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Application:

ATX Power supply

Provided by:

Epowertec

Available at:

PCClub

Review by:

Paul

Edited by:

Scott

Review date:

March 27th, 2004
 

Testing

     The best way we've found to test power supplies is to just monitor the fluctuations of the rails while operating your computer.  I used SiSoft Sandra and Winbond Hardware Doctor 2.71 to monitor the power supply while at idle and while under full load.  The test system is listed below.
 

Case Black Demon Case
CPU P4 2.4C @ 3.0GHz 1000FSB HTT
Motherboard Abit IS7-G
RAM 1GB Geil PC4200
Video Albatron nVidia 5700Ultra
Storage Maxtor 200GB Ultra ATA 100
Power epowertec Jaguar 450
Optical MSI DVD/CD-RW
Optical Lite-On 52x24x52x CD-RW

     Let's take a look at the results.  Sandra first.

Idle

Load

     As you can see from the screenshots above, the +5v line is functioning wonderfully.  Staying above 5v at idle and at load.  If you are interested in overclocking, this is important to you as lesser power supplies can dip on the 5v line causing poor overclocks.  The 3.3v line holds solid above it's rated spec throughout testing.  The 12v line fluctuates under load, but this is well within the specifications.  Let's see if we can confirm these results with Winbond Hardware Doctor 2.71.

Idle

Load

     If you aren't familiar with Hardware Doctor 2.71, the green blocks is the actual reading.  The other blocks you can adjust yourself for the low and high limits.  If you the power supply ever goes lower or higher than the limits you set, you will be notified.  The results are virtually identical with both Sandra and Hardware doctor.

Conclusion

     Epowertec has done an outstanding job with this power supply.  Keeping good solid voltages like the ones shown above will take a lot of headaches out of your computing experience.  With all of the high powered components on the market today, I'm seeing so many problems caused by lower grade power supplies.  The price of this power supply is right around $80.  That's not a lot to pay for the comfort of knowing your power supply is not what's holding your system back.  The only improvement I could see on this power supply would be to give the ECASO 100% power for the 3 minutes after shutdown.  This is an excellent power supply that has found a new home in my computer.  That's saying a lot since it's replacing an Enermax power supply.  Great features, great price.

Club Overclocker Rating

Innovation:

10 out of 10

Performance:

9.5 out of 10

Quality:

9.5 out of 10

Stability:

9.5 out of 10

Overclocking:

N/A

Value:

9.5 out of 10

Software Pack:

N/A

Overall Rating 9.5

 

Skill Level

Project Skill Level
(10 being hardest)

3 out of 10