Antec is probably just the first observation of this issue, that if you have dual toaster ovens in your case, you need a mighty, mighty 12V rail. Split 12V rail designs can even exacerbate the problem.
The idea of "clean power" is an ideal, not necessarily important for digital circuits running off of stepped-down 12V rails. There's nothing running on that dedicated rail that needs clean power, presuming Tyan did at least a reasonably job at the VRM subcircuits. Rather, it seems most likely these Antecs are simply running out of magic smoke.
That kind of problem would as easily occur with many PSU, but it seems likely only a few are being used on these Tyan boards, especially given the fairly short list of Tyan recommended PSU. It could easily be that the Antec is not particularly weak compared to the typical PSU, rather the others on Tyan's list are well above average in their class.
IMO, we've reached that point where Intel's novel idea about higher PSU efficiency is a dead-end, it's time to move past PS2 form-factor and develop some critera for true capacity and recovery time on 12V rails. I've said it before and I'll say it again, with most PSU it's simply impossible for them to appropriately support their lofty 12V amperage ratings. Antec claims 19A * 2 @ 12V. Maybe 19A * 1 / 2 is a better spec.
Intel was passing along novel concepts about how efficient a psu was, instead of the more primary issues about heat density and what the true sustained:rated capacity are. While efficiency is nice, and greener, it's a secondary concern that PSU manufacturers should not be distracted towards pouring $ into until the base design is fit per rating.
And you don’t see a correlation between efficiency and "true sustained:rated capacity"?
A PSU with high efficiency needs much less input power to get rated output. Hence is much likelier to deliver it. Also the function of a PSU is very dependent on temperature and since low efficiency gets more power wasted as heat again the same correlation exists.
High efficiency is not a problem at all; it’s a benefit and a big one at that.
Antec is also know to have a Capacitor problem in some of their PSUs. Bad caps can definitely cause the fluctuations seen. A recording O-scope may be needed to actually see the fluctuations as they would be very transient drops as the foils in the cap shorted briefly until a hole forms in the foil. Could be in the millisecond range.
. As I've often said re. Antec (who also had a problem with failing front USB port assemblies and probably the flimsy door hinge problem too) pushes their OEMs into cost-cutting to meet their price points. If I were a Taiwanese PSU mfr, I'd rather start selling direct than having to deal with Antec.
-- Begin Rant Here --
. People - hear this and hear it well: Antec is almost entirely a marketing company that got big and out of control. If you want quality products, buy direct from the folks that actually make the products and you'll be happier. I think even Channel Well (Antec's major OEM PSU supplier) has gone to selling direct (new website here in the states, product showing up with their label on it various places). So buy your PSU with the Channel Well name on it, or Zippy or Fortron/Sparkle, etc. And tell the Antecs of the world to kiss off until they get thier acts together - they were doing it properly once, perhaps they can do it again. -- End of Rant --
I was on the verge of buying a new Antec 550W TP 2.0 EPS PSU for my Tyan K8SD Pro I have laying around. This is incredibly timely news for me! I got in on the AMD Tech Tour deal in the summer for 2 Opteron's, the Tyan board, and Windows Server 2003, and I have yet to put it all together. Now I'm stuck in decision mode again.
Consumer level PC power supplies have pretty much all been junk up until recent years when it was disclosed just how bad these units were and the fact that many if not most of the PSUs for sale caused major issues with leading edge CPUs and other solid state devices. AMD is the first one I recall stepping up to the plate and sorting out the crap from the usable PSUs when they released the Athlon and approved 300W PSUs.
Since then every Johnny-come-lately has tried to get "approved" by meeting the most basic MINIMUM Intel PSU specs. Typical marketing hype is how many watts a unit produces but the ad claims are usually under bogus test conditions with no independent verification of actual line QUALITY which is far more important in most applications than the total PSU wattage output.
There have been a few good PSU reviews online, but quite frankly PC enthusiasts for the most part fail to comprehend the importance of QUALITY, clean, stable PC power and opt for their favorite brand or someone else's favorite brand like sheep headed to the slaughter house. Only the serious enthusiast and professional PC system builder seek out PSUs that have been independently verified to deliver QUALITY, clean, stable PC power long term, from reputable mfgs. Most PC enthusiasts buy a low-to-medium priced PSU and hope for the best, never understanding the problems inferior PSUs cause with system stability and performance.
The saying that you get what you pay for still holds true in most things in life and finding a "drop dead deal" on a quality PSU doesn't happen because of the cost involved in producing a QUALITY PSU. That doesn't however mean you need to pay a fortune for a quality PSU or buy a larger wattage PSU than required for your application. In my experience Seasonic and PC Power and Cooling are the ONLY PSUs I've found to provide reliable, QUALITY, clean PC power for the long term and their PSUs are competitively priced with the highly marketed unreliable Asian names you see at all the volume e-tailers like Rotten Egg, Monarch, Bad Buy, Clueless USA, and all the rest. Why people will blow $200-$700 on a video card and skimp on a PSU is beyond me, but you see it every single day. Then these same folks can't understand why they have overclocking or stability issues with their PC or why components like memory and CPUs fail prematurely.
