SPCR

Hi all,

I am in the market to upgrade my psu , my previous cheapo fried itself after 3 months so i was thinking of getting a quality one this time. It is going to power an i5 3570K (stock speeds, gtx 660 (140W max output) and one 3.5 hdd+ 2 sticks of ram.

Was thinking between a fanless x 460 (seasonic) or a fanned x 560. I think both will do the job (since max power should be about 340 tops: 140 W for gpu +120W(worst case) for cpu and the rest for hdd and ram (2 sticks).

I have heard that these psu's get terrible coil whine issues ( every psu does it , i know, bot not every psu costs 100£+).

My previous psu didnt whine but its fan wasnt exactly quiet either (small 90mm fan spinning like mad all the time).

It is going to be kept in an antec 302 case under the desk.


For everyone who has a seasonic psu (especially the fanless models), do you get coil whine, or is it just FUD that is going around the web (since people who are having problems are more likely to review a product in the first place)? I know all power supplies whine to a certain extent, I am particularly sensitive to coil whine, so would like to minimize it as much as possible.

dvincent473 wrote:For everyone who has a seasonic psu (especially the fanless models), do you get coil whine, or is it just FUD that is going around the web (since people who are having problems are more likely to review a product in the first place)? I know all power supplies whine to a certain extent, I am particularly sensitive to coil whine, so would like to minimize it as much as possible.

Its not a rumor its real, but its not present for all users, in my case the X400 is totally silent i cant perceive any coil whine, nor in my X660. But if you read user reviews you will find some, more on the Platinum series. Seasonic representative has given some suggestions into how to fix this, also MikeC has rechecked mulitple samples on 520..., personally i dont think its only the PSU, its more a combo of the mobos, some have different power fases and setups on the bios that might be more prone to develop this behavior,

"As mentioned in the review, Seasonic reports that adjustments in the BIOS of some recent motherboards eliminates electronic noise completely with many earlier production samples. The settings are:

BIOS set up to ENABLE ErP/EuP (S4~S5)
BIOS set up to DISABLE Audio Always On"

Now if you want to avoid Seasonic, thinking you might be unlucky... then look into Kingiwn, their PSU are really top notch, reviewed and recommeded by SPCR, and other high end review psu sites, worth mentioning that there are also some users that do report whine or noise, but much less. Consider the following,

KINGWIN STR-500 500W ATX 12V v2.2, EPS 12V v2.91 and SSI EPS 12V v2.92 SLI Ready 80 PLUS PLATINUM Certified Modular Active PFC Stryker Fanless Power Supply
Reviews,
SPCR Fanless PSUs: Kingwin Stryker STR-500 & Silverstone ST50NF
JonnyGuru Reviews - Kingwin Stryker Fanless 500W
[H]ardOCP Kingwin Stryker STR500 Power Supply Review
TechPowerUp Kingwin Stryker Fanless 500 W

KINGWIN Lazer Platinum Series LZP-550 550W ATX 12V v2.2 / EPS 12V v2.91 / SSI EPS 12V v2.92 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS PLATINUM Certified Modular Active PFC Power Supply
Reviews,
SPCR Kingwin Lazer Platinum 550W Power Supply
JonnyGuru Reviews - Kingwin Lazer Platinum 550W
[H]ardOCP Kingwin LZP-550 550W Power Supply Review
TechPowerUp Kingwin LZP-550 Lazer Platinum 550 W

Abula wrote:
Now if you want to avoid Seasonic, thinking you might be unlucky... then look into Kingiwn

Thanks for the suggestion. I am purchasing from UK so kingwin is not actually easily availible here (amazon,ebuyer etc), only on ebay. I have seen that the bequiet psu's are also recommended (especially the be quiet dark power pro 550w), has anybody had any experience using those?


Re seasonic psu's: you mentioned that it is sometimes a combo between psu and other components, is there a thread or database somewhere with good known configurations?

