need absolutely silent power supply

[g1981c]

i'm currently using an Enermax Galaxy 1000W power supply but my system only uses about 50 watts of power from the wall. i'm running 3770K, off of integrated graphics with two SSDs and one HDD, and no other hardware.

i want absolutely silent PSU because i will be recording in the same room and i need my computer as quiet as humanly possibly.

that said, i don't want a PSU that will only be able to power this particular system - i want a versatile PSU that will be able to power any reasonable non-gaming build easily but also be absolutely silent when powering a low-power system like the one i have now.

i could end up building a video editing / file server machine that could end up looking as something like 100W cpu + 2 X 150W GPU or a 2 X 150W xeon CPU + 100W gpu plus about 10 x 10W hard drives so about 500W load total which would call for a 700W or so PSU.

so ideally i would like something that is silent up to about 100W load but is rated as high as 700W so that it can reliably drive the aforementioned video editing machine if i build one, but also run silently when i'm not actually editing videos.

i saw seasonic makes PSUs that can shut the fan off below 30% load and that seems to be exactly what i need, but it would not be prudent to order anything without consulting the forum

i was looking to spend about $100 to $150 or so, but i am open to other suggestions.

 

[lehtv]

Seasonic X650 $90. There is no contest, this is the absolute lowest I've ever seen the unit, it usually goes for $130+. What's more, this is the improved revision with 7 year warranty and ribbon cables. Just buy it before it's out of stock.

In my experience the fan won't turn on until above 300 watt load.

 

[g1981c]

Seasonic X650 $90. There is no contest, this is the absolute lowest I've ever seen the unit, it usually goes for $130+. What's more, this is the improved revision with 7 year warranty and ribbon cables. Just buy it before it's out of stock.

In my experience the fan won't turn on until above 300 watt load.

hm, it has low reviews ...

what about this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151098

it costs more, but ...

your suggestion: 81% 5-star reviews, 10% 1-star reviews
my contender: 85% 5-star reviews, 3% 1-star reviews

also i am not sure what's to like about ribbon cables ? it seems ribbon ones are the cheap ones.

 

[lehtv]

1. almost all of the reviews are of the previous revision of the unit
2. it also has 81% five star reviews
3. most of the negative reviews are of faulty or DOA units, they have no bearing on the quality of a properly working unit. DOA is not even a valid reason to post a negative review because any electrical component can be DOA. It is inevitable and it just means you got unlucky.
4. 10% one star reviews doesn't mean that there's a 10% chance you'll get a crappy unit. People who experience issues are much, much more likely complain and post a review about it than people who receive a unit that works as advertised. DOA rates for PSUs as for components in general are in the 1-3% range, the X650 is no exception and neither is the X560.

I can't recommend the X560, it's way too expensive compared to X650, and it has two years less warranty and no ribbon cables.

 

[g1981c]

1. Almost all of the reviews are of the previous revision of the unit
2. It also has 81% five star reviews
3. Most of the negative reviews are of faulty or doa units, they have no bearing on the quality of a properly working unit. Doa is not even a valid reason to post a negative review because any electrical component can be doa. It is inevitable and it just means you got unlucky.
4. 10% one star reviews doesn't mean that there's a 10% chance you'll get a crappy unit. People who experience issues are much, much more likely complain and post a review about it than people who receive a unit that works as advertised. Doa rates for psus as for components in general are in the 1-3% range, the x650 is no exception and neither is the x560.

I can't recommend the x560, it's way too expensive compared to x650, and it has two years less warranty and no ribbon cables.

why do you like the ribbon cables ??? that seems to be the cheapest and worst kind of cable !

 

[philipma1957]

why do you like the ribbon cables ??? that seems to be the cheapest and worst kind of cable !

much more routable for wire management.

here is one of seasonics best the platinum version

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151121 i own 2 of the 1000 watters




here is the entire line of them:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...atinum&x=0&y=0



I own 2x 1000 watt platinums



2x 660 watt gold older version with thicker round cables.


2x 400 watt fanless.

I also helped build a small sound studio for a friend ..

