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CoolerMaster 600, OCZ 600 and Zalman 660W PSU roundup

Cases & PSU/Power Supplies by geoffrey @ 2009-07-14

Looking for a 600~700W pc power supply but haven´t decided yet what to get? We at Madshrimps have tested three popular products from major brands like Coolermaster, Zalman and OCZ. We compared features, performance and efficiency. Which one to get? Read on to find out!

Zalman extreme power 660W pics & results

Zalman extreme power 660W box unpacked

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Inside the box we found:

Zalman extreme power 660W power supply

Sleeved cables

Manual

5 x Cable Ties

4 x PSU Installation Screws

AC Power Cord (not included in certain countries)

As extra feature Zalman added their ZM-DC1 cable which allows using two fans from one molex connector: one at 12 Volt and one fan running at 5 Volt.

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Cables explored

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1 x PCI-E2(6+2pin) Cable

2 x ODD/HDD Cables

4 x S-ATA Cables

1 x FDD Cable

1 x Fan Dual-Connector (ZM-DC1, not pictured)

Attached onto the PSU is a 24pins ATX cable, a 4+4pins EPS cable and a 6pins PCIe power connector. Special attention goes out to the ATX connector which appears to be covered up nicely too. Some will like, I don't: in smaller pc cases it might interferer with the 2,5" and 3,5" HDD/DVD retention bays plus it might be incompatible with the elder 20 pins mainboards where there are motherboards components placed next to the ATX plug. Positive here is that Zalman adds many cables and allows connecting 6 molex devices and 12! SATA devices.

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Also make note that Zalman gold plated all of their terminals. Personally I don't think this means a whole lot, it won't make the difference in efficiency between 80+ bronze or silver, it's very possible the difference isn't measurable at all but I'm sure gold does make it look better though.

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More pictures

The ZM660-XT is the largest one PSU in this roundup. This probable is due to the XT series existing out of two flavors where the ZM770-XT is the higher-end unit (which require bigger/more components). Same housing and design is used for both, and they both allow 4x20Amps max on the 12V lines, the difference lies in the maximum combined power.

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A glimpse inside shows us many components and extra space used for heatpipe cooling. The heatpipe is used to add cooling for the main rectifiers which should enable lower noise operation. For ventilation they use their own Zalman ZF1425ATF 140mm fan which is produces 94,3 CFM and 31,6dBA at 12V/1740 rpm, but just as with their other products this fan is speed controlled so in many ways it might turn out a lot more silenced.

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Another shot inside, very impressive finishing, look at their LED lightning. For cool aesthetics they did not use a LED-fan, yet they've build 4 LEDS inside the psu, once the fan is spinning the light will come through anyway and this way more directional light will light up your pc housing.

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Zalman extreme power 660W results

How to read the table underneath? Well, we tried 3 different load settings: 100%, 50% and 20% of the total power rating. In the left green field on the right side of the table you can read the output power of the PSU, i.e. the load we set, it's calculated by measuring the live voltage per rail, and by measuring the flowing current per volt rail. You can also see what numbers we've measured inside the CM labs, and how many power is consumed by multiplying U (Volts) with I (Ampéres). In the red field on the left side represents the input power of the PSU, i.e. how many in total is being drawn from the wall plug. The second green value on the right side is the efficiency of the power supply, or output power divided by input power, in percent that is.

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Zalman has no problems keeping inside the 80+ bronze specs with the ZM660-XT, they came out as most efficient in our today’s line-up. Voltage rails remain stable under high load, slightly undervolting as we turn up the power demands but certainly nothing to worry about. During our tests we measured up to 81,5 Amps inrush current which is quite a lot, even with being the highest power rated this is roughly 80% more then the CoolerMaster unit! Power consumption is low and protection circuitry proofed to be well working:

Inrush current: 81,5 Ampére

Power Factor: 0,87~0,97

Standby power consumption: 0,6 Watt

12V shortcut protection: OK

5V shortcut protection: OK

Like with the other PSU's we increased the load on the 12V rail, this way we're able to get 782W out of the PSU before we noticed degraded performance, in short: more then enough headroom.

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