Have experience with 2 Seasonic PSUs x560. One has coil whine while the other does not.
Super Flower manufactures Kingwins' PSUs.
Have a Super Flower Golden King 550W that is equal to Kingwins Lazer Platinum 550 and it has coil whine(to a lower degree, less intensity) as well but it's load switching technology is more pronounced than Seasonics.

The PSUs have been used with different hardware in different locations and still emit the same noise. The problem with saying it is the PSU in combination with specific hardware and electricity wiring is; That being a seller of expensive PSUs, they should take into account the electricity distribution systems, it's not fair to put blame on the buyers.

To OP: Don't worry about coil whine for your particular system. Your graphics card will mask any coil whine. Both x460 and x560 are excellent PSUs.
Some in here have recommended Nexus PSUs. Don't worry about their bronze specification, there is very little difference between bronze, silver, gold, platinum certifications. Their fan rotates constantly, but not a lot of coil whine. You might still get unlucky with a buzzing fan though, as with all fans.

JL5 wrote: Some in here have recommended Nexus PSUs. Don't worry about their bronze specification, there is very little difference between bronze, silver, gold, platinum certifications.

Huh?


x560 owner - no noise here.

CA_Steve wrote:

JL5 wrote: Some in here have recommended Nexus PSUs. Don't worry about their bronze specification, there is very little difference between bronze, silver, gold, platinum certifications.

Huh?

+1. It is especially important if trying to go fanless reliably. 5 years ago there were very few fanless PSUs and many had questionable reliability. That's because they were at most 80+ Bronze. For the last 3 years there have been 80+ Gold PSUs and it has been in this time that the number and quality of fanless PSUs has shot up.

X400 fanless and no noise here except for a tiny 100Hz noise if I put my ear right up to the vented cover of the PSU.

Seems that there are two valid options now:

1-buy any other fanned/fanless psu and still have coil whine (or not).

2-buy a seasonic fanless and hope it doesnt whine, rma/return if it does, get something different.

The way I understand how coil whine works is that the multitude of capacitors inductors etc can interfere with each other causing resonance (much like a basic LCR circuit?) at a specific frequency or frequencies. I believe manufacturers already go to great lengths to minimise this. Would (in theory) , placing a diy LCR circuit (variable) and just giving it power (say from a molex cable ) mean that I can potentially eliminate the interference that is causing the whine in the first place?

The only interference you suggest would be due to components in the rest of the computer and their behaviour. Primarily this means the motherboard. As stated previously Seasonic have got advice on settings to enable/disable and this does effect the +5VSB line which is where the problem appears to lie. Certain of these settings are actually needed to make the motherboard compliant with ErP2013 regulations, as is the PSU. If you're not running the correct settings then the PSU is basically doing something it's not designed too.

This post from Seasonic sums it up best:
viewtopic.php?p=573359#p573359

edh wrote: As stated previously Seasonic have got advice on settings to enable/disable and this does effect the +5VSB line which is where the problem appears to lie. Certain of these settings are actually needed to make the motherboard compliant with ErP2013 regulations, as is the PSU. If you're not running the correct settings then the PSU is basically doing something it's not designed too.

This post from Seasonic sums it up best:
viewtopic.php?p=573359#p573359

Thanks for the link , I will likely go with seasonic then and just enable s4/s5 and disable audio.

Thanks for everyone's suggestions

I bought a Seasonic X-1050 hybrid PSU last January. Hybrid meaning: the fan doesn't spin under 30% load. When the PSU has to produce 350W or more, the fan starts spinning. In my experience (and in a review I've read), the fan started spinning at 200W already. A bit disappointing. And the fan was far from silent. I sold my X-1050.

I now have a Super Flower SF-500P14FG. That's the same as the Kingwin Stryker 500W.
Two shops in my country (Netherlands) sell it.
http://www.super-flower.com.tw/products ... D=79&lang=
I am very impressed with this PSU.
Absolutely no noise (no fan, duh!). But also no coil whine.
And the PSU stays very cool. (Whenever I put my hand on it, after I've played games, it feels like <35C).