I would argue for you to buy a platinum version and the 660 watter is on sale. read reviews

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=326 the 660 plat

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=264 the 1000 plat

the 660 platinum is superior to the gold x650 in every way but 1 price

For most people I would say get the x650 and save the money. In your case (need for quiet ) I would think the platinum is better.

right now you would even get some of the money back due to the plat being better on low power draw. so go for the plat.

 

[lehtv]

why do you like the ribbon cables ??? that seems to be the cheapest and worst kind of cable !

They're fully black so they look better against black case interior, and as philipma1957 pointed out, they're much easier to route. I wouldn't worry about lack of sleeving, I think Seasonic knows what they're doing.

 

[Zap]

why do you like the ribbon cables ??? that seems to be the cheapest and worst kind of cable !

Is the cable able to transfer the power it was designed for?

YES or NO



Then again, people spend all kinds of crazy money on cabling, thinking it gives some magic properties over "cheaper" cabling. this guy spent money on a premium USB cable, of all things, to improve the sound quality of his external USB DAC.

 

[philipma1957]

They're fully black so they look better against black case interior, and as philipma1957 pointed out, they're much easier to route. I wouldn't worry about lack of sleeving, I think Seasonic knows what they're doing.

Is the cable able to transfer the power it was designed for?

YES or NO



Then again, people spend all kinds of crazy money on cabling, thinking it gives some magic properties over "cheaper" cabling. this guy spent money on a premium USB cable, of all things, to improve the sound quality of his external USB DAC.

to op and above I like flat cables and if you really need special cables with short or long length this site is good.




http://www.moddiy.com/


he is not cheap and it is overseas but they have many sizes for a smaller build.



http://www.moddiy.com/products/Seas...0-Custom-PSU-Modular-Cables.html#.UN87mqVG78s


pretty colors etc. I used his gear in my small case




builds



http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=2268192


i have 3 of these one with an i5 3470s one with an i7 3770t and one with an i7 3770k. all have hd7970's inside but if you pull that gpu and put this one inside.

dead quiet http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102980 silent

 

[GAO]

hm, it has low reviews ...

what about this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151098

it costs more, but ...

your suggestion: 81% 5-star reviews, 10% 1-star reviews
my contender: 85% 5-star reviews, 3% 1-star reviews

also i am not sure what's to like about ribbon cables ? it seems ribbon ones are the cheap ones.

Here is the review of the latest KM3 X-650 line, ignore the others as they are for earlier versions:

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/Seasonic-X-Series-KM3-650-W-Power-Supply-Review/1690

 

[lehtv]

It's not like the professional reviews for the earlier version were somehow bad.

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/837 - Golden Award. Conclusion states "flawless power supply"
http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=169 - 9.5/10, with 10/10 in performance and functionality

 

[kleinkinstein]

Back down to $90, damn! That's the BF price! I need more X650's too but they are OOS and Amazon is sitting at $160.

@ lehtv, Keep your sanity and stop trying to talk this guy off the ledge of denial and into the best psu made. We need more for us.

 

[2.71828183]

One comment I have to make as an owner of the X650: If you're going for absolutely silent, you may have to deal with coil whine. I bought one during the Black Friday sale, RMA'd it because of excessive whine, and got a replacement only marginally better. I decided to muffle the whine myself instead of playing the RMA lottery again.

Let me be clear: there's nothing wrong with the power delivery of the unit, and I haven't heard the fan come on once, so other than the coil whine, it's an excellent power supply. Also, the limited poking around I've done leads me to believe that coil whine is a thing that a lot of high-efficiency PSU designs do, not necessarily specific to the Seasonic. I don't know of any manufacturers that have specifically addressed the whine issue with potted coils or other design/component changes. The Seasonic X650 in particular has a lot of negative feedback mentioning coil whine, but that may just be because there's no fan noise to drown it out, so it's subjectively more obnoxious.

It is possible to muffle the whine noise, and if you get a unit as bad as mine (and if you have good high-frequency hearing), you'll want to. Putting the PSU in a case with sound-dampening (Define R4) helped a lot, and I've got a blanket draped over it (carefully so it doesn't block airflow) to muffle the whine coming out the back. The noise seems to be pretty directional, so if you can put something soft and relatively heavy in between your ears (or microphone or whatever) and the source of the noise, it should be pretty well muffled.