DUH, it takes clean, stable DC power to run a modern PC reliably. BTW, PC Power and Cooling has a list of Tyan and other Mobo mfgs. specific PSUs that anyone building a serious PC should consider. Anyone who thinks you can buy a suitable QUALITY PSU for a modern PC for less than $50 has no clue about PSUs or PCs.
Link to Tyan and other mfgs. Mobo specific dual/quad CPU and Specialty PSUs: (follow the link to the section you desire)
Consumer level PC power supplies have pretty much all been junk up until recent years when it was disclosed just how bad these units were and the fact that many if not most of the PSUs for sale caused major issues with leading edge CPUs and other solid state devices. AMD is the first one I recall stepping up to the plate and sorting out the crap from the usable PSUs when they released the Athlon and approved 300W PSUs.
Since then every Johnny-come-lately has tried to get "approved" by meeting the most basic MINIMUM Intel PSU specs. Typical marketing hype is how many watts a unit produces but the ad claims are usually under bogus test conditions with no independent verification of actual line QUALITY which is far more important in most applications than the total PSU wattage output.
There have been a few good PSU reviews online, but quite frankly PC enthusiasts for the most part fail to comprehend the importance of QUALITY, clean, stable PC power and opt for their favorite brand or someone else's favorite brand like sheep headed to the slaughter house. Only the serious enthusiast and professional PC system builder seek out PSUs that have been independently verified to deliver QUALITY, clean, stable PC power long term, from reputable mfgs. Most PC enthusiasts buy a low-to-medium priced PSU and hope for the best, never understanding the problems inferior PSUs cause with system stability and performance.
The saying that you get what you pay for still holds true in most things in life and finding a "drop dead deal" on a quality PSU doesn't happen because of the cost involved in producing a QUALITY PSU. That doesn't however mean you need to pay a fortune for a quality PSU or buy a larger wattage PSU than required for your application. In my experience Seasonic and PC Power and Cooling are the ONLY PSUs I've found to provide reliable, QUALITY, clean PC power for the long term and their PSUs are competitively priced with the highly marketed unreliable Asian names you see at all the volume e-tailers like Rotten Egg, Monarch, Bad Buy, Clueless USA, and all the rest. Why people will blow $200-$700 on a video card and skimp on a PSU is beyond me, but you see it every single day. Then these same folks can't understand why they have overclocking or stability issues with their PC or why components like memory and CPUs fail prematurely.
DUH, it takes clean, stable DC power to run a modern PC reliably. BTW, PC Power and Cooling has a list of Tyan and other Mobo mfgs. specific PSUs that anyone building a serious PC should consider. Anyone who thinks you can buy a suitable QUALITY PSU for a modern PC for less than $50 has no clue about PSUs or PCs.
Link to Tyan and other mfgs. Mobo specific dual/quad CPU and Specialty PSUs: (follow the link to the section you desire)
Consumer level PC power supplies have pretty much all been junk up until recent years when it was disclosed just how bad these units were and the fact that many if not most of the PSUs for sale caused major issues with leading edge CPUs and other solid state devices. AMD is the first one I recall stepping up to the plate and sorting out the crap from the usable PSUs when they released the Athlon and approved 300W PSUs.
Since then every Johnny-come-lately has tried to get "approved" by meeting the most basic MINIMUM Intel PSU specs. Typical marketing hype is how many watts a unit produces but the ad claims are usually under bogus test conditions with no independent verification of actual line QUALITY which is far more important in most applications than the total PSU wattage output.
There have been a few good PSU reviews online, but quite frankly PC enthusiasts for the most part fail to comprehend the importance of QUALITY, clean, stable PC power and opt for their favorite brand or someone else's favorite brand like sheep headed to the slaughter house. Only the serious enthusiast and professional PC system builder seek out PSUs that have been independently verified to deliver QUALITY, clean, stable PC power long term, from reputable mfgs. Most PC enthusiasts buy a low-to-medium priced PSU and hope for the best, never understanding the problems inferior PSUs cause with system stability and performance.
The saying that you get what you pay for still holds true in most things in life and finding a "drop dead deal" on a quality PSU doesn't happen because of the cost involved in producing a QUALITY PSU. That doesn't however mean you need to pay a fortune for a quality PSU or buy a larger wattage PSU than required for your application. In my experience Seasonic and PC Power and Cooling are the ONLY PSUs I've found to provide reliable, QUALITY, clean PC power for the long term and their PSUs are competitively priced with the highly marketed unreliable Asian names you see at all the volume e-tailers like Rotten Egg, Monarch, Bad Buy, Clueless USA, and all the rest. Why people will blow $200-$700 on a video card and skimp on a PSU is beyond me, but you see it every single day. Then these same folks can't understand why they have overclocking or stability issues with their PC or why components like memory and CPUs fail prematurely.
DUH, it takes clean, stable DC power to run a modern PC reliably. BTW, PC Power and Cooling has a list of Tyan and other Mobo mfgs. specific PSUs that anyone building a serious PC should consider. Anyone who thinks you can buy a suitable QUALITY PSU for a modern PC for less than $50 has no clue about PSUs or PCs.
