Fortron power supply with 120mm fan

KenAF · Post by **KenAF** » Tue May 27, 2003 4:11 pm

Has anyone confirmed that the 350W version of the fortran w/ 120mm has the same acoustics as the 300W version?

Will35 · Post by **Will35** » Tue May 27, 2003 4:14 pm

I have one of each, Ken. They are equally quiet.

KenAF · Post by **KenAF** » Tue May 27, 2003 7:06 pm

Thanks Will - good to know.

offroad · Post by **offroad** » Tue May 27, 2003 8:38 pm

Any other resellers that have the 350 watt 120mm Fortron/Sparkle in stock?

XP Direct had the best price but they are back ordered there.

TIA

Will35 · Post by **Will35** » Tue May 27, 2003 10:23 pm

Offroad,

you might give CoolCases.com a try for the 350w Fortron.... Katana Man and others say he's a good guy to deal with and ships to Canada too, if my memory serves me correctly

Yomat · Post by **Yomat** » Wed May 28, 2003 3:37 am

pingo: Thanks man. It both had better fan AND better thermistor. And there are 2 resellers in my crappy country even.

A lot more pricey though.. but it is probably worth it.

tragus · Post by **tragus** » Wed May 28, 2003 1:04 pm

Will35 wrote:you might give CoolCases.com a try for the 350w Fortron.... Katana Man and others say he's a good guy to deal with and ships to Canada too, if my memory serves me correctly

Although XPDirect beats Coolcases' price by $10 or so, they are currently backordered and their sales rep just told me their next shipment may not be for another month. So, at least in the US, Coolcases seems to be more expedient. I'm placing my order tonight since my Zalman died yesterday.

My estimated cost: $55 + $6 ground shipping.

Yomat · Post by **Yomat** » Wed May 28, 2003 4:40 pm

Some more info about the PSU:
http://www.amdforums.com/showthread.php ... did=219869

This relates to my recent thread about voltages:
http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=4989

By using that you can mod away both high temps and stability issues. Flexibility is king.

tragus · Post by **tragus** » Thu May 29, 2003 6:45 am

From the front page of coolcases.com:

The SPI350-60PN PS is in stock. This is the conservatively-rated PS with a temperature-controlled 120 side fan, wildly received by ultra-quiet case geeks.

Hmmm, is that us?!?

Riffer · Post by **Riffer** » Thu May 29, 2003 3:46 pm

tragus wrote:From the front page of coolcases.com:
The SPI350-60PN PS is in stock. This is the conservatively-rated PS with a temperature-controlled 120 side fan, wildly received by ultra-quiet case geeks.
Hmmm, is that us?!?

Sure is

Politik · Post by **Politik** » Tue Jun 03, 2003 11:52 am

I finally bought this PSU...

I blew it with a hairdryer for a long time (3-5 mins?) and the fan didnt seem to speed up. It sure is quiet, but does anyone know if the fan will speed up a lot if it needs to? I think this PSU would let the case temps go too high before running at high speed.

Susquehannock · Post by **Susquehannock** » Wed Jun 04, 2003 5:21 pm

Hi all! ....... new poster here.

Not sure if this has been presented here yet.
I read through the thread and didn't see it.

SystemCooling.com did a review of two Fortron units.
The 530w FSP530-60GNA and the FSP300-60PN with the120mm fan.

Short story ... the reviewer was blown away. Especially with the 300w unit.

http://www.systemcooling.com/modules.ph ... le&sid=574

quote:

Conclusion:

Fortron/Source Technology and their PSU have done nothing but impress me. The PSU are made with extremely high quality and perform very well. Comparing them to what I consider a top of the line Enermax EG465X-VE PSU they do nothing but shine. And what is even better then their performance is the price at a MSRP for FSP530-60GNA at around $85 to $100, and for FSP300-60PN at around $30 to $45 they are a steel when I think that I paid $110 for my Enermax. I would not hesitate to recommend either one of these Fortron/Source power supplies. I would like to thank Fortron/Source Technology and Anthony for sending me these two units for review. And I would like to invite anyone in the market for a PSU to give Fortron/Source Technology a closer look.
_____________________________________________________________

That's a $27 300w unit outperforming a $100 450w unit! ... Amazing!!

Can't say I'm too surprised though. My Fortron FSP300-60ATV
has been quite a pleasant surprise. As a test I hooked as many 12v
components I could to one of the molex connectors to get the overload to kick in.
It was able to power a whole array of stuff and hardly get warm. To be honest,
I ran out of things to plug in before it cut out.

