When did PC Power and Cooling sell out?

[nenforcer]

I bought a red PC Power and Cooling Silencer 750W power supply in April of 2007 as my first high end genuine SLI supporting power supply.

I paid an astronomical price for it back then but I figured it will last me an incredibly long time along with the case I put it in.

I purchased right about the time they were in the process of selling to OCZ group, but the model I purchased was a "genuine" PC Power and Cooling designed by them.

I think at the time they were already outsourcing their lower end PS's to some OEM (Seasonic?).

Anyways, I just wanted to know what the last genuine PC Power and Cooling PS's were? I see some Silencer 750W that look nearly identical to mine with the same sticker but I can see the "A Part of the OCZ Technology Group" just below the name.

Was the Turbo Cool 1KW the last original PCP&C designed models? Can anyone comment on their new supplies and how they stack up?

 

[Meghan54]

Pssst......PC Power and Cooling never made a single power supply.

The Silencers were originally built by Sparkle, followed by Seasonic. The TurboCools were built only by Win-Tact.

In all cases, the PCP&C power supplies were just essentially tweaked base platform power supplies from the respective OEM's to meet PCP&C's requirements for ripple/noise generation, the oddball 80mm sidedraft fan setup, and voltage regulation requirements.

None of PCP&C's power supplies were unique to themselves and were not designed by PCP&C......

 

[Zap]

To answer your original question in your title, May 25, 2007.

To answer your real question, the Silencer 910W probably came about entirely while underneath OCZ management, but it was close enough to traditional PCP&C. Then of course we have the more recent ones with 120mm fans. You know, the ones that PCP&C spent years marketing against? So, the ones we know for sure that are "traditional PCP&C" were the ones brought to market before OCZ stepped in, which would be all the Turbo Cools and the Silencers 750W and below.

Pssst......PC Power and Cooling never made a single power supply.

Silencer 750W - arm & leg
Turbo Cool 1kW - both arms & legs
Epiphany on forums - priceless

 

[Meghan54]

Silencer 750W - arm & leg
Turbo Cool 1kW - both arms & legs
Epiphany on forums - priceless

What's even funnier is all the "single rail is better" marketing PCP&C put out.....after the original "we can't engineer power supply rail distribution (it's soooo hard!!!) worth a damn" TurboCool 1kw debacle....

Yes, to the unwashed, that's a tri-rail Turbo Cool 1kw power supply from PC Power and Cooling. Too bad PCP&C's "engineering" dept. was worthless in distributing its +12V rails......rail #1 was for cpu (ATX/EPS 4+4/8-pin connector), rail #2 was the 24-pin motherboard connector, and rail #3 was for every other connector the power supply had.....Molex, SATA, and PCI-e. Didn't work out too well.....so, rather than fix the problem, they took the cheap way out.

 

[nenforcer]

OK, not surprised by this at all its why I asked.

How about these old 200W and 300W power supplies, the first encased in what looks to be a steel enclosure?

http://cgi.ebay.com/PC-Power-Coolin...-/200499142562?pt=PCA_UPS&hash=item2eaeae1fa2

http://cgi.ebay.com/PC-POWER-COOLIN...t=BI_Control_Systems_PLCs&hash=item35ae060905

http://cgi.ebay.com/PC-Power-Coolin...-/220575404959?pt=PCA_UPS&hash=item335b51939f

I don't know about the last one but the first may have been a genuine PCP&C design?

This one below for sure must have been a custom design

http://cgi.ebay.com/PC-Power-Coolin...-/200552080996?pt=PCA_UPS&hash=item2eb1d5e664

 

[Meghan54]

First two are old Sparkle built units.

The last two are off-the-shelf old Win-Tact server power supplies. You could go to their website, search obsolete units and possibly find them, if Win-Tact still has that info that old still available.

Nothing custom found anywhere.

 

[HOOfan 1]

Epiphany on forums - priceless

I usually don't see the epiphany part...just people doggedly sticking to their thoughts that PC P&C actually made and designed PSUs...