Link to Tyan and other mfgs. Mobo specific dual/quad CPU and Specialty PSUs: (follow the link to the section you desire)
First off all: Antec does not make powersupplies, they charge a premium and pay a lot less to an OEM that makes it for them (which has to do costsavings because they enforce a low cost and do not wish to put money where it counts). Let me tell you: just because a PSU appears outwardly expensive it doesn't mean that it is and that the money / budget was spent correctly (read: where it should be - the INTERNAL components , R&D and design of the PSU)
In my experience as a dealer & distributor of computerhardware I can state the following:
- Antec return rate is currently the highest of ANY powersupply we sell (even much higher than the 350W budget ATX psu's in cases we sell at 37 EUR VAT incl. or similar), and this since over a year now. I have yet to see any other brands with a returnpercentage that is on some models well over 25% (!!!) Therefor I currently do not recommend Antec supplies to any of my customers, a real shame - because they sell some nice cases (which they do not make themselves either).
- after some time several truepower models (especially the 380/430W models) start showing undervolt on the +12v and +5v rails - causing all kinds of weird system reliability issues.
- Tom's hardware recent PSU live test shows clearly that two supplies from Antec did not pass first sample test (ripple was out of ATX spec for example). Now if you know that many far cheaper PSUs can easily stay within the ripple spec, you have to wonder... Only after some tweaking by two engineers that were sent by Antec the supplies passed the THG test.
- Note that what is important is that much of a PSUs quality depends on failsafes built in the PSU. It does not always mean that when a PSU posts with a cheapass board that it is a better PSU. It may merely show that the PSU that kicks into failsafe is reacting to a badly design powercircuit or short, while some other supplies do not or for example damage the system & cause permanent faillure of the PSU(booting for example even when there is a short, creating a possible firehazard!). Quality PSUs like the below brands usually have 6 to 8 failsafe techniques built in. Cheap / low quality PSUs do not most of the time.
- Quality control: Some mfr. will perform a full load duration test at high ambient temp in a clima room. Others will use much lower temps and will test only 100% load for a very short period, with only continuous load test at e.g. 85% or similar. I think it is quite clear that a 100% load test for several hours at e.g. 55 degrees celcius will be a much better test than e.g. 15 minutes 100% load and 85% load for 30 minutes at e.g. 35 degrees... (details some mfr. fail to specify). In general you will find that the industrial PSUs are better tested to operate under these kind of conditions. You should also note, that some cheaper models - while they are labeled with some quality labels like TUV or EC, FCC - are in effect not fulfilling the requirements to earn these labels. Not all mfr. are correct and printing a label is very easy - the official instancies' checks are only random.
PC Power & Cooling (they are based on Zippy or Seasonic designs, depending on the model)
Very expensive, and generally loud (depending on the model) with focus on high quality and reliability
(http://www.pcpowercooling.com)">http://www.pcpowercooling.com)
The return percentage of the latter are much much MUCH lower than Antec, Enermax,... or whatever (usually non-manufacturer, like these latter two) you want to throw in. On Fortron/Zippy I can honestly state that to my knowledge return percentage is well under 1%.
You will notice that you'll see Fortron's FSP productcodes (fortron/sparkle) and Zippy or some OEM products based on some of their designs quite often in Tyan and other serverboard mfr. recommended PSU lists.
love how some people can skew opinion by omitting other facts. They state one number and all the sudden they are right!
Nice to know the return percentage on a product, but are you not forgetting which product is also purchased the most!
i work at a retail chain, and by far antec is the psu that is bought the most. So, common sense would tell u that it would be the one returned the most too!
another bit of information you so kindly left out is that half the time the people that buy psu are trouble shooting their system and have no intention of keeping the product!!
when you factor both those issues in, the actual defect rate is much lower!!
Oh, may i add user error too! How do u know that the duffous didnt kill the psu him self?
Democrate!!! i tell ya, cant live with them, cant get rid of them!!
Uh, he is talking percentage of sold units. How many are sold peroid is irrelevant when he is talking a percentage. If he had said how many total returns he was getting you would be correct.
I have heard from others who run shops that Antec has a high return rate as well, this story is not unusual.
What this has to do with Democrats and Liberals I haven't a clue.
Your right, but my points was he was not painting a complete and concise picture. Using a percentage is fine when all things are equal here, but they are not. Antec has to produce much more product than its competition, causing a higher percentage of defect rate. Secondly, as stated periviously, people are more inclinded to buy a BETTER product to do testing to locate there problem. These people would be a part of the percentage that he stated, which have nothing to do with deffects. all he managed to do, is create a false statement by implimenting an a simple fact that is difficult to dispute.
Now, what does his statement have to do with liblerals, is the fact that they do similar things in politics. Painting there own picture of how the war was started in Iraq. So, with his statement that he has made, deems him a liberal in my eye!
nothing against, just making a harmless joke (not a good one at that i see).
Do you even understand what a percentage is? A higher return percentage means that, compared to the number of units sold, more units are returned. It's irrelevant how many units are sold in total. Did you even make it past 4th grade maths?
Antec is basically in the business of rebranding cases and PSUs and then selling them for ridiculous prices to suckers like you. Lately they've been getting greedy and buying cheaper, crappier PSUs. But as long as people like you keep buying them, I don't think they have anything to worry about.
quote: Now, what does his statement have to do with liblerals, is the fact that they do similar things in politics. Painting there own picture of how the war was started in Iraq. So, with his statement that he has made, deems him a liberal in my eye!
