500W FlexATX PSU

I actually ordered it few days ago and received it yesterday.

What? Didn't you say that you thought the fan of the SSP300 was less annoying than the one of the FSP400?

but I just swapped back to my FSP400 today after using the SSP300 for 2 weeks

And let me tell you, even at load, the SSP300 was far and away less noisy than the FSP400. A combination of less loudness, and the noise being lower pitch made it much more bearable. And to that point, I think we should do a noise comparison of our SSP300s some time, because mine didn't come off as unbearable at load.
 
What? Didn't you say that you thought the fan of the SSP300 was less annoying than the one of the FSP400?

I don't remember how I drew that conclusion, I think I meant at non-synthetic or gaming load, and the SSP300's fan's noise pitch is slightly lower. So given the same loudness, I perceived the SSP300 to be less annoying because of a deeper tone of noise. Just a guess. I should really start putting quantifiable numbers into these loudness tests because my perception is obviously subjective.

These few days I tried both at full synthetic load of my build, which goes to 225W (from the wall power meter reading). And it is fairly apparent the SSP300 was getting stressed and the fan was spinning much faster, and was loud even at regular use distance. Whereas the FSP400's fan, I could hear it spinning when I put my ear up close, but at regular use distance the GPU fan was louder and more prominent.
 
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Any updates on this most excellent PSU venture…?

Curiously contemplating…
 
Sorry, I've got nothing yet. Though I can say that it's a rock-solid and very quiet unit after over a month of using it almost daily.
 
Nothing to see here either, just another return to page one bump…
 
I would prefer you not do that. While it does generate additional exposure, a moderator could technically determine the thread to be dead in theory and call it necro-ed, which is forbidden on [H] as per rule 28, so the thread could get locked or even deleted if it's being bumped too often. I know you all just want this to gain traction so we will reach the MOQ and I appreciate that you want to help, but I'd prefer we try to adhere to the rules as well as possible to keep a good climate on the forum.

BTW, almost 100 people have answered the wishlist poll! Thank you to everyone who participated, your feedback is extremely valuable!
Incorporation of Freilite e.K. is almost complete, expect more news on that front within the next two weeks. *fingers crossed*
 
Short Update:

I know there were no updates for a while, and I'm sorry about that, so here's a short roundup of the situation:

Freilite e.K. is now incorporated and has a proper website and email address, so I'm now legally allowed to sell stuff.

A better solution for the -12V problem was found, using an isolated power converter like this. While this increases reliability, it also will increase the cost of the PSU by something between 15 and 5 bucks. Not really a fan of that

Most importantly, though, FSP allegedly released some info about 600W and 750W FlexATX PSUs at electronica, with -12V rails. I don't know too much yet, but I'll pester them as long as needed to get some information about that. I'll only change the title of the thread once I can confirm that those will actually exist at 150mm length. While 600W are of course overkill for systems that profit from FlexATX, the additional power overhead would make it easier to integrate two 8pin connectors and reduce noise further.

I'll do my best to pick up the pace.
 
Any updates on this brilliant endeavour? My current PC is dying and I'd love to be able to make my tiny PC dream come true!
 
Any updates on this brilliant endeavour? My current PC is dying and I'd love to be able to make my tiny PC dream come true!

Funny you'd ask, here's one. Thanks for answering the survey, btw!

About that new, better PSU:

So I received the list (which apparently isn't confidential, so take a look here), and unfortunately the new Flex PSUs with 650, 750 and 850 Watts, while including a -12V rail, are only going to be available at 220mm length, which makes them completely unsuitable for most cases the FSP500-50FSPT could be used in.

Interestingly, there seems to be a different version of the FSP500-50FSPT, the FSP500-50FGGBN, which is almost exactly the same except that some rails don't have a minimal load specified and that it is only 80Plus Gold rated instead of Platinum. It seems that this could be an alternative that is less expensive but also louder than the Platinum version. Personally, I don't like the idea of bringing back the exact reason why Flex is so stigmatised as a form factor, but I'll try and get quotes for either version to see what the cost difference will be.
 