Note, I have a pretty silent system (watercooling, 3570K, gtx680). So getting no noise from the PSU is very important to me. With a regular videocard and CPU-fan, it probably is much less important.

Just got Seasonic Fanless 400W Platinum.

So my report. I live in an apartment, so it is not an anechoic chamber ever, although it is not noisy around either. I was testing it for a couple of days for now. Previously a had a rather quiet PC with more or less quiet components, but still clearly audible from where I sit normally. I'm a pro audio person. I disconnected the HDDs for testing. The only fan I have is a Thermalright CPU fan, that I also was able to switch off for a short time for testing.

I was surprised to clearly hear the 'sound' from one of my PC displays, it was the loudest one, although I never notice it before. The second was some static noise from my audio speakers. Then, from my place I can barely hear the CPU fan noise when it is really quite around. The PC is the open case frame, about 140 cm from me. I don't think I can hear the Seasonic PSU from there.

However, If I put my ear directly to the PSU there is a clearly audible very high pitched signal mixed with just some 'buzz noise', which I'm still barely able to hear at about 50 cm distance. Again, it is never dead-silent in my place.

My recent motherboard (soon to be upgraded) is ASUS P8H77-V. It says it is ErP ready, but there seems to be no special entry in the BIOS for that. There was something related to audio - I switched it off. However, I just disabled the stuff related to CPU power saving modes, like C-states, as it is a common necessity around pro audio setups.

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My question is, are some of you saying that you are not able to hear ANY sounds from your Seasounic PSUs, even if you put your ear directly on it?
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Anyways, my issues are minor, so the PSU definitely stays, but still curious, are there any totally dead-silent Seasonic PSUs in existence?

ADDED: I've just read some SPCR reviews, seems there is always some reasonable level of noise always present, so I guess my situation is pretty much normal.

AKM76 wrote:Just got Seasonic Fanless 400W Platinum.

So my report. I live in an apartment, so it is not an anechoic chamber ever, although it is not noisy around either. I was testing it for a couple of days for now. Previously a had a rather quiet PC with more or less quiet components, but still clearly audible from where I sit normally. I'm a pro audio person. I disconnected the HDDs for testing. The only fan I have is a Thermalright CPU fan, that I also was able to switch off for a short time for testing.

I was surprised to clearly hear the 'sound' from one of my PC displays, it was the loudest one, although I never notice it before. The second was some static noise from my audio speakers. Then, from my place I can barely hear the CPU fan noise when it is really quite around. The PC is the open case frame, about 140 cm from me. I don't think I can hear the Seasonic PSU from there.

However, If I put my ear directly to the PSU there is a clearly audible very high pitched signal mixed with just some 'buzz noise', which I'm still barely able to hear at about 50 cm distance. Again, it is never dead-silent in my place.

My recent motherboard (soon to be upgraded) is ASUS P8H77-V. It says it is ErP ready, but there seems to be no special entry in the BIOS for that. There was something related to audio - I switched it off. However, I just disabled the stuff related to CPU power saving modes, like C-states, as it is a common necessity around pro audio setups.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
My question is, are some of you saying that you are not able to hear ANY sounds from your Seasounic PSUs, even if you put your ear directly on it?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, my issues are minor, so the PSU definitely stays, but still curious, are there any totally dead-silent Seasonic PSUs in existence?

ADDED: I've just read some SPCR reviews, seems there is always some reasonable level of noise always present, so I guess my situation is pretty much normal.

I upgraded to a Corsair RM650x, which is semi passive. I have only heard the fan come on once, which is during BIOS, and it never whines which is great.

My SSD squeals and ive noticed my GTX 690 which is 2 cores on one board doesn't squeal anymore so that's a bonus!