Ok then, what would be a conservative/republican? Lying sack of shit who would do anything to meet his agenda and please his butt-buddies in the oil business?
The (literally) last Antec PSU I had was a 430W TruePower and almost all rails had pretty heavy fluctuating voltage. While that never caused any trouble for my old Athlon XP box on a Asus NF2 board, I simply dont recommend Antec power supplies anymore. This is also in line with some extensive tests recently published by the c't print magazine, where also surge and burst resistance problems have been discovered - which Antec blamed on a manufacturing fault that has been fixed by now.
yeah i'm not. my roomate's computer in college started to lock up and freeze and he noticed teh 5 volt rail dipping to 3 volts. turns out his antec power supply had melted two of the 24? or 20 pin things that connects to the motherboard. poor guy. at least his computer still worked :-D lol.
if u are going to constantly have these pc power people pushing there products maybe anand should get some ad revenue. it seems that any and every powersupply thread/article, has these pcpc fanbois. too them i say, a quatlity psu should not have to cost 200 bucks PERIOD. pcpc is good, ok we get it. don't have to wave there flag everywhere.
I would hardly blame Tyan for a power supply not putting out 12v on that line. Its not like the board is magically lowering the voltage. I have the 2885 myself and its a great board, rock solid, but then I use an OCZ power supply with it.
Just out of curiosity, what did Tyan 'used to be' in your opinion? My dual Athlon board never worked right, and under Unix one CPU would never show up. My dual Opteron board works perfectly under any OS. Seems they are improving at least by my experience.
And idea which power supplies give the problems? Don't scare people off from buying great power supplies to go with their Tyan boards because of a problem with consumer level Antec PSUs. I can say with complete certainty that this problem does not effect all Antec PSUs.
Since November 2003 I've had a workstation with a Thunder K8W (s2885) and an Antec True 550 (v1) without a single problem almost 24/7.
Yes some Tyan boards are picky. I can't even get ATI video cards to run on the board because they're incompatible with the AMD chipset, but don't go scaring people into buying new PSUs without elaborating on which models are effected.
We've done some testing with Tyan as this article was the first they'd heard of any issues. So far nothing is wrong.
We're continuing to work/research this to find out exactly what's going on.
S2882 has been phased out, but Tyan tested other motherboards with TP2-550EPS12V and both 12V rail reading are around 12.03V and 11.97V
Here is the system configuration:
Dual Opteron E6 880 Dualcore 2.4G x 2
nVIDIA FX3400 Quadro FX
Memory DDR400 2G x 8 = 16G
They are running 100% burn in test and SST test at the same time. Both CPUs consume 14A during the burn in test. But I never see both 12V rails drop below 11.9V.
This is not the first time I have read about Antec PSU's having compatability issues. A few years ago there was a similar story involving Antec. Maybe someone remembers it better than me and knows where the link is.
This is not the first time I have read about Antec PSU's having compatability issues. A few years ago there was a similar story involving Antec. Maybe someone remembers it better than me and knows where the link is.
Yes, there is alot of threads about it at silentpcreview.com. I'm one of the unfortunate suckers with an Asus A8N-SLI Premium and an Antec Neo HE. Computer powers on, and shuts down after 20-30 seconds. Doesn't matter what I do. Idle CPU temps when this happends is 25C. Computer works perfectly with a $25 generic noname PSU.
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39 Comments
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mindless1 - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Antec is probably just the first observation of this issue, that if you have dual toaster ovens in your case, you need a mighty, mighty 12V rail. Split 12V rail designs can even exacerbate the problem.The idea of "clean power" is an ideal, not necessarily important for digital circuits running off of stepped-down 12V rails. There's nothing running on that dedicated rail that needs clean power, presuming Tyan did at least a reasonably job at the VRM subcircuits. Rather, it seems most likely these Antecs are simply running out of magic smoke.
That kind of problem would as easily occur with many PSU, but it seems likely only a few are being used on these Tyan boards, especially given the fairly short list of Tyan recommended PSU. It could easily be that the Antec is not particularly weak compared to the typical PSU, rather the others on Tyan's list are well above average in their class.
IMO, we've reached that point where Intel's novel idea about higher PSU efficiency is a dead-end, it's time to move past PS2 form-factor and develop some critera for true capacity and recovery time on 12V rails. I've said it before and I'll say it again, with most PSU it's simply impossible for them to appropriately support their lofty 12V amperage ratings. Antec claims 19A * 2 @ 12V. Maybe 19A * 1 / 2 is a better spec.
ceefka - Thursday, November 17, 2005 - link
Why has that to do with high efficiency? Clean power is something else altogether isn´t it?I was planning on buying a Phantom 500W. Am I in trouble now?
mindless1 - Thursday, November 17, 2005 - link
Intel was passing along novel concepts about how efficient a psu was, instead of the more primary issues about heat density and what the true sustained:rated capacity are. While efficiency is nice, and greener, it's a secondary concern that PSU manufacturers should not be distracted towards pouring $ into until the base design is fit per rating.Live - Saturday, November 19, 2005 - link
And you don’t see a correlation between efficiency and "true sustained:rated capacity"?A PSU with high efficiency needs much less input power to get rated output. Hence is much likelier to deliver it. Also the function of a PSU is very dependent on temperature and since low efficiency gets more power wasted as heat again the same correlation exists.
