SilverStone NJ450 450W Fanless Power Supply Review @ [H]

[FrgMstr]

SilverStone NJ450 450W Fanless Power Supply Review

SilverStone is no stranger to small form factor PC power supplies as it is the most complete supplier of these to the enthusiast PC marketplace. Today SilverStone is adding complete silence to these SFF PSUs with the 450 watt Nightjar. Excellent efficiency makes silence easier, but can the Nightjar stand up to an extremely hot case?

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[MrDeaf]

I thought your review was put together really well, except for one minor point about the cables.
I would like to point out that Silverstone still hasn't fixed their SFX SATA power cable design problem.

Particularly the point where the majority of Silverstone's newer mITX cases require straight, 180d, SATA power connectors, but Silverstone ships their SFX PSUs with 90d connectors.

For example, on the RVZ series, Silverstone likes to place the 2.5in SSD/HDD so they sit side by side and have the PCB side face towards the outer panel. This scheme works fine with straight connectors that have individual strands, but is an extremely poor match with 90d connectors. In fact, it wouldn't be that bad if there was a bit of wiggle room between the 2.5" bay and outer panel, but there's almost none at all, so this causes these 90d connectors to get strained even more and can cause the connector to break... off of the disk side.


This picture below is the 2.5" disk tray from a Silverstone SG13, with the same above mentioned issue. The disks sit with PCB facing the outer panel and with almost no room between the outer panel
As you can probably see, those are individual stranded straight power cables that fit. (Okay, granted, the cables on the Corsair SF600 are also extra, but Silverstone doesn't even sell a cable kit with straight line SATA connectors)

90d angle connectors with ribboned cables will not fit very well... and Silverstone insists on using those inline 90d connectors for some reason.

 

[emphy]

The SilverStone NJ450 is a fanless unit so, rather unsurprisingly, it was silent throughout load testing. As such, the unit easily achieved its advertised noise profile.

There is such a thing as "electromagnetically excited acoustic noise", which would likely be all the more annoying in a completely fanless environment. That's why some checking of the "coil whine-free" claim from Silverstone's advertisement may be appropriate.

 

[FrgMstr]

There is such a thing as "electromagnetically excited acoustic noise", which would likely be all the more annoying in a completely fanless environment. That's why some attention for checking the "coil whine-free" claim from Silverstone may be appropriate.

And it was silent....

 

[[Spectre]]

I thought your review was put together really well, except for one minor point about the cables.
I would like to point out that Silverstone still hasn't fixed their SFX SATA power cable design problem.

Particularly the point where the majority of Silverstone's newer mITX cases require straight, 180d, SATA power connectors, but Silverstone ships their SFX PSUs with 90d connectors.

For example, on the RVZ series, Silverstone likes to place the 2.5in SSD/HDD so they sit side by side and have the PCB side face towards the outer panel. This scheme works fine with straight connectors that have individual strands, but is an extremely poor match with 90d connectors. In fact, it wouldn't be that bad if there was a bit of wiggle room between the 2.5" bay and outer panel, but there's almost none at all, so this causes these 90d connectors to get strained even more and can cause the connector to break... off of the disk side.


This picture below is the 2.5" disk tray from a Silverstone SG13, with the same above mentioned issue. The disks sit with PCB facing the outer panel and with almost no room between the outer panel
As you can probably see, those are individual stranded straight power cables that fit. (Okay, granted, the cables on the Corsair SF600 are also extra, but Silverstone doesn't even sell a cable kit with straight line SATA connectors)

90d angle connectors with ribboned cables will not fit very well... and Silverstone insists on using those inline 90d connectors for some reason.

View attachment 105043

SilverStone power supplies are not just used in SilverStone cases.

 

[emphy]

Indeed. Our sample did not exhibit coil whine. That said, given the factors behind why units will whine it is almost impossible to guarantee that every single unit from a production run will be free of the issue in every possible hardware configuration and scenario. As such, the whining about coil whine is much ado about nothing.

Heh, don't quite agree there (obviously); I get that the review was aimed at the other performance metrics, but for this specific PSU, Silverstone is advertising the lack of whine noise prominently in their video, so having it present would, imo, definitely have been a negative point. After all, they are guaranteeing that it'll run free of the issue (to be more precise: that, if there is noise, it will be blocked)

 

[[Spectre]]

Heh, don't quite agree there (obviously); I get that the review was aimed at the other performance metrics, but for this specific PSU, Silverstone is advertising the lack of whine noise prominently in their video, so having it present would, imo, definitely have been a negative point. After all, they are guaranteeing that it'll run free of the issue (to be more precise: that, if there is noise, it will be blocked)

Yes, and they guarnetee it to run for three years also. However, it is almost impossible to guarantee that every single unit from a production run will be free of any issue that causes failure in every possible hardware configuration and scenario as well. That doesn't change how the unit did. You understand what I mean?

 

[emphy]

Yes, and they guarnetee it to run for three years also. However, it is almost impossible to guarantee that every single unit from a production run will be free of any issue that causes failure in every possible hardware configuration and scenario as well. That doesn't change how the unit did. You understand what I mean?

That is no different from any other (PC hardware) product, so no worries there.

My point was that coil whine noise reduction becomes rather more important than normal for such an esoteric feature, given the kind of psu this is, and audience it seems to be aimed at.

 

[FrgMstr]

That is no different from any other (PC hardware) product, so no worries there.

My point was that coil whine noise reduction becomes rather more important than normally for such an esoteric feature, given the audience this psu seems to be aimed at.

Thanks for your input, we fully understand.

 

[Tony Ou]

There is such a thing as "electromagnetically excited acoustic noise", which would likely be all the more annoying in a completely fanless environment. That's why some checking of the "coil whine-free" claim from Silverstone's advertisement may be appropriate.

Indeed. Our sample did not exhibit coil whine. That said, given the factors behind why units will whine it is almost impossible to guarantee that every single unit from a production run will be free of the issue in every possible hardware configuraiton and scenario. As such, the whining about coil whine is much ado about nothing.

Normally we take anywhere from 1 to 3 months of fine-tuning during PSU development on multiple platforms and software suites to make sure we can reduce the chance of users hearing these noises. With the NJ450-SXL, we didn't spend a single day doing that because there were simply no noise to begin with. Electrical / coil whine noises are generally higher frequency sound waves so they are best transmitted by air, with NJ450-SXL's sealed design air doesn't get out, thus no noise gets out. Simple physics!

 

[M76]

SilverStone power supplies are not just used in SilverStone cases.

You'd think their power supplies are compatible with their own cases. You can't expect parts from the same manufacturer to work together out of the box?

 

[Bawjaws]

This looks like a really decent bit of kit, speaking as someone who loves both SFF stuff and silence. The price is a bit scary but it's understandable, I suppose.

 

[Tony Ou]

You'd think their power supplies are compatible with their own cases. You can't expect parts from the same manufacturer to work together out of the box?

We have nearly 100 case models available for sale so our power supply cable definition can't fit all. Some of our small form factor cases are designed to be as small as possible so they have different limitations. We do offer cables adapters ourselves to help make these connections easier such as CP10 and CP13.