Personally though, I'd much rather have a 650W flex anyway, depth isn't an issue in my case design but it's still a shame that they haven't made the 150mm size available. I'd like the overclocking headroom anyhow...

At least it currently has a -12V rail, but it seems a bit odd that neither of the 500W have that rail but every other wattage does. Like the survey suggests there is clearly decent enough interest, and I'd imagine once something like this releases there would be way more interest in it. They are missing out on a heap of sales by not getting in on this market.

Edit: in the remarks down the bottom, how soon is 'coming soon', are we talking like within the next month or two?
 
Personally though, I'd much rather have a 650W flex anyway, depth isn't an issue in my case design but it's still a shame that they haven't made the 150mm size available. I'd like the overclocking headroom anyhow...

I can appreciate that, but if length is less of a factor, 1U seems like the better choice anyway. There you can even get 700W Platinum cooled by two fans instead of one. Ask LukeD how great a PSU that is :D

At least it currently has a -12V rail, but it seems a bit odd that neither of the 500W have that rail but every other wattage does. Like the survey suggests there is clearly decent enough interest, and I'd imagine once something like this releases there would be way more interest in it. They are missing out on a heap of sales by not getting in on this market.

The thing is, they probably don't. Flex is mostly used in servers, so a system integrator will just get mainboards (made) that don't need -12V or generate it on-board. They probably didn't include it because there simply wasn't enough space. The more powerful designs are also much larger, so it's no suprise they put it in them.

Edit: in the remarks down the bottom, how soon is 'coming soon', are we talking like within the next month or two?

Haha nope. Soon likely means that you can order them now if you get a few hundred. When they will be delivered is a whole different story and not equal to each unit and not even each customer. Whoever is deemed more important gets their stuff first.
 
Bummer haha, well I'd still like to see a Flex 650W, a 1U style makes my case look kinda funky.

I meant more of the consumer market sales though. I know the AthenaPower version of what we are after is lower quality but surely if they can integrate a -12V rail then FSP should be able to accommodate :)

Really appreciate all the effort you're putting in for this though, it'd be a really great addition to the SFF community to have a reliable and yet high power density PSU.
 
Bummer haha, well I'd still like to see a Flex 650W, a 1U style makes my case look kinda funky.

I'm sure if FSP starts producing Titanium rated units, something in that ballpark will be possible. Give it a few years. ;)

I meant more of the consumer market sales though.

Remeber that FSP has only begun to dip their toes into the consumer market with the Dagger series recently. Before that they exclusively were an OEM for other brands and still are big there. I would hope that at some point they will just corner the consumer Flex market themselves so I don't have to deal with it anymore :D

I know the AthenaPower version of what we are after is lower quality but surely if they can integrate a -12V rail then FSP should be able to accommodate :)

That's an intuitive thought, but there are so many things that go into engineering a product like this, I would expect the efficiency gains (and the implementation of PMbus) to also have an impact on the size of the components. We know the Athena PSU is shutting down before hitting its maximum load, maybe because they skimped on heatsinks. It might well be that the size of those alone are the cause for the missing -12V rail.
 
I get ya, I'm not sure I can wait 2 years though! I did a lil bit of research today in regards to a 650W Flex, found a seller on Alibaba that offers a gold standard psu. I'm willing to take the plunge to see if it works, if it does I'll probably go with that. Its got two fans as well, like you said LukeD's 1U has :p

I understand they are a difficult engineering piece, hence why I'm a mechanical engineering student rather than electrical haha
 
I get ya, I'm not sure I can wait 2 years though! I did a lil bit of research today in regards to a 650W Flex, found a seller on Alibaba that offers a gold standard psu. I'm willing to take the plunge to see if it works, if it does I'll probably go with that. Its got two fans as well, like you said LukeD's 1U has :p

You mind sharing a link? Because if it's just got two fans in series, you won't get better cooling performance from that, and two fans in parallel aren't possible with Flex because then you'd either have to divide the whole PSU into two channels on the inside or not have any space for the C13 socket on the back or the DC cables on the front. If it actually has two fans next to the C13 socket, then it's a 1U, not a Flex.

