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Corsair HX 620W Power Supply Review

Cases & PSU/Power Supplies by KeithSuppe @ 2006-11-14

Corsair has ventured even further away from their home range landing in the middle of Power Supply territory. Their initial offering´s are well constructed and feature one of the best modular cable systems seen to date. Today we have the opportunity to test their CMPSU-620HX modular PSU.

Specifications / Under the Hood

Corsair HX620 Specifications

Madshrimps (c)

Corsair has replaced the atypical spec list at their site, with a list providing information in layman’s terms. I'm inclined to agree with their method since end-users in the market for a 520W or 620W PSU would most likely appeal to more mainstream users rather then a high-end gamers or overclockers.

Madshrimps (c)

It's not as if these power supplies don't pack a punch and with the HX620 SLI is definitely in the picture, however; with Geforce 8800 GTX graphic cards now hitting store shelves and quad core CPU already falling into reviewer’s hands, 1000W PSU's are becoming standard for the extreme user. The HX620 seems to have enough power to appeal to all sorts of people. Similar to its modular design, even specifications listed at the site are user-friendly. All the vital details are found here including efficiency, noise and power tables, seen in thumbnails below. The latter were taken directly from the site and HX series manual respectively.

For those who may resist change, or simply prefer the usual specification layout I've translated the data from Corsair's site into that format below.

Corsair HX620W PSU
Operating Range:	Universal AC input 90~264V automatically scans and detects the correct voltage.
Active Power Factor Correction:	0.99
Operating Frequency:	50-60Hz
Current:	10A
Efficiency:	Double forward switching - 80%
DC Output:	+5V @ 30A +12V1 @ 18A +12V2 @ 18A +12V3 @ 18A -12V @ 0.8A +3.3V @ 24A +5VSB @ 3A max combined wattage - 3.3V & 5V = 170W max combined wattage - 12V* = 600W total power = 620W
Safety Approvals:	UL, CUL, CE, CB, FCC Class B, TÜV, CCC, C-tick
Operating Temperature:	50ºC
Industrial Grade Capacitor Temp	105ºC (4 times the lifespan of conventional 85ºC rated capacitors)
Fan Type:	Ultra quiet 120mm double ball-bearing (varying RPM by temperature)
Noise:	19 - 35dB(A) / 10 - 100% LOAD respectively
Compatibility:	Supports the latest ATX12V v2.2 and EPS12V 2.91 standards and is backwards compatible with ATX12V 2.01 systems. Guaranteed compatibility with dual-GPU configurations
M/B Connectors:	24-pin, 8-pin, 4-pin, dual 6-pin Video
Drive (Assorted) Connectors:	8 Serial ATA connectors (4 on 520W), 1x2-Molex, 2x3-Molex, 1x2-floppy (Molex adapter), 1xMolex to Fan.
Dimensions:	5.9"(W) x 3.4"(H) X 5.9"(L) 150mm(W) x 86mm(H) x 150mm(L)
MTBF:	100,000 hours

Under the Hood:

At first glance the HX620 look's to be robust and well constructed. The circuitry is organized, capacitance is substantial, and the main transformer is significant.

Madshrimps (c)

Heat is our nemesis and the HX620 features a 120mm fan supplied by ADDA. It's quite powerful moving 85.2CFM at 39.1dB(A) which does present a noise concern, but certainly keeps things cool when needed. The fan is temperature controlled which does aid in noise reduction and proper cooling.

Madshrimps (c)

Under the Hood Continued -->

Comment from SuAside @ 2006/11/15

compared to the competition (in the same pricerange), it does have rather small sinks, doesn't it?

Comment from jmke @ 2006/11/16

I've been going through the review again, especially the noise section; from the different readings, a max. difference between idle/load of ~3dBA is hardly a noticeable increase.

thus I've altered the final conclusion, stating that the unit indeed, quiet thanks to the use of a larger 120mm fan.

Comment from Carni4 @ 2006/11/16

I bought this PSU about a month ago together with a Antec P180B and it's great. The corsair fits the antec like a glove.
I don't have the latest hardware, so i don't get it to load fully. I just love the fact that it only blows cold air out

It also come with that cool bag for your modular cables. The bag is great for your toothbrush and stuff when you go to a LAN

Comment from EsaT @ 2006/11/16

Quote:

Originally posted by SuAside
compared to the competition (in the same pricerange), it does have rather small sinks, doesn't it?

Compared to plain aluminum plates in FSP (Fortron) Epsilon 600W/700W (same design also in OCZ GameXstream) heatsinks used by Seasonic are big.
Remember that efficiency is factor determining what amount of cooling capacity (=size of heatsinks and/or amount of airflow) is required.

And despite of three (virtual) 12V rails in sticker there's two of them at most on PCB and there aren't any current limiting devices in those meaning it works as single 12V line PSU.
http://jonnyguru.com/review_details....=32&page_num=2
Markings for two 12V lines on PCB are there because originally Seasonic's aim was design with current limited rails (/or came from design of original S12 serie) but they took notice of possible problems with power hungry components and left current limiting out but so that it could be added to PSU if customer wants.

Same Seasonic's design is used also in PC P&C Silencer 750W. Determining this similarity should be easy to do by comparing innards where only bigger difference is heatsinks optimized for different airflow:
http://www.madshrimps.be/?action=get...&articID=5 10
http://www.madshrimps.be/?action=get...&articID=5 11

As for noise these tests aren't enough for fully determining that, even that second test rig peaks under 400W and that's just where fan speed would start to increase more, at least that Silencer might start getting towards noisy end of scale at higher loads because 80mm fans can't move so much air without lot of RPMs which makes higher pitched more disturbing noise than 12cm fans.

Torture test (emphasis on torture) of same design in Seasonic's own brand PSU can be found here:
http://jonnyguru.com/review_details....=13&page_num=2

Comment from Sidney @ 2006/11/16

I wish I had a load tester.

Comment from jmke @ 2006/11/16

apparently, they are quite costly

his setup http://jonnyguru.com/new_testing/

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