Page 4 - Minor Tests and Conclusion
Power supplies are interesting products -- because often, reviews of products in this category are conducted and tested in methods that make it difficult to distinguish one power supply from another. Many aspects have to be taken into consideration -- of which certain criteria consists of efficiency, noise, power ripples, and of course the ability to pull out the rated specifications. Because many cannot afford such equipment to obtain results regarding those aspects, articles covering power supplies often come out with less than adequate and acceptable information. As this is a product report -- not a review -- what we are doing is a close examination of the power supply, and the internal hardware and build. But what we can do for you is do some minor testing with the results we can present to you with, and let other review sites with professional equipment show you the actual test results. We're not going to try to BS you by installing the power supply into the latest gaming rig and try to take readings from that, as this is not even remotely the correct way to test power supply units. We understand that many websites do that as a means of load testing, but the results, even if you use an oscilloscope and multimeter at each output location, it is not sufficient, nor does it accurately reflect the performance of the power supply.
Using our power supply tester which exerts minimal load on the power supply, the initial consumption was 11W as measured by our wall meter unit -- indicating that the basic load-free power consumption of the power supply is very good. It is a little more than products like the Cooler Master V1000 1000W, PC Power & Cooling Silencer Mk III 1200W, and Seasonic Platinum 1000W, but a bit less than the SilverStone Strider Gold S ST85F-GS 850W. Independent reviews from websites with professional load testing equipment showed the SilverStone Strider Gold S ST75F-GS V2.0 750W delivered very good efficiency, voltage regulation, and ripple across the board -- right up to its rated wattage. This includes its 80 Plus Gold certification.
Voltages with minimal load are generally accurate, which is a basic requirement of power supplies out of the box. In this situation all are within 2.5%. The PG (Power Good) delay seems to be well within its rated range and general power supply standard of 290ms.
Active power correction is important to correct AC load line loss. In AC power, there are three components to it; as there is a phase difference between current and voltage. This makes up the power triangle, which consists of the following: Average usable power (P, measured in watts), reactive power (Q, denoted as VA-R), and total power (S, written as VA). While they all have the same physical units, it is not the same thing as aforementioned. What we want is the average usable power -- with as little wasted reactive power as possible. The total power provided over the AC line is the magnitude of the two combined (sqrt(P^2+Q^2)). Power factor can then be easily calculated by P/S. The ideal value is 1.00, and this is where active PFC comes in. A nominal load of 135W (18%) on the SilverStone Strider Gold S ST75F-GS V2.0 750W had the power factor at 0.99. This is very good, considering how many PSUs do not hit 0.99 until at least 25% to 30% load.
The Silverstone Strider Gold S ST75F-GS V2.0 750W is fairly quiet power supply, but definitely not the best we have seen. Under regular loads (Less than 300W), the 750W Strider Gold S is reasonably low noise. Personally, I found the Globe S1202512L to be pretty good, except you can definitely hear some coarseness in the motor noise at higher speeds. While this is very subjective, I am quite a picky person on noise. On a scale from 0-10 where 0 is silent and 10 is the loudest, I would rate the SilverStone Strider Gold S ST75F-GS V2.0 750W to be at 2.0/10 acoustically under nominal loads, because the fan spins really slowly. The fan is out of the way to approximately 70% of its maximum speed, but it will become exponentially more audible when it kicks in. If you are a silent PC enthusiast, the SilverStone Strider Gold S ST75F-GS V2.0 750W is still a respectable choice, but the fan motor's smoothness may bother the pickiest.
SilverStone provided this product to APH Networks for the purpose of evaluation.
The SilverStone Strider Gold S ST75F-GS V2.0 750W is a well-built PSU that delivers very good performance according to our affiliates with professional load testing equipment. Its supremely compact package -- being only 140mm long -- while being an 80 Plus Gold certified, 750W fully modular power supply is nothing short of impressive; no pun intended. A smoother running fan would be nice, especially considering this is a sleeve bearing fan, which already sacrifices some reliability for less noise. Also, carrying the same model code as its predecessor while being a completely different unit internally is a bit confusing, especially if you were to buy one today. Word on the street is V2.0 will be priced lower than V1.0, but you are not likely to see the latest version around until the previous stock is depleted.
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Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. Physical Look - Outside
3. Physical Look - Inside
4. Minor Tests and Conclusion