Take the above as you will. I know my next rig will have a
Fortron powering it.

Susquehannock · Post by **Susquehannock** » Wed Jun 04, 2003 5:27 pm

offroad wrote:Any other resellers that have the 350 watt 120mm Fortron/Sparkle in stock?

XP Direct had the best price but they are back ordered there.

TIA

Fortron=Sparkle=AOpen=PowerMan=Verax

I really want to buy one of those 120mm fan PSU but all
that I can find are the 300w models.

If anyone knows of a vendor that carries 350w with the large fan please
let me know. Directron.com had them but have been out of
stock for over a month.

ThanX ...

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Wed Jun 04, 2003 7:33 pm

Hello:

Have you tried XP Direct?

http://store.yahoo.com/xpdirect/35sparpowsup.html

Are you sure that you need the 350watt?

tragus · Post by **tragus** » Thu Jun 05, 2003 5:01 am

Susquehannock wrote:
offroad wrote:Any other resellers that have the 350 watt 120mm Fortron/Sparkle in stock?

XP Direct had the best price but they are back ordered there.
If anyone knows of a vendor that carries 350w with the large fan please
let me know. Directron.com had them but have been out of
stock for over a month.

Ummm, please see my post 8 messages prior to this one. In particular, Coolcases.com has them in stock now, albeit for $55, not $48. I paid the premium not to wait for the month and my 350W arrives this afternoon.

offroad · Post by **offroad** » Thu Jun 05, 2003 7:50 am

I received my 350 watt 120mm Fortron/Sparkle from CoolCases.com yesterday. They shipped it fast, certainly wasn't overpacked but it arrived undamaged.

I agree this PSU is very quiet, from about two feet I can't hear it at all.
Would have prefered another molex or two but Y-cables fixed that.

Overall very happy so far.

tragus · Post by **tragus** » Thu Jun 05, 2003 4:01 pm

My 350W Fortron/Sparkle, purchased from coolcases.com, arrived this afternoon and I installed it about an hour ago. Like offroad's, mine arrived intact though the packaging was far from deluxe (an inside-out Enermax PSU box with bubble wrap padding).

My impressions: Upon first power, the fan spins fast and a bit loud then quickly quiets down. My box has been folding for an hour, with ambient temps around 20C. The fan seems to be spinning and I detect a faint, but noticeable thrummm (low frequencies -- I'd guess 100-500 Hz noise) from about 1m away. It's quieter than the now-dead Zalman 300 (which I should RMA) with a lower pitch to the sound. I could probably have gotten by with the 300W for my home system, but wanted to test out the bigger PSU with an eye for the future.

For various reasons, the 120mm fan is also the only case fan. I've turned up the Panaflo CPU fan on the SLK800 (on a 800 MHz Athlon), though not all the way (I'd guess ~9V) with a Zalman FanMate. CPU temp is now stable at 42C, MB at 25C. I'd bet I could lower the temps by adding another exhaust fan, but it's fine for now.

My bottom line: I'll order this one for the high-end system I'll be building shortly. So far, a very reasonable choice that I would recommend.

Kawboy · Post by **Kawboy** » Thu Jun 05, 2003 5:37 pm

Well, I just ordered the FSP350-60PN from coolcases.com (it being apparently the only vaguely Canada-friendly place to get them) after a long "should I get one?" stage. It'll go into my system at the same time I get my Antec Sonata and install my modded Thermaltake Volcano 7+ (80mm Panaflo installed in place of the 70mm screamer). The stock P4 cooler is pretty quiet at 2300 rpm compared to the rest of my system, but the room temp rose by two degrees here the other day and my Asus board whipped up the idle speed to a whining 3000+ rpm.

The Sonata and the Fortron (Sparkle actually I guess) should be here next week sometime, so hopefully next weekend I'll go from having a not-horribly-loud system to a bloody quiet one (current stock Ti4400 fan excluded). I just hope the Volcano 7+ is somewhere near as good as, say, an SLK-800 with a quiet fan on it.

Susquehannock · Post by **Susquehannock** » Thu Jun 05, 2003 8:53 pm

Ummm, please see my post 8 messages prior to this one. In particular, Coolcases.com has them in stock now, albeit for $55, not $48. I paid the premium not to wait for the month and my 350W arrives this afternoon.

ThanX! ... the manner which the lynk was presented within the body
of the sentence without any highlight made it exceedingly difficult to see.

BTW ... who will have the PSU in a month?
That's not too long to wait.

