Another PSU getting tested... Fanless 450 Lion

jonnyGURU

jonnyGURU

Technical Marketing Manager at Corsair Memory
Joined
Apr 9, 2005
Messages
4,844
I don't see this one much in circulation, so I thought it'd make a good review.

The power supply is from ePower/PCMCIS (one in the same, right?) It's fanless and called the "450 Lion." Model # EP-450P5 L1."

I haven't hooked it up to the loader yet, but when installed in a PC it seemed to be fairly stable, but got wicked hot. The fan isn't supposed to turn on until the load is greater than 250W. The fan never turned on! :eek: Maybe they should make it turn on if the load exceeds 250W OR the temps get over a certain number. ;)

Unfortunately, the whole PC got hot too since there was no ambient heat exhausting through the PSU, but that's partially my fault. I'm sure I could buy a case and some case fans that would be a suitable alternative to relying on a power supply fan to exhaust heat.

The unit is made by Topower and offers a whole 28A on the 12V rail. It doesn't have a 24-pin connector or PCI-e, so I'm not sure who the target audience is supposed to be. Maybe they're discouraging installing it in a really powerful system because it'll overheat? ;)

Anyways... Many truths will be exposed once I get the thing on the SunMoon... But for now, here's some pics:


This is the top of the PSU. Looks like any other Topower.

Here's the label. Note the cheese grater grills along the bottom of the PSU.

Here's the back. The button allows you to turn the fan on. Note the heatsink sticking out of the back. It looks like nothing more than a 60MM CPU heatsink....

...From the inside, you can see that the "CPU heatsink" isn't really part of the heatsinks the MOSFET's are attached to. It's "bolted" on to the other heatsinks.

Side shot with top off. Looks very Topowerish.
 
Hey Johnny after i send you this TTGI/Superflower mind taking a look at one of the fanless TTGI/Superflowers?
 
On the topwer line of power supplies the fans only speeds up/turns on after 250w, it guesses this amount by the temperature sensor in the psu. If you tested the psu outside of a computer then its likely it wouldnt come on at all.

Its a real shame that my topower psu (globalwin) blew up when a 12v cable short circuited. It blew up one of the transistors on the heatsink next to the large capacitors :(

It would be great if you could test a 550/650w qtec since they awfull psu's and can only give out 300-350w but I think they are only available in europe.
 
TDK said:
On the topwer line of power supplies the fans only speeds up/turns on after 250w, it guesses this amount by the temperature sensor in the psu. If you tested the psu outside of a computer then its likely it wouldnt come on at all.

Its a real shame that my topower psu (globalwin) blew up when a 12v cable short circuited. It blew up one of the transistors on the heatsink next to the large capacitors :(

It would be great if you could test a 550/650w qtec since they awfull psu's and can only give out 300-350w but I think they are only available in europe.
Click to expand...

Are you talking about a FANLESS model Topower?

It's clearly stated on the box that the fan turns on at 250W + load. I may not have had it over that, but if it does "guess" you're at 250W by the temperature of the PSU (which IMO is stupid because there's more variables at play then wattage when it comes to your PC's and PSU's total ambient temperature) then it should have turned on well long before I finally decided to turn the PC off. It got VERY hot.
 
They are all pretty much the same, it says its a load controlled fan but really its temperature controlled fan. Basically the temperature sensor is tweaked so that the fan will only turn on at say 60C which is when it will be using roughly 250w while in a computer case which is 30-35C ambient temp.

You could have had a faulty one though. Maybe they can cope with that amount of heat, the tagan psu's which are very similar also run very hot (fan speeds up after 250w)
 
Ok... This PSU gets the thubs up (with a slight twitch, of course.)

It does what it's supposed to do.

TDK was right about the fans not turining on until the temps get to a certain temp. That sort of pisses me off that the box and docs say "250W." There is NO direct relation between wattage and temperature except of course for temperatures going up as wattage goes up.. but what if I were running this PC in an igloo in Alaska?

I fired it up and put a steady 300W load on it for about 45 minutes. I ate breakfast... drank coffee....got the paper, read a few pages.... took out the trash... then suddenly.. at 45C, the fan kicked in ever so slowly.

The fan actually spins at a full range of RPM's starting at 600 RPM, so even after this thing kicks into gear at 45C, it's still VERY quiet!

If I could change anything, I'd make it more efficient so it didn't run as hot (duh!) and I think that IF the fans were spinning because the temps were high, and the PC is shut down, I'd like it if the fans would keep running at the same RPM for a few minutes after power down as to keep the components cool, like the Raidmax and XClio fans do.

I guess I've got a review to write up.

Hmm... Maybe I should see about scoring a water cooling kit and build a quiet PC out of my Lian-Li case and this PSU and put that one in the bedroom. :)
 
Sorry everyone.

Thursday has come and gone and now we're half way through Friday and apparently there's no updates on SLCentral.

There's a Thermaltake TWV480W going up as well, but I just have to wait for it to get posted. :(
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top