Antec Truepower 550W

[DasSmoof]

Greetings,

Up until two or three days ago, I had an Antec Truepower 550W (not sure of the model number), I've heard that these PSU's, despite being Antecs are somewhat "crappy". That they were manufactured--along with the Earthwatts--by some other company and they just weren't a reliable PSU. Is this true?

Anyway, yeah, I had it up until a few days ago because upon switching my components over to a new case and plugging the PSU in, it fried itself and took my motherboard with it. So, my question is, should I warrenty this PSU (assuming I can) and get another of it's ilk, or should I go with a Fortron 700W I was planning to buy? It would save me some cash on a new PC to warrenty the Antec, but I'm just worried that it would also fry itself because it's cheap (which I haven't verified yet, merely heard rumors) and take my new rig with it.

Are my worries unfounded, or should I avoid trying to get the Antec Warrantied?

 

[Puffnstuff]

Get a fs, seasonic, enermax or any quality unit and stay away from the antecs however I would still send the bad unit in for replacement. Who knows maybe antec will feel generous and send you a better unit. I stopped using them several years ago after a string of problems with them prompted me to look elsewhere. It was then that I turned to enermax and my power problems disappeared. If you aren't already doing so use a surge protector to prevent any spikes in the ac line from making it to you ps. I would encourage you to invest in an apc with line voltage regulation to prevent fluctuations from ever reaching the ps in the first place.

 

[Zuddud]

I got the 430W version of the trio for my wife's build a few months ago and it wasn't as great as I thought it would be. 3 weeks after having it, the system would boot, but NONE of the case fans would fire up. We had 1 120 and 2 80's running through the molex that was designated as the fan plug so the PSU could control fan speed. It was great for a while because you could hardly hear the system. Luckily the whole unit didn't fail and I was able to hook the fans up to another molex. Still though...not too great a result IMO.

 

[DasSmoof]

I suppose I'll see if they approve my RMA and see what they send me in that case. I've just ordered my new PC from newegg which contains the following (skipped the PSU, because I wasn't sure what to do just yet)

C2D E4300
Gigabyte DS3 (Rev 3.3)
2 gigs G.Skill DDR2 800
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7

Then I also have an 8800GTS I'll be RMAing on Monday. I have a Fortron 450W PSU, do you think that would be enough to power all of this together? Should I rely on it or should I upgrade the PSU and just use the 450W until I can get something better/different? I obviously would like to OC and I'm guessing my Fortron wont like that very much, unless I'm wrong.

Thanks for the info. Looks like I'll see if I can find a reasonably priced PSU from Enermax or Seasonic. The only one I saw was from Fortron and that was overkill with $700 and $130. I'd like to find something a little more in my price range and I'm guessing I wont need more than 550W, because I think the 8800 only requires a minimum of 350W anyway.

 

[TanisHalfElven]

my antec 550 has been going strong for almost 9 months. worked perfectly with my 8800gts. i think its a great PSU and more than capable of handling your load.

 

[Captante]

Older True-Power's had serious problems with overheating capaciters which caused them to have a very high failure rate especially under heavy load or when the PSU fan was called on to do the majority of system cooling, however starting first with the Neo-Power seris & now with all except for the super-cheap Basiq models, Seasonic is the OEM. The Earth-Powers in particular have reviewed very well & appear to be the best power supplies Antec has offered in a long time.

Keep in mind however that the quality standard of the Seasonic-Antecs is not up to that of Seasonics brand-name models & while they are much improved & can now at least be viewed as a viable brick & mortar available quick-fix, the real deal is still a much better choice. Fortron is very good but I'd go with either Seasonic, Enhance/Silverstone or PC Power & Cooling first if the price is reasonable.