High efficiency is not a problem at all; it’s a benefit and a big one at that.
Zepper - Monday, November 21, 2005 - link
Antec is also know to have a Capacitor problem in some of their PSUs. Bad caps can definitely cause the fluctuations seen. A recording O-scope may be needed to actually see the fluctuations as they would be very transient drops as the foils in the cap shorted briefly until a hole forms in the foil. Could be in the millisecond range.. As I've often said re. Antec (who also had a problem with failing front USB port assemblies and probably the flimsy door hinge problem too) pushes their OEMs into cost-cutting to meet their price points. If I were a Taiwanese PSU mfr, I'd rather start selling direct than having to deal with Antec.
-- Begin Rant Here --
. People - hear this and hear it well: Antec is almost entirely a marketing company that got big and out of control. If you want quality products, buy direct from the folks that actually make the products and you'll be happier. I think even Channel Well (Antec's major OEM PSU supplier) has gone to selling direct (new website here in the states, product showing up with their label on it various places). So buy your PSU with the Channel Well name on it, or Zippy or Fortron/Sparkle, etc. And tell the Antecs of the world to kiss off until they get thier acts together - they were doing it properly once, perhaps they can do it again. -- End of Rant --
.bh.
Webgod - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
I was on the verge of buying a new Antec 550W TP 2.0 EPS PSU for my Tyan K8SD Pro I have laying around. This is incredibly timely news for me! I got in on the AMD Tech Tour deal in the summer for 2 Opteron's, the Tyan board, and Windows Server 2003, and I have yet to put it all together. Now I'm stuck in decision mode again.Beenthere - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
HOUSTON WE HAVE AN ANANDTECH SERVER PROBLEM...Consumer level PC power supplies have pretty much all been junk up until recent years when it was disclosed just how bad these units were and the fact that many if not most of the PSUs for sale caused major issues with leading edge CPUs and other solid state devices. AMD is the first one I recall stepping up to the plate and sorting out the crap from the usable PSUs when they released the Athlon and approved 300W PSUs.
Since then every Johnny-come-lately has tried to get "approved" by meeting the most basic MINIMUM Intel PSU specs. Typical marketing hype is how many watts a unit produces but the ad claims are usually under bogus test conditions with no independent verification of actual line QUALITY which is far more important in most applications than the total PSU wattage output.
There have been a few good PSU reviews online, but quite frankly PC enthusiasts for the most part fail to comprehend the importance of QUALITY, clean, stable PC power and opt for their favorite brand or someone else's favorite brand like sheep headed to the slaughter house. Only the serious enthusiast and professional PC system builder seek out PSUs that have been independently verified to deliver QUALITY, clean, stable PC power long term, from reputable mfgs. Most PC enthusiasts buy a low-to-medium priced PSU and hope for the best, never understanding the problems inferior PSUs cause with system stability and performance.
The saying that you get what you pay for still holds true in most things in life and finding a "drop dead deal" on a quality PSU doesn't happen because of the cost involved in producing a QUALITY PSU. That doesn't however mean you need to pay a fortune for a quality PSU or buy a larger wattage PSU than required for your application. In my experience Seasonic and PC Power and Cooling are the ONLY PSUs I've found to provide reliable, QUALITY, clean PC power for the long term and their PSUs are competitively priced with the highly marketed unreliable Asian names you see at all the volume e-tailers like Rotten Egg, Monarch, Bad Buy, Clueless USA, and all the rest. Why people will blow $200-$700 on a video card and skimp on a PSU is beyond me, but you see it every single day. Then these same folks can't understand why they have overclocking or stability issues with their PC or why components like memory and CPUs fail prematurely.
DUH, it takes clean, stable DC power to run a modern PC reliably. BTW, PC Power and Cooling has a list of Tyan and other Mobo mfgs. specific PSUs that anyone building a serious PC should consider. Anyone who thinks you can buy a suitable QUALITY PSU for a modern PC for less than $50 has no clue about PSUs or PCs.
Link to Tyan and other mfgs. Mobo specific dual/quad CPU and Specialty PSUs: (follow the link to the section you desire)
http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl...">http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl...
Beenthere - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Consumer level PC power supplies have pretty much all been junk up until recent years when it was disclosed just how bad these units were and the fact that many if not most of the PSUs for sale caused major issues with leading edge CPUs and other solid state devices. AMD is the first one I recall stepping up to the plate and sorting out the crap from the usable PSUs when they released the Athlon and approved 300W PSUs.Since then every Johnny-come-lately has tried to get "approved" by meeting the most basic MINIMUM Intel PSU specs. Typical marketing hype is how many watts a unit produces but the ad claims are usually under bogus test conditions with no independent verification of actual line QUALITY which is far more important in most applications than the total PSU wattage output.
