Silver saints! Enermax 850W/1050W Revolution series

[Travis]

Again Enermax showed their 82+ series to the public in Computex08 Taipei...
http://www.expreview.com/computex08/new/2008-06-06/1212749098d9108.html

but now we see a brand-new high-end series, Revolution, successors to the Galaxy series, hitting the high-power efficiency championship.

http://www.80plus.org/manu/psu/psu_detail.aspx?id=28&type=2

Both units are just pre-production samples. Both have shown exciting efficiency numbers(88.6% typical). Judging from the data they have four 12V "rails".

So let's welcome two new silver saints. This year is the "year of 80+ Silver".

plus: According to Hexus.net, Enermax had a close-door show of this Revolution procotype in Computex 08. http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=13634
I think this is the most interesting part of PSU section in this Computex08. Also we have AcBel showing its 80+ silver "R88 Power" series.
Now that two famous manufacturers have introduced their 80+ silver product lines, both in high-end range, the Galaxy War of Silver has begun.

[Super Nade]

80+ is nice but in my book is a worthless metric to judge power supplies by. It will be interesting to see if these current modulo units have lower failure rates than the liberty units or not. Too many reports of them blowing up for comfort.

[Travis]

I don't see many Enermax here in China so I can't see how the failure rate is. What caps are Liberty using? What's the symptom of the bad units? Does "blowing up" mean blowing up caps or blowing up transistors/resistors?

[Super Nade]

Transistors and diode-packs. Search this forum and you will find many complaints.

[SKYMTL]

Unfortunately, I have very little confidence in Enermax these days considering the issues many people have had with their recent units. Without a doubt it is great to see near 90% efficiency but that means very little to me if the PSU is going to self destruct after a year or two.

[jonnyGURU]

80+ is nice but in my book is a worthless metric to judge power supplies by. It will be interesting to see if these current modulo units have lower failure rates than the liberty units or not. Too many reports of them blowing up for comfort.

Agreed. Going through Computex this year, I'm finding 80 Plus is now "old hat". I'm seeing 80 Plus from Huntkey, Wintech... companies not known for best quality. Even out-of-nowhere start ups like Dominion are pushing 85+ efficiency on 1000W+ units.

Efficiency is no gauge of quality for sure.

[Oklahoma Wolf]

Yeah - everybody and their dog is now using the double forward converter design. It was inevitable more units would pass 80+ as a result.

[Travis]

Double forward is by all appearances far better than half-bridge that Huntkey is still sticking to even in their 600W units. Better efficiency, less heat, and you have much better switching transistors as your choice. Everybody is using a double forward on their unit and this is not a bad news.
The problem is if they're willing to build a quality unit, or just an efficient unit.
After all, one of the most important reason that many choose "good" PSUs is that, they're expected to last longer, but what if they don't?

Anyway I don't believe a company like HiPro or AcBel would build a product series that easily burn itself after 1 or 2 years. --But for small or less renowned providers like Enermax/Huntkey/Wintech, I'm not sure.

http://we.pcinlife.com/thread-943360-1-2.html
Some guy included Enermax in the "first-class PSU provider" list (while AcBel/Enhance/Delta are rated "second-class"), that's... awesome indeed.

[Spectre]

Anyway I don't believe a company like HiPro or AcBel would build a product series that easily burn itself after 1 or 2 years. For small or less renowned providers like Enermax/Huntkey/Wintech, I'm not sure.

Enermax has a pretty good reputation in the west even with some of the primary side failures. Hipro/AcBel are almost completely unheard of's ;)

[Travis]

Even out-of-nowhere start ups like Dominion are pushing 85+ efficiency on 1000W+ units.

Who's that Dominion?

[Spectre]

Who's that Dominion?

http://www.dominion.com.tw/

[Travis]

http://www.dominion.com.tw/
It focuses on special power supplies and it's only introducing one 80+ SILVER 1250W+ product line.
By "soft switching" it's no wonder that it has achieved this. The designers dare use this design and I bet they can handle this.
Since they're currently dealing with high power-density designs of special power supplies, they can handle that on PC units. They're definitely not the first ones who use soft-switch on PC power supplies, but that's the future of efficient PC powers and that's what CMC is about to do in the next year (promote the Resonant converter topology on PC power and provide controller chips).

