Viewing page 1 of 5 pages.
1 2 3 4 5 Next
March 15, 2005 by Devon
Cooke and Mike
Chin
Consumers who buy power supplies through retail channels are generally not
interested in the technical details that go into providing pure, stable
power. What makes an aftermarket power supply attractive to consumers
are "visible" features: Ease of installation, aesthetics, and, yes, noise level.
Assurance of high performance is necessary and important, but not necessarily the regimented specification sheets reserved for OEMs and system integrators.
The companies that sell power supplies are aware of these factors, and
adjust their product offerings accordingly. The Raidmax RX-520XPW is a good example: Plexiglass windows and blue LED lights,
oodles of extras (like an embedded AC outlet), and, according to the retail
box, "The Power of Silence". This nice little pun will, no doubt,
do well for Raidmax's bottom line, but it does not a power supply make.
|
Feature Highlights of the Raidmax RX-520XPW
|
| FEATURE & BRIEF |
COMMENT |
|
All connectors are gold-plated for more stable outputs.
|
More importantly, they look cool.
|
|
Output-cables are twisted wires reducing EM-Interference.
|
Good for
cable management too. |
|
Supports OVP, OCP & SCP (Short-Circuit Protection).
|
Standard
on any power supply. |
|
ATX12V version 1.3 and downwards compatible.
|
An older but
still widely used standard. |
| Silence Control
Technology with Dual-Fans for Whispering operation of 21-22dBA
at up to 60% load. |
So, The Power
of Silence is 60% load. For this power supply, that's 280W output. |
|
Two Serial-ATA harddisk-connectors built-in.
|
Helps push
towards ATX12V 2.0 compatibility |
| ECASO Technology,
keep fans running for cooling down you power and system 3 mints
after shout down the power. [sic] |
Presumably,
this should read "keeps fan running 3 minutes after shutdown". |
| Video Card
Connector with Noise Filter for Power-Hungry Video Card. |
This is a
4-pin Molex connector, not a 6-pin PCI-Express plug |
Like the power supply itself, the box is sleek and stylish. And larger
than necessary.
Power supply, thin manual, EMI-shielded AC cable, mounting screws, and
two zap straps for cable management.
|
SPECIFICATIONS: Raidmax RX-520XPW
|
|
AC Input
|
100-120 / 200-240 VAC, 50 / 60 Hz
|
|
DC Line Output
|
+3.3V
|
+5V
|
+12V
|
-12V
|
-5V
|
+5Vsb
|
|
Maximum Output Current
|
26A
|
45A
|
18A
|
1.0A
|
0.8A
|
2.5A
|
|
Maximum Combined Wattage
|
220W
|
216W
|
12W
|
4W
|
12.5W
|
|
464.5W
|
Raidmax also makes a similar model called the RX-520XP. As far as we can tell
from Raidmax's sparse documentation, the only differences between it and
our review model, the RX-520XPW, are the blue-tinted windows and the
rear-mounted 80mm intake fan instead of bottom-mounted 92mm fan. It appears
that the change in fan is necessary to accommodate the windowed design. This
change in fan can be expected to have a considerable effect on internal airflow
and temperatures, so we do not consider our review representative of the non-windowed
version. As a side note, the non-windowed version is about $10 cheaper.
Aside from the change in fan, we had issues about the labeling
and technical information that came with the Raidmax:
- No technical specifications are available either in the manual or on their
either of the product websites that we found. The specifications listed in
this review come from the label on the bottom of the PSU.
- No amperage for the external AC plug is given anywhere.
- The rear of the power supply is labeled 90~115 VAC with no indication of
what this refers to. We think it refers to the output voltage of the AC plug,
as the unit has a voltage selector switch that allows it to be used with 220
VAC input.
- The model number of the power supply is mislabeled on the spec sheet
as the XP model.
- The spec sheet reports the maximum wattage as 520W. Adding up the maximum
wattages for each rail totals only 464.5W.
- The 18A max current available on the 12V line is very low for a PSU rated at even 464.5W. It compares unfavorably with several recently reviewed PSUs: The 20A of the Clever Power 400; 30A total (12V1 and 12V2) of the Fortron Blue Storm 500; the 22A total of the Coolermaster 450; 18A on the 12V line is matched by the Seasonic Super Tornado (or Silencer) 300!
| Help support this site, buy from one of our affiliate retailers! |
|