There have been a few good PSU reviews online, but quite frankly PC enthusiasts for the most part fail to comprehend the importance of QUALITY, clean, stable PC power and opt for their favorite brand or someone else's favorite brand like sheep headed to the slaughter house. Only the serious enthusiast and professional PC system builder seek out PSUs that have been independently verified to deliver QUALITY, clean, stable PC power long term, from reputable mfgs. Most PC enthusiasts buy a low-to-medium priced PSU and hope for the best, never understanding the problems inferior PSUs cause with system stability and performance.
The saying that you get what you pay for still holds true in most things in life and finding a "drop dead deal" on a quality PSU doesn't happen because of the cost involved in producing a QUALITY PSU. That doesn't however mean you need to pay a fortune for a quality PSU or buy a larger wattage PSU than required for your application. In my experience Seasonic and PC Power and Cooling are the ONLY PSUs I've found to provide reliable, QUALITY, clean PC power for the long term and their PSUs are competitively priced with the highly marketed unreliable Asian names you see at all the volume e-tailers like Rotten Egg, Monarch, Bad Buy, Clueless USA, and all the rest. Why people will blow $200-$700 on a video card and skimp on a PSU is beyond me, but you see it every single day. Then these same folks can't understand why they have overclocking or stability issues with their PC or why components like memory and CPUs fail prematurely.
DUH, it takes clean, stable DC power to run a modern PC reliably. BTW, PC Power and Cooling has a list of Tyan and other Mobo mfgs. specific PSUs that anyone building a serious PC should consider. Anyone who thinks you can buy a suitable QUALITY PSU for a modern PC for less than $50 has no clue about PSUs or PCs.
Link to Tyan and other mfgs. Mobo specific dual/quad CPU and Specialty PSUs: (follow the link to the section you desire)
http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl...">http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl...
Beenthere - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Consumer level PC power supplies have pretty much all been junk up until recent years when it was disclosed just how bad these units were and the fact that many if not most of the PSUs for sale caused major issues with leading edge CPUs and other solid state devices. AMD is the first one I recall stepping up to the plate and sorting out the crap from the usable PSUs when they released the Athlon and approved 300W PSUs.Since then every Johnny-come-lately has tried to get "approved" by meeting the most basic MINIMUM Intel PSU specs. Typical marketing hype is how many watts a unit produces but the ad claims are usually under bogus test conditions with no independent verification of actual line QUALITY which is far more important in most applications than the total PSU wattage output.
There have been a few good PSU reviews online, but quite frankly PC enthusiasts for the most part fail to comprehend the importance of QUALITY, clean, stable PC power and opt for their favorite brand or someone else's favorite brand like sheep headed to the slaughter house. Only the serious enthusiast and professional PC system builder seek out PSUs that have been independently verified to deliver QUALITY, clean, stable PC power long term, from reputable mfgs. Most PC enthusiasts buy a low-to-medium priced PSU and hope for the best, never understanding the problems inferior PSUs cause with system stability and performance.
The saying that you get what you pay for still holds true in most things in life and finding a "drop dead deal" on a quality PSU doesn't happen because of the cost involved in producing a QUALITY PSU. That doesn't however mean you need to pay a fortune for a quality PSU or buy a larger wattage PSU than required for your application. In my experience Seasonic and PC Power and Cooling are the ONLY PSUs I've found to provide reliable, QUALITY, clean PC power for the long term and their PSUs are competitively priced with the highly marketed unreliable Asian names you see at all the volume e-tailers like Rotten Egg, Monarch, Bad Buy, Clueless USA, and all the rest. Why people will blow $200-$700 on a video card and skimp on a PSU is beyond me, but you see it every single day. Then these same folks can't understand why they have overclocking or stability issues with their PC or why components like memory and CPUs fail prematurely.
DUH, it takes clean, stable DC power to run a modern PC reliably. BTW, PC Power and Cooling has a list of Tyan and other Mobo mfgs. specific PSUs that anyone building a serious PC should consider. Anyone who thinks you can buy a suitable QUALITY PSU for a modern PC for less than $50 has no clue about PSUs or PCs.
Link to Tyan and other mfgs. Mobo specific dual/quad CPU and Specialty PSUs: (follow the link to the section you desire)
http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl...">http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl...
Griswold - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Word.Sh0ckwave - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
I would like to see an updated power supply roundup from Anandtech.IwillBenelux - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Hi,This is no surprise to me at all.
First off all: Antec does not make powersupplies, they charge a premium and pay a lot less to an OEM that makes it for them (which has to do costsavings because they enforce a low cost and do not wish to put money where it counts). Let me tell you: just because a PSU appears outwardly expensive it doesn't mean that it is and that the money / budget was spent correctly (read: where it should be - the INTERNAL components , R&D and design of the PSU)
In my experience as a dealer & distributor of computerhardware I can state the following:
- Antec return rate is currently the highest of ANY powersupply we sell (even much higher than the 350W budget ATX psu's in cases we sell at 37 EUR VAT incl. or similar), and this since over a year now. I have yet to see any other brands with a returnpercentage that is on some models well over 25% (!!!) Therefor I currently do not recommend Antec supplies to any of my customers, a real shame - because they sell some nice cases (which they do not make themselves either).
