Page 3 - Physical Look - Inside
As always, we opened up our Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 850W power supply to take a detailed look at what is going on inside. Please note that doing this at home will void your 10-year warranty, thanks to the warranty seal Thermaltake applied over one of the attachment screws. It is great it comes with a 10-year warranty, which is the industry standard for performance PSUs. For the benefit of you, we cracked ours open, so you do not need to. There are no user serviceable parts inside.
Opening the Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 850W is quite straightforward with the removal of six screws. Taking out the internal components from the enclosure requires the removal of more. Our photo above shows an overhead view of its internal components. Its OEM is Channel Well Technology or CWT, a reputable OEM since 1993. It features an LLC half bridge topology with DC-to-DC converters. At first glance, the build quality appears to be excellent. There are three main heatsinks inside and almost no wires. All of them are located on the primary side and are painted black. This is the same as the Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 1000W, but different than the Toughpower GF1 1000W.
Pulling the enclosure apart 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. Thermaltake has always done a great job in the past to make sure their higher end power supplies met or exceeded the recommended requirements, and the Toughpower GF3 850W is no exception. The Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 850W has one metal oxide varistor, two metalized polyester X-capacitors, four ceramic Y-capacitors, and two common mode chokes. This is two times the amount of X and Y capacitors than recommended. Considering some PSUs have missing MOVs, I am happy to see it here as this component is used to stabilize spikes from the AC line.
The active PFC circuit featured on the Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 850W uses two Yangzhou Yangjie Electronic Technology GBU1506 bridge rectifiers on both sides of the smallest heatsink. At 115V, the maximum rectified forward current capacity with heatsink is 15A each, so you can theoretically pull up to 3450W (15A * 2 diodes * 115V) from the bridge rectifier at 100% efficiency. Of course, this is limited by the fact that it is not 100% efficient and also neglects the fact that not every component in the system is able to keep up.
Further down the line, we can see two Vishay SiHF30N60E power MOSFETs for the active PFC circuit; both on the same side of the heatsink closest to the bulk capacitor. Each is rated for up to 18A at 100c. These transistors present a maximum resistance of 125 mΩ and typical resistance of 104 mΩ when turned on according to the manufacturer's data sheet. 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 same heatsink, there is one Cree C3D08060 silicon carbide Schottky diode as the APFC boost diode attached to it. Meanwhile, on the remaining heatsink, there are two Infineon IPA60R190P6 power transistors attached to it. Each is certified for up to 12.7A at 100c. These transistors present a maximum resistance of 190 mΩ and typical resistance of 171 mΩ when turned on according to the manufacturer's data sheet.
Champion's CU6901VAC is the switching controller, located on the mainboard near the back. The Champion CM6500UNX and Sync Power SPN5003 are part of the APFC controller circuit, located on a vertical PCB between the heatsinks.
On the primary side, we can see one Japanese brand Nippon Chemi-Con capacitor. 100% Japanese brand capacitors are specified on the marketing material, so this is to be expected. Our 850W version of Thermaltake's latest Toughpower GF3 series power supply incorporates one 680µF x 450V capacitor. It is rated at 105c, whereas more value-oriented power supplies usually use 85c rated capacitors.
On the secondary side, we can see more Japanese brand electrolytic capacitors from Nippon Chemi-Con and Nichicon rated at 105c. However, the 100% Japanese brand capacitors claim is false, because while it is true all the electrolytic capacitors are Japanese brand, there are many Chinese-made CapXon polymer capacitors.
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. Six ON Semiconductor NTMFS5C430N MOSFETs are responsible for generating the +12V output, located on an add-in board immediately after the transformer. The NTMFS5C430N's rated continuous drain current is 131A at 25c. It has an RDS(on) value of 1.7 mΩ maximum and 1.4 mΩ typical at 10V.
The +5V and +3.3V outputs are generated by two UBIQ Semiconductor QN3107M6N and two UBIQ Semiconductor QM3054M6 MOSFETs on another add-in board, shown in the above photo. Each QN3107M6N is certified for up to 22A at 25c. These transistors present a maximum resistance of 2.6 mΩ and typical resistance of 2.1 mΩ at 10V when turned on according to the manufacturer's data sheet. Each QM3054M6 is certified for up to 16.6A at 25c with a maximum resistance of 4.8 mΩ and typical resistance of 3.8 mΩ at 10V when turned on.
On-Bright Electronic's OB2365T is the PWM controller, located next to the bulk capacitor. Meanwhile, a Weltrend WT7502R monitoring IC, located on a vertical PCB next to the secondary stage components, provides over/under current and over/under voltage protection. The Microchip PIC16F1503 fan controller is located on the same vertical PCB. The datasheets for all components mentioned in this review can be found on their respective manufacturers' websites.
At the back, we have a large daughterboard covering the majority of the rear panel for the modular cable sockets. All modular sockets at the bottom are soldered directly to the main PCB after the secondary stage. Pin headers join the mainboard and daughterboard to reduce power transmission loss. The output connector configuration can be seen on the previous page. Overall, the internal build quality of Thermaltake's Toughpower GF3 850W power supply is very good -- something we would expect from a CWT-built unit. Components are arranged very well for optimal cooling with almost no wires running around inside, and solder points on its black/green PCB is quite clean in general. I would say the Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 850W is generally very good with regards to the selection of components used under the hood.
Lastly, we see a 135mm fan that provides cooling to the Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 850W's internal components. This fan is slightly smaller than the Toughpower GF1's 140mm fan. It is connected to an add-in board using a 3-pin connector. A 135mm fan is about the largest you can fit in a power supply with a bottom mounted fan, and if not a lot of heat is being generated, noise will be kept to a minimum.
The model of the fan is Hong Hua HA13525H12SF-Z, as shown in our photo above. The HA13525H12SF-Z is a fluid dynamic bearing fan specified at 0.50A for a maximum speed of 2300 RPM. The fan is not supposed to activate until the PSU is loaded to approximately 255W with Smart Zero Fan active. As such, it should remain off for the most part, and even when it is on, the fan speed will vary with load. Fans with fluid dynamic bearings generally have much longer lifespans compared to sleeve bearing fans, and are quite suitable for this application.
Page Index
1. Introduction, Packaging, Specifications
2. Physical Look - Outside
3. Physical Look - Inside
4. Minor Tests and Conclusion