Another addendum: If you've never built a silent rig before, you may be surprised at what else you can hear. I can hear coil whine from my monitors and graphics card, 60Hz buzz from my UPS, and I can hear a "grunting" (like hard drive noises, but much quieter) from the VRMs when my processor switches between load and idle. None of these are nearly as loud as the PSU whine, which is why I was rather disappointed when I bought it, but they are noticeable in a quiet room. (The graphics card is the only other one that I'd class as obnoxious, and that is dealt with by my sound-damped case. It was clearly audible in my previous case, which was much more open.) If you have a hard drive, it'll make a horrible racket--a truly silent build pretty much has to be SSD-only.

 

[Ferzerp]

I like the Kingwin Stryker.

Modular, 80+ platinum, but it's 500W which is more than you need. I use it in my HTPC. At 50W of load (not wall power), it's something like 87% efficient, so you'd be low on its efficiency curve. It doesn't pass 90% efficiency until your load is 70W. So, I'm not sure that it's really the best choice, but I know it works well.

 

[g1981c]

One comment I have to make as an owner of the X650: If you're going for absolutely silent, you may have to deal with coil whine. I bought one during the Black Friday sale, RMA'd it because of excessive whine, and got a replacement only marginally better. I decided to muffle the whine myself instead of playing the RMA lottery again.

Let me be clear: there's nothing wrong with the power delivery of the unit, and I haven't heard the fan come on once, so other than the coil whine, it's an excellent power supply. Also, the limited poking around I've done leads me to believe that coil whine is a thing that a lot of high-efficiency PSU designs do, not necessarily specific to the Seasonic. I don't know of any manufacturers that have specifically addressed the whine issue with potted coils or other design/component changes. The Seasonic X650 in particular has a lot of negative feedback mentioning coil whine, but that may just be because there's no fan noise to drown it out, so it's subjectively more obnoxious.

It is possible to muffle the whine noise, and if you get a unit as bad as mine (and if you have good high-frequency hearing), you'll want to. Putting the PSU in a case with sound-dampening (Define R4) helped a lot, and I've got a blanket draped over it (carefully so it doesn't block airflow) to muffle the whine coming out the back. The noise seems to be pretty directional, so if you can put something soft and relatively heavy in between your ears (or microphone or whatever) and the source of the noise, it should be pretty well muffled.

Another addendum: If you've never built a silent rig before, you may be surprised at what else you can hear. I can hear coil whine from my monitors and graphics card, 60Hz buzz from my UPS, and I can hear a "grunting" (like hard drive noises, but much quieter) from the VRMs when my processor switches between load and idle. None of these are nearly as loud as the PSU whine, which is why I was rather disappointed when I bought it, but they are noticeable in a quiet room. (The graphics card is the only other one that I'd class as obnoxious, and that is dealt with by my sound-damped case. It was clearly audible in my previous case, which was much more open.) If you have a hard drive, it'll make a horrible racket--a truly silent build pretty much has to be SSD-only.

i am quite sensitive to high frequency whine. i often hear it on equipment in which there are no mentions of it in any of the reviews. for my recording i could most likely kill it with noise reduction software because it would be such a distinct and monotonous tone ( as opposed to something like hard drive chatter, that is spurious ) but i would most likely go insane myself being in the same room with it, and i am in the same room with this PC on for more than 10 hours a day.

i have a mechanical hard drive but it's strictly for storage. the os / program files is 2 x 128 gb SSD raid, so i am pretty well covered on that front, as the storage hard drive doesn't just start randomly accessing stuff for no reason.

yeah i would have to say the whine is unacceptable. thanks for bring it up because while Newegg prices are low their return policy is not as nice as Amazon's. amazon has this PSU for $160 which is obviously a joke - but it has other nice seasonics at prices that match newegg.

do you think other seasonics from the "X" and "platinum" series would be quieter in the whine department ? or are they all likely the same ?

 

[ExcaliburMM]

As an X650 owner and it being my third SeaSonic, I can tell you anyone questioning the quality of a SeaSonic unit has no business in PC building. They are the top of the line in PSUs, bar none. They have consistent scores across the board, look at any JohnnyGuru review of them, and no one reviews a PSU as in depth as JG.