- after some time several truepower models (especially the 380/430W models) start showing undervolt on the +12v and +5v rails - causing all kinds of weird system reliability issues.
- Tom's hardware recent PSU live test shows clearly that two supplies from Antec did not pass first sample test (ripple was out of ATX spec for example). Now if you know that many far cheaper PSUs can easily stay within the ripple spec, you have to wonder... Only after some tweaking by two engineers that were sent by Antec the supplies passed the THG test.
- Note that what is important is that much of a PSUs quality depends on failsafes built in the PSU. It does not always mean that when a PSU posts with a cheapass board that it is a better PSU. It may merely show that the PSU that kicks into failsafe is reacting to a badly design powercircuit or short, while some other supplies do not or for example damage the system & cause permanent faillure of the PSU(booting for example even when there is a short, creating a possible firehazard!). Quality PSUs like the below brands usually have 6 to 8 failsafe techniques built in. Cheap / low quality PSUs do not most of the time.
- Quality control: Some mfr. will perform a full load duration test at high ambient temp in a clima room. Others will use much lower temps and will test only 100% load for a very short period, with only continuous load test at e.g. 85% or similar. I think it is quite clear that a 100% load test for several hours at e.g. 55 degrees celcius will be a much better test than e.g. 15 minutes 100% load and 85% load for 30 minutes at e.g. 35 degrees... (details some mfr. fail to specify). In general you will find that the industrial PSUs are better tested to operate under these kind of conditions. You should also note, that some cheaper models - while they are labeled with some quality labels like TUV or EC, FCC - are in effect not fulfilling the requirements to earn these labels. Not all mfr. are correct and printing a label is very easy - the official instancies' checks are only random.
Some brands I can recommend in general:
Fortron Source (good quality for your buck)
(http://www.fsp-group.com.tw)">http://www.fsp-group.com.tw)
Zippy Emacs (generally rather expensive but very solid, industrial PSUs)
(http://www.zippy.com.tw)">http://www.zippy.com.tw)
Seasonic (a bit more expensive than Fortron in general, but also good productquality)
(http://www.seasonic.com.tw)">http://www.seasonic.com.tw)
PC Power & Cooling (they are based on Zippy or Seasonic designs, depending on the model)
Very expensive, and generally loud (depending on the model) with focus on high quality and reliability
(http://www.pcpowercooling.com)">http://www.pcpowercooling.com)
The return percentage of the latter are much much MUCH lower than Antec, Enermax,... or whatever (usually non-manufacturer, like these latter two) you want to throw in. On Fortron/Zippy I can honestly state that to my knowledge return percentage is well under 1%.
You will notice that you'll see Fortron's FSP productcodes (fortron/sparkle) and Zippy or some OEM products based on some of their designs quite often in Tyan and other serverboard mfr. recommended PSU lists.
Regards,
David / Iwill Benelux
Goose77 - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
love how some people can skew opinion by omitting other facts. They state one number and all the sudden they are right!Nice to know the return percentage on a product, but are you not forgetting which product is also purchased the most!
i work at a retail chain, and by far antec is the psu that is bought the most. So, common sense would tell u that it would be the one returned the most too!
another bit of information you so kindly left out is that half the time the people that buy psu are trouble shooting their system and have no intention of keeping the product!!
when you factor both those issues in, the actual defect rate is much lower!!
Oh, may i add user error too! How do u know that the duffous didnt kill the psu him self?
Democrate!!! i tell ya, cant live with them, cant get rid of them!!
Goose77 - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
oops, ment Liberals... democrate are actually good when they aint liberal!Reflex - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Uh, he is talking percentage of sold units. How many are sold peroid is irrelevant when he is talking a percentage. If he had said how many total returns he was getting you would be correct.I have heard from others who run shops that Antec has a high return rate as well, this story is not unusual.
What this has to do with Democrats and Liberals I haven't a clue.
Goose77 - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Your right, but my points was he was not painting a complete and concise picture. Using a percentage is fine when all things are equal here, but they are not. Antec has to produce much more product than its competition, causing a higher percentage of defect rate. Secondly, as stated periviously, people are more inclinded to buy a BETTER product to do testing to locate there problem. These people would be a part of the percentage that he stated, which have nothing to do with deffects. all he managed to do, is create a false statement by implimenting an a simple fact that is difficult to dispute.Now, what does his statement have to do with liblerals, is the fact that they do similar things in politics. Painting there own picture of how the war was started in Iraq. So, with his statement that he has made, deems him a liberal in my eye!
nothing against, just making a harmless joke (not a good one at that i see).
will stop posting now!
Justin Case - Sunday, November 20, 2005 - link
Do you even understand what a percentage is? A higher return percentage means that, compared to the number of units sold, more units are returned. It's irrelevant how many units are sold in total. Did you even make it past 4th grade maths?Antec is basically in the business of rebranding cases and PSUs and then selling them for ridiculous prices to suckers like you. Lately they've been getting greedy and buying cheaper, crappier PSUs. But as long as people like you keep buying them, I don't think they have anything to worry about.
Griswold - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Ok then, what would be a conservative/republican? Lying sack of shit who would do anything to meet his agenda and please his butt-buddies in the oil business?
Just a joke... of course.
