BallaTheFeared
Diamond Member
- Nov 15, 2010
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The good power supplies typically have operating temperature from 10°C - 50°C.Anything below or above results in decreased efficiency.
Yes which is what we're talking about here, with such an open ended question JG might have been citing a $14 550w unit on newegg.
If you look at his tests his hotbox only got into the 30C range, so I didn't want to use that to show it still easily made it's rated power. However Techpowerup has a real nice hotbox going on with an overloaded 12v (30A vs rated 28A) at @ 52C intake… Guess what? It still makes it rated power.
As you can see the PSU worked flawlessly even at 52.1°C ambient and with full load, so we wonder why Corsair states 430W maximum wattage at only 30°C. Efficiency was constantly above 80% and peaked at 85.5% with 40%, of maximum rated capacity, load.
You are right about some PSU's not making their rated power at hotter/colder temps, however a CX430 isn't one of those PSU - at least not at normal operating temps, even 52C is well above what I'd call normal.
However the way you stated it, 85% efficiency means 85% of total rated wattage while hotboxed is utterly wrong. It is simply stating how much power it needs to draw to make it's power. When you look at the 100% load graph you see exactly that, 430 watts provided required 525 watts from the wall, resulting in an efficiency of 81.8%.
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