After several weeks of testing and swapping Power Supplies from a large range of manufactures it is safe to say that all these models will be able to supply enough juice to power high-end gaming PC’s.
They all provide stable volt lines and even when I overclocked my setup to the limit it was never the PSU which caused instabilities when working “on the edge”.
Some units stood up from the crowd though:
LooksThis is of course a very subjective decision, as something I find pretty may be ugly to others. The Aerocool AeroPower II+ scored very high in my book, closely followed by the Global Win Leleel. Although the Aspire AS500 has great looks, it is a bit over the top for me. Overall none of the PSU’s reviewed fit into the “dull grey box” category, with great finishing and high quality components.
PerformanceThe Antec stood head and shoulders above the rest when it comes down to stable volt lines. Even without having to adjust the rails every other minute the recorded values were spot on! Does this mean the others were bad? Far from actually, every PSU tested gave excellent performance and you can not make a “wrong” choice.
NoiseOf course the 2 passive PSU’s run away with the Gold medal here. Luckily none of the actively cooled units sounded like a jet taking off. After some subjective listening I have to say that the Aerocool’s fans are most effective! The Antec with its speed regulated fans is also very silent, while all the units equipped with a 120mm never produced annoying noises, although when these spin faster you’ll notice them.
OverallIf I were able to choose 2 PSU’s I would put the Antec in my most powerful and overclocked system, although the price is a bit higher the advantage of having 550W of juice with controllable volt lines is really worth it.
The second one for a more modest system would be more difficult to pick, although the idea of having a passive PSU is quite attractive due to the absence of noise, the higher price combined with possible increase in case temperature might set me off though. In a badly ventilated case it would be best to put in an active PSU, the 120m powered units would do great here. The Global Win and Aerocool PSU’s provide a good mix of the above two choices.
As you can see from the list below, you will be able to find a power supply which will fit nicely into your system and in your budget!
FSP FSP300-60PN(PF) €28
FSP FSP350-60PN(PF) €40
FSP Aurora - FSP350-60PN(PF) €40
ZECK ZKS-300WX €40
ZECK ZKS-350WX €??
ZECK ZKS-450WX €??
TASK TK-945TX-DF (450W) €130
ASPIRE AS500W €60
Antec TrueControl 550W €130
Global Win SAF Eleel 380W €80
Global Win SAF Leleel 450W €150
Yesico FL-350ATX €170
SilverStone EFN-300 €170
Aerocool AeroPower II+ 350W €70
Thank you all for reading, I hope this round-up will help you find a PSU that fits your needs! I also would like to thank a bunch of people for helping me out with this review, in no particular order:
David from ITC Multimedia for the Aerocool & Yesico.
Frederick from Cloetens for the FSP, Zeck, Task.
The guys at Color Cases for the Aspire.
David from Antec for the TrueControl.
Amal from Eurobizz for the Global Win.
Jurek from SilverStone for the EFN-300
JMke from [M]adshrimps for his great help writing this article.
Mysterious Weirdoke from School for her help carrying the PSU's :)
Questions/Comments: forum thread