Not only did I find one of its PDP adapter build neat and favorable, I also found this ad. on its website interesting:
http://www.dominion.com.tw/company_02.htm
"Network Analyzer - measure gain margin and phase margin"

Well I like that power supply company saying they use a network analyzer as an AD. Other companies aren't as interesting.

The whole BS above is only judging from the website info and has absolutely nothing to do with "Is this manufacturer reliable" question. But I guess you may find a little surprise from this new company.

[Spectre]

Not only did I find its build neat and favorable, I also found this ad.

What build have you seen that you find neat and favorable?

[Travis]

What build have you seen that you find neat and favorable?

An LCD projector power.
http://www.dominion.com.tw/products_02a.htm

Yeah I would like to see the internal design and build quality of their PC power products.

[jonnyGURU]

Double forward is by all appearances far better than half-bridge that Huntkey is still sticking to even in their 600W units.

You haven't seen their entire new product line. They revamped everything to double forward. Unfortunately, they still use the Frankenstein heatsinks. I talked to their head product manager lady and she was adamant that that was the most advantageous design. I told he it looked like ass and one didn't have to open the unit to see that but that didn't seem to change her mind. I should've learned "looks like ass" in Mandarin to make sure my point was more clear.

[Travis]

It's good news for ME to hear Huntkey now turns everything to double forward. At least now their units have better component choices using this design. It's just incredible that the largest manufacturer in mainland China is still using a quite aged design on its whole product line up to 600W.

btw: LW-8588 and LW-8688 are already double forward but they're EPS oriented noisy products.

I can't wait to see their new product line and sample units. Did she tell you if they're planning sub-500W mainstream double forward units, or even 300W units?

They still need a crap heatsink? Aweful.

What's her opinion of terrible results in Paul and Gabe's reviews?

"looks like ass" is "看起来很傻逼" in Mandarin. Ask a Chinese colleague of you to teach you this phrase. Seeing her next time tell her this and I'm sure that's clear. Tell her that a Chinese reader of you gets angry with that crap heatsink.

Is that a "She" being the head product manager? Damn...

[jonnyGURU]

"看起来很傻逼"

What's that in Pinyin? I don't read Mandarin. :D

[Travis]

看 kan 4
起 qi 3
来 lai 2
很 hen 3
傻 sha 3
逼 bi 1

The last two characters are a typical Chinese dirty word which you may frequently hear watching football games.


Totally off topic so let's get back to design/product specific discussions...

I'm not sure if this change to the double forward design happens only on oversea product lines, or includes the China market in.
For quality control ... I can't tell who's better. Huntkey, Great Wall, Wintech or even "Kingnod"?
There are so many manufacturers in a small area in Guangdong and Huntkey is among the larger ones.
If Huntkey is willing to build some stable units, they may not die so easily as Enermax.
After all a change from rather old half-bridge or push-pull to the mainstream forward design is a good step.
Double forward with group-regulation or dual mag-amp outputs is a typical old school design which every capable RD person should be familiar with, and you can easily get schematics of a CM6800 unit on internet. There's not a chance to build a mainstream crap, no way of doing this.
So I'm waiting for a Huntkey version of Antec EarthWatt or CWT DSA, maybe a CWT PSH?

Go one step further to synchronous buck converter on the secondary, efficiency is improved but performance is limited by component parameter of DC-DC module. The performance result varies. Looks like manufacturers don't want to pay for more copper wires.
Another approach is Active-clamp with SR on secondary. It's been a good design so far. Huntkey is using that on "Solid Rock 800" 600W unit.
PSFB or Resonant converter? I'm not familiar with these two but we've seen Antec Phantom as a good example of PSFB. Both two are popular on special power supplies (communication, modular redundant) which require high power density or/and high efficiency.

[Zap]

I should've learned "looks like ass" in Mandarin to make sure my point was more clear.

Next time ask me before you take off. :p I know a bit.

[jonnyGURU]

Know any Cuban-Spanish? I'm on my way to Miami now. :D

[Spectre]

Know any Cuban-Spanish? I'm on my way to Miami now. :D

Yo Quero Ft. Lauderdalo? Por favor.

[jonnyGURU]

Ft. Lauderdalo? DESEO! Simplemente viejos de Miami.

[Travis]

http://www.80plus.org/manu/psu/psu_detail.aspx?id=2&type=2

AcBel PC7061/PC7062/PC7063, three 80+ silver mid-range units, ~88% efficient under 50% load. Are they the "R88 power" announced on Computex08 Taipei?