started coming out. Well after burning up several of these I finally changed to PC-Power and cooling supplies and haven't had a problem in 10 years or so.
I get a kick out of some that say this 750 supply is too much. Well one of my systems that is running here has dual socket 775 quad cores with dual Geforce 9800 GTX+'s in it. Needless to say the 750 is close to maxed out.
In any case PC-Power and Cooling builds some of the best PSU's in the world and I wouldn't trust my systems to anything else.
I noticed the price here was listed at $199 I think... well NewEgg has a recertified 750 for $89 at the moment. FYI
Martimus - Thursday, July 19, 2007 - link
What is the difference between this PSU and the copper 750 Quad Silencer? Other than the fact his one is $30 more, the specs look the same between the two. Can you tell me what differences they have?meeshu - Thursday, July 19, 2007 - link
Once again no ripple results!Vidmar - Wednesday, July 18, 2007 - link
While I think the Efficiency charts in load percentage are nice, if you included Efficiency charts in watts it would be more informative from a buying perspective.The reason? I know the sum of system load is 375watts normally. The way it is now, if power supply XYZ has a max load of 650watts, I have to calculate where my ~375watts falls into that load chart (~57% load). But if the next power supply has 1000 watts max, then I have to yet again calculate what load percentage that may be for *that* power supply. If the Efficiency charts were in watts, instead of load, no calculations would be necessary. If I could look at your charts and see that XYZ power supply provided those watts the most efficiently, that would be the power supply I would get.
Maybe you could just provide a second X axis on the chart that included the watts.
Thanks!
bob4432 - Wednesday, July 18, 2007 - link
why is it rated @ 60A output on the 12V rail yet only delivered ~50A? so is 60A peak and not a ems amount? you got ~600W on the 12V, not ~720W like the math dictates.i know it is 10A (120W, quite a bit of difference imho) but does that mean that other psus that are rated @ 30A on the 12V line only put out 20A? or a 20A that only puts out 15A?
seems a bit misleading if they are mixing peak and ems amounts....
Martimus - Friday, July 20, 2007 - link
It is a DC output. There is no "EMS".bob4432 - Friday, July 20, 2007 - link
maybe i am thinking rms....hahabob4432 - Friday, July 20, 2007 - link
ok, so why is it still 10A lower than what it is listed as?Belldandy - Wednesday, July 18, 2007 - link
What was the ambient temperature when the efficiency tests were performed? I'm assuming the efficiency will go up when the ambient temperature is lower as it leads to lower temperature of the components.Also is the unit unable to hit 750 Watts? It states that the peak wattage is 825, and there's plenty of room for more current to be drawn from the 12V lines if it can indeed provide 60A current. Can it actually provide 825W of inrush current to power up large disk arrays?
Given the premium nature of this power supply, I wouldn't be surprised if it found it's way into video editing workstations with 2 Quad core cpus and a disk array of say 24 SATA drives.
Christoph Katzer - Wednesday, July 18, 2007 - link
The graphs show the efficiency at higher temps (25-50). You can see the exact temp on page 14.I will add the inrush and peak wattage test in the methodology.