Susquehannock · Post by **Susquehannock** » Thu Jun 05, 2003 9:07 pm

Will35 wrote:Offroad,

you might give CoolCases.com a try for the 350w Fortron.... Katana Man and others say he's a good guy to deal with and ships to Canada too, if my memory serves me correctly

No wonder that vendor didn't show in a search.

"Fortran" ... ???

$55 is a way too steep for me. Directron.com was asking $38 when
they last had them in stock.

Besides, for just $4 more you can buy the
Fortron FSP400-60PFN . That model did extremely well
in several reviews. The 40amp 5 volt rail was rock solid.

As for the FSP350-60PN ... hopefully Directron.com will soon send
an availability date.

Thanks for the posts all ... this has been a great thread.

ai · Post by ai » Sat Jun 07, 2003 9:22 am

Received an email from XPDirect yesterday:

We are pleased to let you know that your back order item become available as we have 400pc just got in today. Would you like us to send you the back order now. Please simply to response this email. Thank you for your patient !

regards,
XP Direct Customer Service

This was a little late for me as I had already purchased the 300w version from NewEgg last week and it is *very* quiet.

Thank you Katana Man for starting the thread.

P.S.: First post...

Liquidated · Post by **Liquidated** » Sun Jun 08, 2003 3:28 am

I got my 350 from xp direct before the forces of spcr knocked down their doors and ransacked their initial stock, good to see they got 400 more lol.

As for service, it was fast, price was cheap and the box came with peanuts and a power cord... nothing else. I was thrilled =)

Cheers!
-Liq

JimK · Post by **JimK** » Sun Jun 08, 2003 6:23 am

My "Retail" 300 from Newegg came with only the power cord, that must be the standard FSP "package."

Yes, it is neat that such an inexpensive PSU can be so nice.

FishaOfMen · Post by **FishaOfMen** » Sun Jun 08, 2003 8:44 am

Check out my post at the bottom of this page

.

jamoore9 · Post by **jamoore9** » Mon Jun 16, 2003 10:15 am

Is anybody running the 300 Watt unit with a P4 "C", Radeon 9500 or higher, and 2 optical drives? Just wanting to know if it'll push enough juice. My current 350W doesn't seem to be up to snuff.

RDaneel · Post by **RDaneel** » Tue Jun 17, 2003 6:58 am

I agree with jamoore9 - I'd love to know if a 300W will power my new high end system. I was going to get a SilenX 350W, but I am concerned about heat, so I might just try this PSU.

I want to be able to run a 3+ GHz P4, Radeon 9700, DVD+RW, DVD-ROM, and one 120mm fan (for the watercooling radiator) without power issues. It seems that 300W is enough for many people, but I don't want to take any chances!

Thanks!
RDaneel

modman · Post by **modman** » Tue Jun 17, 2003 7:01 am

jamoore9 wrote:Is anybody running the 300 Watt unit with a P4 "C", Radeon 9500 or higher, and 2 optical drives? Just wanting to know if it'll push enough juice. My current 350W doesn't seem to be up to snuff.

This is a bit off topic but to answer your question:

The R9500 Pro wants 200W, but it doesn't specify if PSU or 12V line.

I had one that caused high-pitch squeeks and screen glitches on a Enermax EG365 (350W). The Enermax (claims to) put 185W on the 12V, with up to 22A.

The Fortron 300W states 15A, no watts rating, but probably less than 185W.

I think the PSU reqs for the R9500 Pro are in the 400W+ range with 200W+ on the 12V line.

I fixed my problem by getting a R9600 Pro, which doesn't need extra PSU power, and generates less heat because of less circuits. I have a P4 2.8C GHz.

I believe Mr_Smartepants still has a R9700 Pro w/heatpipe and a 120MM Fortron; don't know which one. He mentioned noticing some video glitches when he padded his box.

Cheers

livedistortion · Post by **livedistortion** » Tue Jun 17, 2003 2:44 pm

Is there a 400W version with a 120 fan?

ycss · Post by **ycss** » Tue Jun 17, 2003 3:34 pm

livedistortion wrote:Is there a 400W version with a 120 fan?

Nope.....not yet.

Zhentar · Post by **Zhentar** » Tue Jun 17, 2003 4:10 pm

modman- wattage is volts* amps, som the fortron has 180 watts, and the enermax 264 watts.....

which just goes to prove PSU sellers are lying like dogs.

Fortron power supply with 120mm fan

Here's a place to try

woo