I'm using one of these Seasonics in my main PC:


SeaSonic M12 SS-700HM ATX12V / EPS12V 700W Power Supply @ $210 + $8.50 shipping (modular cables, virtually silent & rock-solid rails)



This Silverstone is pretty close to as good & will save you a few dollars, but its a bit louder & no modular cables so it'll be more of a pita to work with:


SILVERSTONE SST-ST75ZF ATX 12V 2.2 & EPS 12V 750W SLI Certified Power Supply @ $180 + free 3-day shipping



Finally the PC Power & Cooling 610 watt unit is a solid choice & should have plenty of power for your current setup or for pretty much anything else you add short of 2900XT Crossfire or 8800GTX SLI:


PC Power & Cooling Silencer 610 EPS12V EPS12V 610W Continuous @ 40°C Power Supply @ $150 + $8.50 shipping

 

[DasSmoof]

So should I not worry about RMAing the Antec? I've only had it for a few months (well, close to a year), it's a Truepower 2.0. If anything, I may purchase the last PSU you posted, because it's closer to my price range.

 

[soydios]

1.) RMA the Antec
2.) FS/FT
3.) profit!

I have an Antec NeoHE 550 that's been powering my 24/7 system perfectly (all rails stable at or slightly above their specified voltages) for ten months now.

 

[Captante]

Originally posted by: DasSmoof
So should I not worry about RMAing the Antec? I've only had it for a few months (well, close to a year), it's a Truepower 2.0. If anything, I may purchase the last PSU you posted, because it's closer to my price range.

I'd say its still worth doing the RMA becuase the only thing it should cost you is ground shipping charges ... even if you don't ever use it in another PC, it will come in handy once in awhile to have a "known-good" psu sitting around. Also theres no reason it couldn't be used to power an older backup Athlon XP or P-III/P-4 based system that doesn't run for extended periods under heavy load.


Heres one more suggestion for an even mre reasonable priced high-quality model ... not as good as the PC Power & Cooling 610 watt Silencer, but still plenty-strong:

Enhance ENS-0560G-G 600W EPS SLI&2Xeon RoHS Power Supply @ $124 + shipping

 

[John]

DasSmoof, RMA the Antec and they will send you a new one. Go to their website for more information. Depending on your revision of the TruePower you could have between 3-5 years of warranty. All psu's vendors have units that fail.

Since you have a Fortron 450 I would use that since it should power your rig just fine.

 

[DasSmoof]

Originally posted by: Captante

http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=PS-0560G-G">Enhance ENS-0560G-G 600W EPS SLI&2Xeon RoHS Power Supply</a> @ $124 + shipping

Thanks, that ought to be more in my price range.

Originally posted by: John
Since you have a Fortron 450 I would use that since it should power your rig just fine.

Temporarily speaking, of course, right? I was looking at my 8800GTS box last night and it requires a minimum 400W PSU and I can't imaging the draw on the PSU if I were to overclock D:

Anyway, thanks for the tips, folks. Hopefully, I'll have my new system up and running with it's RMA'd graphics card and everything in two weeks. Looks like it's going to take 3-days there and 3-days back to get my 8800 RMA'd.

 

[John]

You can't go by wattage alone. They use wattage ratings since there are a lot of generic (crap) psu's out there. Your 450w is a quality unit and will be more than adequate. You do not need a different psu unless you "want" one, or you want an 80+ efficient unit to save on your electricity bill.

 

[DasSmoof]

Originally posted by: John
You can't go by wattage alone. They use wattage ratings since there are a lot of generic (crap) psu's out there. Your 450w is a quality unit and will be more than adequate. You do not need a different psu unless you "want" one, or you want an 80+ efficient unit to save on your electricity bill.

So, essentially it's like a horsepower rating on a car then? It essentially means nothing, but gives a rough idea of what you might be able to expect?
But just the Fortron 450W would be sufficiant to power a decent overclock on the CPU/RAM and also a fat-ass 8800?

Sorry for sounding redundant, it just sounds almost too good to be true. Granted, I do not know a whole lot about PSU's beyond what brands are good and what ones are crap. I'd love if my Fortron would work well with a decent OC and my 8800, because then I could save some cash for the moment.

