Reviews

Cooler Master Silent Pro Gold 600W Review

Efficiency

The big focus nowadays is centered around efficiency, whether it be cars, electronics, or the humble computer. So with the emphasis firmly placed on power supplies, manufacturers have to strive to make their units as efficient as possible to win over prospective customers from the competition. Now that the 80 plus programme is so well known consumers are more conscious of efficiency than ever so it’s probably the biggest selling point for a PSU aside from price.

Keeping with the 80 plus testing technique we tested the power supplies at 20%, 50% and 100% of their rated capacities to ensure that overall the PSU is in keeping with it’s rated specifications. As per the 80 plus program the testing was performed at 115V/60Hz, but we also tested at 230V/50Hz as that’s what we use in the UK. Using the equipment previously mentioned, the power input (what the PSU takes in) and the power output (what the PSU produces) are recorded, giving us two figures, which once divided (output/input) gives us the efficiency.

So let’s take a look at how the three power supplies we tested held up. Obviously we are only expecting one to reach 80 plus gold specification, but they should all be over 80% efficiency without a shadow of a doubt.

Verdict: It’s clear to see that Coolermaster’s Silent Pro Gold M PSU easily achieves the 80 plus gold specification at 115V, managing to surpass the 80 plus rating by 1% on both 20% and 50% loads. Luckily those of us on 230V lines will see higher efficiency by a good couple of percent. The two Corsair PSUs are pretty efficient too, keeping in mind that both have been on the market for a considerable length of time, especially the HX 620W.

Now we move on to further testing of the PSU.

Stability

The three PSUs tested all remained within the ATX specification with ease during testing. See the tables below:

Corsair HX 620W

Corsair HX 650W

Cooler Master Silent Pro M Gold 600W

Hold-Up Time

Keeping it fairly simple, hold-up time is the length of time a PSU continues to power the system it’s attached to, within the specified voltage range, after a power loss, whether it be due to a power outage, short circuit or other factors. To keep within 80 plus specifications this should be above 16ms.

Inrush Current

This is the maximum current drawn by the PSU the instant it’s turned on.

Standby Power

This is the amount of power consumed by the PSU in standby mode, ie. the system is turned off but the PSU switch is on and ready for action.

Short Circuit

To ascertain whether or not the PSU shuts down when it encounters a short circuit, we used the dedicated short circuit button on the Chroma… to short circuit the 12V rail(s). The PSU should shut down immediately.

Temperature

Both the input and exhaust temperatures were monitored and recorded. Then the temp delta was calculated by subtracting the input temperature from the exhaust temperature.

Verdict: The Silent Pro M Gold has the best hold up time at 30.7ms. Typically PSUs have between 15 and 25ms so both the Corsair HX 650W and the Coolermaster Silent Pro are well above specification.

In regards to inrush current the Coolermaster records the lowest result, which is good news as the higher the inrush current, the more potential their is to damage the circuitry, however all the PSUs are well within safe limits.

Standby Power is very interesting. Both Corsair units managed to draw a steady 2W each whereas the Coolermaster has the least draw at 1.48W on standby. In reality both standby powers are very close, so much so that if the units were in standby for a year there would be a couple of pounds extra cost at most with the Corsair units.

Thankfully all the units shut down as they should when a short circuit was applied.

All three units remained cool in operation. The Corsair HX 650W had the lowest delta temperature, but in comparison with the other two units the fan did spin up considerably more, therefore increasing it’s noise output, although it wasn’t loud by any means.

That’s it for the testing, move on to the next page for the Conclusion.

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Tags: 600W, Cooler Master, Power Supply, PSU, Silent Pro Gold