The Enermax Liberty - Getting long in the tooth, but still worth a look
by Christoph Katzer on July 30, 2007 1:40 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
Intro
Today we will be looking at the Enermax Liberty 500W power supply. Liberty? But that PSU is two years old! Yes, as a matter of fact it is, but since its release a few years ago it has served the community well, providing stable power and low failure rates. We thought it would be worthwhile to take a look at it and see how it compares to some of the latest and greatest PSUs we've been reviewing. It's still a very stable offering, and users running such a power supply will hopefully be able to determine whether or not they need to consider upgrading anytime soon.
Enermax has been in the power supply (and case) market for ages, and anyone who has taken the time to build and/or mod a PC in the past decade should already be familiar with the Enermax name. When they were founded in 1990, Enermax was one of the first companies to begin selling retail power supplies to the market, helping to bring us to where we are today. Over the past few years we've seen a tremendous growth of Enermax products, particularly when it comes to introducing new technology and being the first to market with new standards. Enermax has built up a successful team over the years with branch offices and warehouses around the world. Their headquarters are located in Taoyuan, Taiwan.
The Liberty was designed with cable management as one of the features, which continues to provide good flexibility two years after purchase. The discussions around the web about voltage drops caused by the modular cable design and the extra resistance that can create do not seem to be a problem for Enermax - they continue to design current models with modular cables. Enermax promotes the flexibility of cable management in their advertising, and it is said that you can run a decent high-end system with the smaller 400W Liberty and a few extra cables. For people who own a Liberty power supply that are looking to upgrade, they don't necessarily need to buy a new power supply. A few extra cables will be enough to run many newer systems as well. The 500W model comes with two 12V rails supporting 22A each - plenty strong for all but the most demanding configurations - and we will see later that their OCP is even a little higher than stated.
Today we will be looking at the Enermax Liberty 500W power supply. Liberty? But that PSU is two years old! Yes, as a matter of fact it is, but since its release a few years ago it has served the community well, providing stable power and low failure rates. We thought it would be worthwhile to take a look at it and see how it compares to some of the latest and greatest PSUs we've been reviewing. It's still a very stable offering, and users running such a power supply will hopefully be able to determine whether or not they need to consider upgrading anytime soon.
Enermax has been in the power supply (and case) market for ages, and anyone who has taken the time to build and/or mod a PC in the past decade should already be familiar with the Enermax name. When they were founded in 1990, Enermax was one of the first companies to begin selling retail power supplies to the market, helping to bring us to where we are today. Over the past few years we've seen a tremendous growth of Enermax products, particularly when it comes to introducing new technology and being the first to market with new standards. Enermax has built up a successful team over the years with branch offices and warehouses around the world. Their headquarters are located in Taoyuan, Taiwan.
The Liberty was designed with cable management as one of the features, which continues to provide good flexibility two years after purchase. The discussions around the web about voltage drops caused by the modular cable design and the extra resistance that can create do not seem to be a problem for Enermax - they continue to design current models with modular cables. Enermax promotes the flexibility of cable management in their advertising, and it is said that you can run a decent high-end system with the smaller 400W Liberty and a few extra cables. For people who own a Liberty power supply that are looking to upgrade, they don't necessarily need to buy a new power supply. A few extra cables will be enough to run many newer systems as well. The 500W model comes with two 12V rails supporting 22A each - plenty strong for all but the most demanding configurations - and we will see later that their OCP is even a little higher than stated.
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swaaye - Saturday, August 4, 2007 - link
I've bought a few AX400s and an AX450. On the surface, they seem to be great PSUs. Very quiet with that 120 mm fan. I don't think they have very good efficiency. Newegg only says >65%. I would like to see a review of one of them as well.miahallen - Monday, July 30, 2007 - link
A8N-SLI DeluxOpty 165 @ 2.5GHz
8800GTX @ 621/999
4x SATA2 HDD
Antec P180b
I bought the Liberty 500W about a year ago and it has served me very well. I am very picky about noise, so I swapped the fan for a low noise Yate Loon model...best change ever. Now I cannot hear it at all!!!
It's interesting you mention good reliability, there seems to be lots of unhappy users on forums around the web having had problems with the Liberty series (mostly the 620W version from my experiance). I also replaced my 500W 6mo after purchase, but not because it failed, it just developed a rattle that drove me crazy. Enermax was very prompt at replacing it with a brand new one! Speaking of failures, I have a good friend who bought the 620W on my recommendation, and his blew up last week?! Whoops! Anyhow, thanks for the great review, you've endulged my confidence in the investment I made :)
JarredWalton - Monday, July 30, 2007 - link
So I'm not sure I understand... you bought the 500W and swapped the fan for a Yate Loon, but then the PSU developed a rattle and you got a new unit? I don't know what causes a rattle in a PSU, but usually it's the fan, which you had already replaced.... Since you had already opened it, wouldn't it have been easy to just fix the issue yourself? Or was there something else causing a rattle? (I'm also surprised any manufacturer would replace a PSU that you had opened to swap fans.)Anyway, one of the unfortunate aspects of PSUs is that a company can make an excellent product in one market and a lousy one in another. Sounds like the 500W Liberty might be great but the 620W has issues. I know I had a test system (from ABS) where a 620W failed during the two weeks of stress testing and benchmarks. They sent a replacement, which seemed to work fine, but long-term I couldn't say whether it was really stable.
xsilver - Monday, July 30, 2007 - link
just goes to show that old psu's are not outdated by any means.its funny that psu's are one of the few (only?) components that dont drop massively in price years after release.
is there a review of the corsair hx520 in the works? thats the psu that most people seem to be recommending for higher end systems and I feel will be the benchmark for performance/value
Final Hamlet - Monday, July 30, 2007 - link
What I am really longing for is the review of the new 1TB-F1 hard-drive by Samsung. Any ETA available?Thank you.
Le Québécois - Monday, July 30, 2007 - link
Any chance you could review one of the newer Enermax model from the Galaxy or Infinity series?Great PSU reviews btw, keep them coming !