 

[tomoyo]

PC Power really did pump the hype market for power supplies back in the day. It's kinda like the madness of hype between ati and nvidia these days, except ati and nvidia do actually design things. Somehow they brainwashed a ton of enthusiasts into thinking their products were actually unique and reliable. The real truth is they were one of the early companies to put out good psus designed and made by other oems, but now they've been passed many times over by much better real oems and better brands such as corsair.

 

[Rifter]

they literally sold out a few years back as mentioned above. Which is too bad they used to sell higher quality PSU's.

 

[bryanl]

None of PCP&C's power supplies were unique to themselves and were not designed by PCP&C......

Not even their combination power supply/backup? It was a large AT supply with a battery inside.

 

[DaveSimmons]

They were good in the 80s, one of if not the first company to promote quality over the lowest price in PSUs.

Since then, I can't recall a time when buying PSUs made sense to me. Their "Silencer" models have been much louder than the competition and their other models were overpriced.

 

[Operandi]

Man, lots of hate here.... PCP&C made (marketed, whatever) good units, particularly the Silencers.

I've never used the Turbo Cool units but I've used lots of Silencers, and the Turbo Cool units always tested out well to my knowledge.

Personally I went the Silencers because I knew the OEM was Seasonic, and they undercut the price of S12 units by fair amount.

It was no secret that they didn't build anything themselves but the units were different. The Silencers all had a single 12v rail, no other Seasonic based unit at the time did that I know of. They also used different caps than either the S12 or OEM Seasonic units (OST in all the samples I had). They also used (better) Nidec fans, Seasonics own units used Addas. The PCB also had "PC Power and Cooling" silk screened on the boards. Clearly these were "unique" units built to their specs by the OEM, its the same way with Antec and Corsair.

As far as the current state of the company.... it dosn't look too impressive, I probably won't be coming back. Anyone know who the new OEM is for their current lineup?

 

[HOOfan 1]

The Silencer Mk.II with the large fan is Sirfa/High Power

It looks like they may be bringing back some Seasonic units though.

BTW...the lower powered Seasonics until recently used Nippon Chemicon on the primary and OST on the secondary...the M12 and S12 higher end systems, including the 500W units used Rubycon, Hitachi and Nippon Chemicon

Hell even XFX had some PSUs with PC Power and Cooling on the PCB...HAHA
http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story4&reid=181

Seasonic is also using Sanyo Denki fans now...besides I would take a 120mm ADDA over an 80mm nidec screamer anyway....

 

[Minerva]

Nidec fans are awesome. (former server builder/tech here)

 

[HOOfan 1]

yeah...they are great stuffed in a crowded server room with nice walls between them and human ears....80mm fans ramped up to full speed are kind of annoying on a computer that is 4 feet from your head though.

 

[Minerva]

80s not too bad unless you're talking 7000RPM turbojet ones!
The 30mm ones in the 1U packs are painful. In a room with 26,000 servers the only way to talk to the person next to you is cup your hands and scream in their ear! D:

 

[Motorheader]

Back in the day they were one of the best PSU's (along with Delta) hands down. When I built or serviced a rig with one of them I knew that would a component I'd never have to address.

Does anyone remember they used to market and sell processor cooling solutions for a short time as well.

 

[HOOfan 1]

My former job had a microfilm reader/printer with a 24V 60mm Nidec....that thing was loud...

 

[Operandi]

Seasonic is also using Sanyo Denki fans now...besides I would take a 120mm ADDA over an 80mm nidec screamer anyway....

Sanyo Denki is about as good as fan as you'll ever get but I would put Nidec above Adda in quality.

Also the Silencers really did live up to their name; they used a lower speed Nidec that was very, very quiet. Just a slight tick from the motor and you had to be right on top of it to even hear it.

I have a 370 watt Silencer I picked up in 09 powering my Phenom II X6 system which is inaudible from about 4 or 5 feet. Its doing a great job and I plan to keep it in there with some overclocking but I'll have to upgrade it for sure if I ever want to do SLI or Crossfire.

 

[HOOfan 1]

I've heard a 750 "Silencer" that would wake the dead