 

[Puffnstuff]

Amps on the 12v rail are the most important number when looking at a modern ps. Watts are a slight of hand so you must look at the amps to get a true feel for a ps. Modern system tax the 12v rail the heaviest unlike a couple of years ago. I would tell you to make sure that you have a minimum of 36a available on the 12v rail of continuous load. My enermax has 120a on the 12v rails but I was looking for overkill to futureproof my build.

 

[DasSmoof]

I am reasonably certain that this is my PSU
http://www.newegg.com/product/...p?item=N82E16817104954
Pretty sure that AX450-PN is the model number on the side of my box. I'd check to verify via newegg, but I'm at work and I don't trust these computers enough to put in my log in information for newegg.

Where do you find the amps on the 12v-rail? I'm looking at it and I looked at Fortrons page for it, but it's nonsensical to me. Where should I be looking to find such information about a PSU?

Unless I'm looking at this information here:

+3.3V@30A, +5V@28A, +12V1@18A, +12V2@18A, -12V@0.5A, +5VSB@2A

If that is correct, should I be adding the amperage together for the total (36amps), or should it be counted seperately?

 

[DasSmoof]

Double Post.

 

[zig3695]

i had a tpII 430 for over a year and it worked great, then died for no reason. luckily it took nothing with it, and antec replaced it no questions asked with a brand new TP-III! so far, 6 months later, all is good.

 

[MarcVenice]

+12v only, thats were the cpu and gpu are drawing their power from. I've just been catching up on this myself though, and there is something called combined power, but I'm allready lost there. I got a very detailed guide on it, but it's in Dutch. It had this link in it though: http://www.silentpcreview.com/article28-page1.html, and this one: http://www.firingsquad.com/guides/power_supply/ and this one: http://www.pcguide.com/ref/power/sup/index.htm

Heres a site where you can figure out how much you actually need: http://www.extreme.outervision.com/index.jsp

Hope this helps.

 

[allies]

Originally posted by: zig3695
i had a tpII 430 for over a year and it worked great, then died for no reason. luckily it took nothing with it, and antec replaced it no questions asked with a brand new TP-III! so far, 6 months later, all is good.

I had a TP II 550 that died on me recently. I sent for an RMA, should get it tomorrow. Hopefully it's a TP III, I'd be stoked

 

[DasSmoof]

Thanks for the replies and links, all.

I'm still trying to figure this all out, but I think I forgot to mention that I'm going to be running three HDD's (80Gig IDE, 80gig SATA and 320Gig SATA) and one optical drive in addition to my soundcard and it's front I/O.

Are there any free power calculators? I wouldn't mind using the one linked above, but I'm not quite willing to pay for it.

 

[Roguestar]

Yes, the Fortron 450W you have should be enough for your system, even if overclocked.

 

[Captante]

Originally posted by: DasSmoof
Thanks for the replies and links, all.

I'm still trying to figure this all out, but I think I forgot to mention that I'm going to be running three HDD's (80Gig IDE, 80gig SATA and 320Gig SATA) and one optical drive in addition to my soundcard and it's front I/O.

Are there any free power calculators? I wouldn't mind using the one linked above, but I'm not quite willing to pay for it.

Personally I wouldn't run your system on a 450 watt PSU even though I do agree that the Fortron model you have is pretty good quality & very likely will be enough to make it work ... also keep in mind that PSU's lose significant power output as they get older so if yours is a couple years old its actually putting out considerably less then the 450 watts it was rated for when new.

When I build a PC I like to calculate my worst-case load & then add roughly 30% to it so that I know my PSU won't ever be running near capacity, never mind exceeding it ... considering the relative cost of components it just doesn't make sense to skimp on the most important piece of your system & although 600 watts is more then you actually "need", its the minimum I would install myself so thats what I suggest you go with.

Go with either the Enhance 600 or the PC Power & cooling 610 & you'll be certain that if you do have any problems with your new system, it isn't the PSU ... I'd say its worth it just for the piece of mind.


Edit: Actually if you are tight for cash you could hold out & see what Antec sends you for the RMA replacement when you send in the TP-550 ... if you get a brand-new TP-III 550 (made by Seasonic) then theres no need to upgrade.