I understand they are a difficult engineering piece, hence why I'm a mechanical engineering student rather than electrical haha

Fully agree, mechanical engineering is way easier to grasp :)
 
This is one of the one's I'm looking at: https://zumax.en.alibaba.com/produc....html?spm=a2700.7803228.1998738836.185.Bt6OWT

Unless I'm looking at this all wrong it seems like a decent option for my application.

Unfortunately it only comes with a single 6pin PCI-e connector, but I'm having a chat with the supplier in regards to them accommodating for 2 6+2pin PCI-e. If I've done my research right then it would be as simple as using a 2 Molex -> 6+2 PCI-e, but I'd prefer to have it hardwired in from the factory that way the onus is on them if it fails :p

Edit: Well I suppose I'm a bit of a ditz, I didn't realise LukeD was the owner of that brilliant custom 1080 SLI case. Quite a bit of inspiration for my own case has stemmed from that endeavour.
 
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Boy I really didn't read that product page well... I should probably get some sleep haha, I could have sworn it was flex :banghead:

From what it seems its nigh impossible to get a flex sized PSU that will suit my needs, 1U it is!
 
Yeah because they mention it in the product title just to get into a search results. Make sure to link me your build log once you started it!
I've got a CAD model that I'm slowly adding to, I'll definitely start a thread when I find a PSU that I like :D
 
Just heard back from John Chen at FSP Group regarding their new Flex ATX lineup, the 850W Flex (FPS850-50FGGH1) in safety process and will be ready for mass production mid March 2017, he hasn't got a date for the 650W version as they are still working on it.
 
Ah good to know! Well then, good luck finding another 300 people who want it :D Or is that unit going to be available in retail as well?
 
Hey there, this couldn't have come at a better time. I have a custom build I'm working on that I was just exploring spacing options with either 1U PSUs which are typically 220+ in length (too long), or SFX PSUs (besides the unreleased 800W SFX-L from Silverstone), which are too low power and wouldn't fit as I'd need two of them.

I think I can combine two of your FSPs together should they ever be available for sale. I would remove the fans, and use my own to blow air onto it which would further shorten the PSU. The build I'm working on will consistent of two Titan XPs, 250W TDP each, a 2699V4 165W TDP, 256GB of DDR4 on an Asrock x99e-itx water cooled with two radiators and an Apogee Drive II running an MCP35X (10W pump) for a total system draw of 792W as estimated with pcpartspicker. I could separate the Titan Xs on two separate PSU or running them all on a Silverstone 800W SFX-L but that would mean running them at their limit which I would like to avoid. So all in all:

PSU 1: Motherboard 24pin + Titan X
PSU 2: Motherboard 8pin + Titan X + water cooling loop

Would this be suitable?
 
Just filled out the survey and read this entire thread, props to iFreilicht for all the hard work! Perhaps I missed something but is something like this going to become a reality? It didn't seem too clear to me and I'm ready to pull the trigger on 3 of these units!
 
PSU 1: Motherboard 24pin + Titan X
PSU 2: Motherboard 8pin + Titan X + water cooling loop

Would this be suitable?

Should work a treat, you'll even have a good bit of headroom left. Keep in mind that you'll have to mod the 24pin a little to turn on both PSUs together.

Just filled out the survey and read this entire thread, props to iFreilicht for all the hard work! Perhaps I missed something but is something like this going to become a reality? It didn't seem too clear to me and I'm ready to pull the trigger on 3 of these units!

Thanks!

I'm working on it, but right now it's slow-going legal stuff, so there's not much to update on. While I technically have a incorporated company now, I still have to apply for a proper tax ID, for which I want a separate bank account, and that's where I'm at now. I already applied for the electronic tax transmission and the national company register login, and I've also got a tax lawyer to help me out with everything, but to keep cost down I have to do most of this stuff myself.

I know quite a lot are waiting for this unit to come out, I know I do, but there are so many hoops to jump through it just takes a lot of time. I did get my phone working again so I hope to make a bit quicker progress with FSP at least.
 
-12V Progress!

This might be the most boring schematic I've ever done.