Webgod - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Don't believe every conspiracy theory you hear. Perhaps you need to be Hannitized.Chadder007 - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Wow....thanks for the info. I always though that Antec made good PSU's....oh well.Griswold - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
The (literally) last Antec PSU I had was a 430W TruePower and almost all rails had pretty heavy fluctuating voltage. While that never caused any trouble for my old Athlon XP box on a Asus NF2 board, I simply dont recommend Antec power supplies anymore. This is also in line with some extensive tests recently published by the c't print magazine, where also surge and burst resistance problems have been discovered - which Antec blamed on a manufacturing fault that has been fixed by now.quasarsky - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
yeah i'm not. my roomate's computer in college started to lock up and freeze and he noticed teh 5 volt rail dipping to 3 volts. turns out his antec power supply had melted two of the 24? or 20 pin things that connects to the motherboard. poor guy. at least his computer still worked :-D lol.michal1980 - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
if u are going to constantly have these pc power people pushing there products maybe anand should get some ad revenue. it seems that any and every powersupply thread/article, has these pcpc fanbois. too them i say, a quatlity psu should not have to cost 200 bucks PERIOD. pcpc is good, ok we get it. don't have to wave there flag everywhere.Phantronius - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
I'd blame Tyan more then Antec, tyans not what it used to be.Reflex - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
I would hardly blame Tyan for a power supply not putting out 12v on that line. Its not like the board is magically lowering the voltage. I have the 2885 myself and its a great board, rock solid, but then I use an OCZ power supply with it.Just out of curiosity, what did Tyan 'used to be' in your opinion? My dual Athlon board never worked right, and under Unix one CPU would never show up. My dual Opteron board works perfectly under any OS. Seems they are improving at least by my experience.
dilidolo - Monday, November 21, 2005 - link
So what UNIX are you using? What kernel are you booting into?I have different Tyan boards with dual Opterons, work fine on Linux, FreeBSD and Solaris 10.
Phantronius - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Oh and I have a Antec NeoPower with a Asus A8N SLI Premium with no problems.hravn - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Do you have a Neopower or a Neopower HE? It's only the HEs that have troubles with the A8N-SLI boards.Rayvn - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
And idea which power supplies give the problems? Don't scare people off from buying great power supplies to go with their Tyan boards because of a problem with consumer level Antec PSUs. I can say with complete certainty that this problem does not effect all Antec PSUs.Since November 2003 I've had a workstation with a Thunder K8W (s2885) and an Antec True 550 (v1) without a single problem almost 24/7.
Yes some Tyan boards are picky. I can't even get ATI video cards to run on the board because they're incompatible with the AMD chipset, but don't go scaring people into buying new PSUs without elaborating on which models are effected.
AntecRep - Friday, November 18, 2005 - link
We've done some testing with Tyan as this article was the first they'd heard of any issues. So far nothing is wrong.We're continuing to work/research this to find out exactly what's going on.
S2882 has been phased out, but Tyan tested other motherboards with TP2-550EPS12V and both 12V rail reading are around 12.03V and 11.97V
Here is the system configuration:
Dual Opteron E6 880 Dualcore 2.4G x 2
nVIDIA FX3400 Quadro FX
Memory DDR400 2G x 8 = 16G
They are running 100% burn in test and SST test at the same time. Both CPUs consume 14A during the burn in test. But I never see both 12V rails drop below 11.9V.
Googer - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
This is not the first time I have read about Antec PSU's having compatability issues. A few years ago there was a similar story involving Antec. Maybe someone remembers it better than me and knows where the link is.You will almost never have a problems with http://pcpowerandcooling.com/">PC Power and Cooling
Googer - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Adding to my last comment. I believe there were some press releases last time Antec's PSU did not work with certain Motherboards. Strike Two Antec!ATTuan - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
Sorry, I neglected to include the power supply model. My mistake.It's the Antec True Power 2 EPS units that have the problem. You can find more information on them here: http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=...">http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=...
essjae - Thursday, November 17, 2005 - link
" We have been advised that certain Antec power supplies " by who? Is there any data to back this up? Where's the link?Googer - Saturday, November 19, 2005 - link
This is not the first time I have read about Antec PSU's having compatability issues. A few years ago there was a similar story involving Antec. Maybe someone remembers it better than me and knows where the link is.Live - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
There are reports of antec NeoHE PSUs having problems with ASUS nvidia based boards both for the AMD and Intel platform.hravn - Wednesday, November 16, 2005 - link
Yes, there is alot of threads about it at silentpcreview.com. I'm one of the unfortunate suckers with an Asus A8N-SLI Premium and an Antec Neo HE. Computer powers on, and shuts down after 20-30 seconds. Doesn't matter what I do. Idle CPU temps when this happends is 25C. Computer works perfectly with a $25 generic noname PSU.Rayvn - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
err...edit:Since November 2003 I've had a workstation with a Thunder K8W (s2885) and an Antec True 550 (v1) running without a single problem almost 24/7.
Rayvn - Tuesday, November 15, 2005 - link
err...edit:Since November 2003 I've had a workstation with a Thunder K8W (s2885) and an Antec True 550 (v1) running without a single problem almost 24/7.