Page 3 - Physical Look - Inside
As always, we opened up our FSP Dagger 600W power supply to take a detailed look at what is going on inside. Please note that doing this at home will void your five-year warranty, thanks to the warranty seal FSP applied over one of the attachment screws. But for the benefit of you, we cracked ours open so you do not need to, haha. There are no user serviceable parts inside.
Disassembling the FSP Dagger 600W is quite straightforward with the removal of nine screws. The Dagger 600W is designed and made by FSP themselves, which is unsurprising, since the company is a large PSU OEM for many other brands. Our photo above shows an overhead view of its internal components. At first glance, the build quality appears to be average. It is not the best we have seen, but it is also far from being the worst. There are two main heatsinks inside, with all the components crowded into this small space.
A quick tug on the shell, and we got straight to the internal inspection. The transient filter stage is the first input stage of a computer power supply, so we will take a look at that first. FSP has always done a great job in the past to make sure their power supplies met or exceeded the recommended requirements, and the Dagger 600W is no exception. The FSP Dagger 600W has two common mode chokes, one differential mode choke, two metalized polyester X-capacitors, and four ceramic Y-capacitors. This is two times the amount of X capacitors and Y capacitors than recommended. There is no metal oxide varistor, but a diode is used to stabilize spikes from the AC line first seen in the FSP AURUM Gold 600W. A Power Integrations TNY278PN switcher for controlling standby power can be spotted as well.
On the primary side, we can see one Japanese brand Nippon Chemi-Con capacitor. Japanese brand capacitors are usually what we expect from something in this price range, so this is nothing surprising. Our 600W version of FSP's Dagger incorporates one 330µF x 450V capacitor. This unit is rated at 105c; whereas more value oriented power supplies usually use 85c rated capacitors.
The active PFC circuit featured on the FSP Dagger 600W uses one Diodes Incorporated GBU1506U glass passivated bridge rectifier attached to one side of what is barely a heatsink. At 115V, the maximum rectified forward current capacity with heatsink is 15A, so you can theoretically pull up to 1725W (15A * 1 diode * 115V) from the bridge rectifier at 100% efficiency -- of course, this is limited by the fact that it is not 100% efficient, and neglects the fact that not every component in the system are able to keep up. Two STMicroelectronics STF24N60M2 N-channel MOSFETs located on the larger heatsink are used on the active PFC circuit on the FSP Dagger 600W power supply, with a Cree C3D06060A Schottky diode. This rectifier is certified for up to 9.5A at 135c. Two Toshiba TK16A60W MOFSETs can also be found on the smaller aluminum heatsink, with a Champion CM6901 LLC resonant controller to boost efficiency. Each STMicroelectronics STF24N60M2 MOFSET can deliver up to 12A at 100 degrees Celsius continuously. These transistors present a maximum resistance of 0.19 ohm when turned on; with a typical resistance of 0.168 ohm according to the manufacturer's data sheet. The Toshiba TK16A60W MOSFETs can deliver up to 15.8A at 25 degrees Celsius continuously (The specifications for 100c were not listed); with a maximum resistance of 0.19 ohm and a typical resistance of 0.16 ohm. This on characteristic is called Static Drain-Source On-Resistance, or commonly abbreviated as RDS(on). The more efficient the component is, the lower the RDS(on) value, since it wastes less power with lower resistance.
On the secondary side, we see capacitors made by Japanese manufacturers Nippon Chemi-Con and Nichicon as well as Chinese manufacturer CapXon. Japanese capacitors are generally preferred for better quality. As with modern high efficiency power supplies, all rectifiers produce the +12V out -- while the +5V and +3.3V outputs are generated from the +12V output using a DC to DC converter within the power supply unit. Three Toshiba TPHR8504PL MOSFETs are responsible for the rectification process. The TPHR8504PL's rated continuous drain current is 150A at 25c (The specifications for 100c were not listed), and a pulsed drain current of 500A. Drain source voltage is rated at 20V, and a RDS(on) value of 0.85 ohm maximum and 0.70 ohm typical. Two Texas Instruments CSD86350Q5D are used to generate the +5V and +3.3V outputs. Meanwhile, a Silicon Touch PS223 monitoring IC provides the Dagger 600W's OVP, UVP, and OCP protection. The datasheets for all components mentioned in this review can be found on their respective manufacturer's websites.
At the back, we have a large daughterboard covering the entire rear panel for the modular cable sockets. There is nothing special going on here electrically other than a few CapXon filtering capacitors. The output connector configuration can be seen on the previous page. Overall, the internal build quality of FSP Dagger's 600W power supply is ordinary. Components are tightly packed given the limited amount of space available, and solder points on its black PCB is done to an acceptable quality. I would say the FSP branded, FSP built Dagger 600W is generally average with regards to the selection of components used under the hood.
Lastly, we see an 80mm fan that provides cooling to the FSP Dagger 600W's internal components. It is connected to an add-in board using a 2-pin connector. An 80mm fan is rather small nowadays for a power supply with a bottom mounted fan even for a SFX power supply, but if not a lot of heat is being generated, it should not be much of an issue. The Dagger 600W is not a semi-passive power supply. An 80mm fan is used to keep the enclosure as small as possible. Power Logic is the fan OEM, with PLA08010B12HH as the model number, as shown in our photo above. Further research indicates the PLA08010B12HH is a dual ball bearing fan specified at 0.35A. Ball bearing fans are very reliable at the expense of noise.
Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. Physical Look - Outside
3. Physical Look - Inside
4. Minor Tests and Conclusion