Y8NTs5a.png


And the PCB isn't much exciting, either:

0hE9yFJ.png


It's a very simple solution with an isolated DC/DC supply and a connector. The PCB is 27.4mm*13.7mm and is only using SMD components, so it can be glued to the side of the ATX24pin connector with double sided tape.

The DC/DC supply can be one of three possible units from XP Power, Recom Power or CUI Inc which are pin-compatible. Which one will be used in the end will depend on availability and assembly cost. The connector is a 2mm pitch JST PH, which is also available from TE, so mating plugs are easy to source for everyone who wants to customise their cable harness but still needs 12V.

As you can see, the PCB has a somewhat odd layout for the pins with GND in the middle. This has two reasons. First, it allowed to make the PCB single-sided, which reduces cost a little bit. And second, as we found out, some boards - like the Gigabyte B85N-Phoenix - that "check" the -12V rail on boot can be fooled by just shorting the -12V pin to ground. So if someone wants to try that without modifying the PSU, all they need is to get a matching connector and bridge the GND and -12V pins with some solder. So with this pin layout, it is very easy to see whether Vin is shorted to ground in the process.

At this point I have to mention two things. First, what I just described is of course not officially supported and you might risk damaging your mainboard. Second, this -12V unit can only serve as a voltage reference, it's output current is about 80mA, which is below the current recommended by the ATX standard. This means that on mainboards with PCI (which still exist), PCI cards (which also still exist) that require -12V will not work and could potentially damage this unit by drawing too much current. I don't know whether there'll be any issue with RS-232 devices, but I think that shouldn't be a problem. Good, we got that covered.

Now the next step for this thing is to panelise it, generate the gerber files and then ask my manufacturer (the company that makes the PCB) and assembler (that company that puts the components on the PCB) for a quote.

Luckily, I already did part of that:

MHOvked.png


The rest I'll do tomorrow. Thanks for reading!
 
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I like the idea, but am a little concerned if the 40 mm fan will be a little bit noisy...

It seems that ordinary 8cm fans is too thick for flex ATX PSU though.
 
I like the idea, but am a little concerned if the 40 mm fan will be a little bit noisy...

It seems that ordinary 8cm fans is too thick for flex ATX PSU though.

I've been using a sample of this PSU for some time now, and I can tell you that if you're using an ITX GPU, it will be louder than the 40mm fan at any time. Remember, this unit is platinum-rated, so at 50% load it needs to have an efficiency of at least 94% wich yields about 13W of waste heat. That's not a problem for the 40mm fan. If you had enough space you could easily cool this PSU passively. It might get a little louder at full load, but it's meant to be used in builds that profit from the space savings of ITX PSUs, so a total power draw of 500W is not to be expected.

Yes, a normal 80mm fan is too thick, but it would be easy to mod the PSU and put an 80x10mm fan on the top of it. The PSUs fan is even on a connector, so you wouldn't have to solder anything.
 
I see that FSP have this PSU listed on their own website for sale, I assume this means your endeavour was successful iFreilicht?
 
Now, that's the stock version that was posted somewhere above as well. It even has the same error in the specification that it did back then, mentioning an over-current protection on the non-existent -12V rail. Once my version of the FSP500 comes to fruition, you will know about it :D
 
First version of drawing complete!

Today I've finally completed a first version of the drawing! Link to PDF.
If anyone finds a mistake or has objections, please tell me! The division of connectors to the 12V rails is not final, everything else seems pretty much fine to me.

I'll add this to the first post so people can find it easily.
 
Small update: I've created a spreadsheet to collect all information required for running this PSU properly.

Google Docs link

For now, information in there is limited to extension cables, but that already should be quite useful for everyone. If you have any additions, just add them to the spreadsheet.

Also, I submitted a corrected version of the drawing and a final list of modifications for the PSU, which are:
  1. Modified cable harness
  2. Black case
  3. No "Full-RPM" of the fan on start-up
  4. No external cable retention (my unit didn't have that, but I included it for completeness)
  5. Mounting flange at the front
Unfortunately, requirement 3 might not be possible to implement and with bad luck requirement 2 could raise the MOQ to 500, but so far I don't know for sure either way. I'll post a proper update once I get more info, and then we can still decide what route to take if there are multiple choices emerging.
 
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