Now as for what you need:

If you want quiet, you have to pay for it, and that's it. Quiet is as much of a commodity as any other feature of a product. So there's going to be a premium, and you have to make peace with that. I'm very familiar with wanting something specific and not being happy with the price, but that's the way of the world.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151122
Fanless, platinum efficiency, modular, and though rated for 520 I'd bet anything it can run a 550w load and laugh. And why can it do that? Because its a SeaSonic unit, and that means its quality.

If you need something above 550w, you need a fan cooled PSU, and you have plenty of other suggestions in this thread for that.

 

[lehtv]

Back down to $90, damn! That's the BF price! I need more X650's too but they are OOS and Amazon is sitting at $160.

Yeah, not surprised. The page showed it in stock just earlier today.

@ lehtv, Keep your sanity and stop trying to talk this guy off the ledge of denial and into the best psu made. We need more for us.

:awe:

One comment I have to make as an owner of the X650: If you're going for absolutely silent, you may have to deal with coil whine. I bought one during the Black Friday sale, RMA'd it because of excessive whine, and got a replacement only marginally better. I decided to muffle the whine myself instead of playing the RMA lottery again.

Coil whine was a relatively common complaint, I would expect it be one addressed in the new revision

 

[g1981c]

As an X650 owner and it being my third SeaSonic, I can tell you anyone questioning the quality of a SeaSonic unit has no business in PC building. They are the top of the line in PSUs, bar none. They have consistent scores across the board, look at any JohnnyGuru review of them, and no one reviews a PSU as in depth as JG.

Now as for what you need:

If you want quiet, you have to pay for it, and that's it. Quiet is as much of a commodity as any other feature of a product. So there's going to be a premium, and you have to make peace with that. I'm very familiar with wanting something specific and not being happy with the price, but that's the way of the world.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151122
Fanless, platinum efficiency, modular, and though rated for 520 I'd bet anything it can run a 550w load and laugh. And why can it do that? Because its a SeaSonic unit, and that means its quality.

If you need something above 550w, you need a fan cooled PSU, and you have plenty of other suggestions in this thread for that.

why would a fanless PSU be quieter than one with a fan that doesn't turn on ?

 

[IlllI]

Kingwin Stryker STR-500

 

[g1981c]

Kingwin Stryker STR-500

my inner artist can't get over that fake "heatsink" top. i don't do fake - it's not my style.

 

[Ferzerp]

my inner artist can't get over that fake "heatsink" top. i don't do fake - it's not my style.

Your "inner artist" has no concept of what fake is. It's completely functional. The inner components are mated to that plate with inner metal blocks, and of course, as we know more surface area is better for convection.

 

[g1981c]

Your "inner artist" has no concept of what fake is. It's completely functional. The inner components are mated to that plate with inner metal blocks, and of course, as we know more surface area is better for convection.

ok it seems semi-functional. i still think it is unnecessary.

 

[Eureka]

ok it seems semi-functional. i still think it is unnecessary.

Why would it be unnecessary? If you're going silent it means going fanless, and going fanless means you need passive heat dissipation. And it's not even obnoxious, it's just molded into the casing. Get over your "inner artist" and realize that a) it's actually used and b) who cares, it's going inside your case.

 

[g1981c]

Why would it be unnecessary? If you're going silent it means going fanless, and going fanless means you need passive heat dissipation. And it's not even obnoxious, it's just molded into the casing. Get over your "inner artist" and realize that a) it's actually used and b) who cares, it's going inside your case.

fine whatever, i still think a hybrid system with on-demand fan is better than a fanless solution for my needs.

because as i explained i need silence when i am recording audio using Adobe Audition, which doesn't tax the system very much, but when i edit videos ( which uses a lot of juice ) i don't need silence. so i don't need silence and power at the same time.

in fact, i want not only a hybrid psu with on-demand fan but i want also the switch that toggles between "normal" and "hybrid" modes because i want the fan on at all times except when i'm recording. since i have an open case i would be able to flip the switch anytime.

 

[Maximilian]

As has been mentioned umpteen times before, buy a seasonic X series.