If you own a Fractal Design power supply we'd love to hear your feedback

Fractal Design NA

Fractal Design NA

Sales and Community Manager
Joined
Apr 28, 2016
Messages
87
I may have mentioned it once or twice before, but user feedback is the single most important resource we rely on when it comes to new product designs and revisions. I think one of the biggest reasons cases like the Define R5, Define S and the new Define C series have been such a widespread success is because our customers have been so forthcoming with such detailed feedback.

Unlike with our cases though, owners of Fractal Design power supplies have been silent as the hardware itself despite healthy sales and an extremely low failure rate. Maybe it's because a power supply is the sort of hardware you only really think about when it fails. Whatever the reason may be, customer reviews are immensely helpful both to us and to other customers, and only four have been left across the whole Integra M series at Newegg since their launch over two years ago. There's somehow not a single review on the 650W version. I like to think the other 99.9% of Integra M owners are pleased with their PSU since they haven't come back and thrown them at us, but it would be great to hear back from more customers.

So if anyone here has a Fractal Design PSU or has owned one in the past, please tell us how you liked it. Is there anything in particular you liked about it? Is there anything we could do better, or maybe something you'd like to see in future products? If so please share your thoughts.

Also, it'd mean an awful lot to us and be a big help to others on the search for new hardware if you could take a moment sometime to go back and leave a review, be it good or bad, at whichever site you originally bought your PSU from. Same goes for any other Fractal Design product too. Anyone who does leave feedback has every right to say they helped design the next Fractal Design product.

Thanks again guys.
 
Newton R3 800W

It failed after a year sadly.
The black stealth cables were very good quality. Much better than the stiff braided cables in the current EVGA P2.

A waterproof PSU would get my attention. Maybe work on that? Otherwise I don't see how you can compete with Seasonic & SuperFlower.
 
PSU's are a tough sell because they are mostly just re-brands of Chinese and Taiwanese makers. If you are paying less then generally you are lower quality components. It's not like a case where cheap steel can be overlooked in favor of amazing airflow and handy tweaks. Who builds Fractal's units, it seems like some come from FSP?
 
Fractal products are pretty decent but I consider Corsair and Noctua to make better products in the same categories.
 
Seasonic too.
My Corsair AX750 is in its 6th year now, very pleased.

Fractal, if you want a good following/sales you need a good class of reviews from sites like JonnyGuru and [H].
Anecdotes dont hold the same value.
And compete favourably on price for features.
 
Important things I recently considered when in the market for a new power supply after mine randomly died whilst I slept one night. In no particular order:

All modular cables, preferably sleeved
Some kind of "eco" mode where the fan in the PSU would turn off when not under heavy load.
A good warranty! The unit I ended up getting has a 10 year warranty and that spoke volumes to me.
This may be more of a niche than a mainstream feature but I needed 2 4+4 CPU hookups coming from the power supply and most units I looked at only had one until I got into the 700-800 watt range.
Some kind of intelligent monitoring.

And one of the biggest SUGGESTIONS I could offer is allow buyers to customize what cables they want to come with there PSU. For example, I need absolutely ZERO molex connectors yet my brand new 2017 850watt PSU came with several of them. I would have rather changed them out for some more SATA cables that will eventually get used.
 
Panmaster said:
Newton R3 800W

It failed after a year sadly.
The black stealth cables were very good quality. Much better than the stiff braided cables in the current EVGA P2.

A waterproof PSU would get my attention. Maybe work on that? Otherwise I don't see how you can compete with Seasonic & SuperFlower.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry to hear that. Were you able to a replacement under the warranty? If there's anything I can do to help please shoot me a pm and I'll be glad to assist.

A waterproof PSU is an interesting idea, though it would certainly would be quite an undertaking to design such a thing. I imagine it would have to be watercooled itself for the sake of forming a seal, but I can't help but wonder if a waterproof PSU compartment would be a more practical alternative. I'm also betting there'd be some significant risks involved in putting a waterproof label on something that handles 120-240VAC. It could be a perfect product with 0% failure rate, but personally I'd still feel uncomfortable suggesting anyone assume it's safe to be anywhere near a live, wet PSU. Still an interesting idea though and thanks for the suggestion.
 
Nenu said:
Seasonic too.
My Corsair AX750 is in its 6th year now, very pleased.

Fractal, if you want a good following/sales you need a good class of reviews from sites like JonnyGuru and [H].
Anecdotes dont hold the same value.
And compete favourably on price for features.
Click to expand...

I totally agree and will be recommending the same to my team.
 
jimbob200521 said:
Important things I recently considered when in the market for a new power supply after mine randomly died whilst I slept one night. In no particular order:

All modular cables, preferably sleeved
Some kind of "eco" mode where the fan in the PSU would turn off when not under heavy load.
A good warranty! The unit I ended up getting has a 10 year warranty and that spoke volumes to me.
This may be more of a niche than a mainstream feature but I needed 2 4+4 CPU hookups coming from the power supply and most units I looked at only had one until I got into the 700-800 watt range.
Some kind of intelligent monitoring.

And one of the biggest SUGGESTIONS I could offer is allow buyers to customize what cables they want to come with there PSU. For example, I need absolutely ZERO molex connectors yet my brand new 2017 850watt PSU came with several of them. I would have rather changed them out for some more SATA cables that will eventually get used.
Click to expand...

All good ideas. I'm also a fan of sleeved cabling and I don't think anyone would argue with more warranty. Dual 4+4 connectors are understandably niche, geared more to the workstation and server side of life by my understanding, but monitoring and fan control could be quite useful to hardware enthusiasts in general.

Custom cable options are a cool idea to think about as well. At least molex connectors are thankfully already becoming a thing of the past, so I expect you'll see fewer (if any) of them in the future regardless. Thanks for all the input.
 
Correct me if I'm wrong but I think one of the problems with giving the user control over the fan is (rather than just monitoring it's speed) is we don't generally have the ability to actually see the temps of components in the PSU to make accurate judgements like we do case and CPU fans. Generally that's all internally controlled in the PSU's PCB and we'd need almost like a USB port on the PSU that would allow more direct monitoring before controlling the fan would really be useful or practical.
 
Fractal Design NA said:
I may have mentioned it once or twice before, but user feedback is the single most important resource we rely on when it comes to new product designs and revisions. I think one of the biggest reasons cases like the Define R5, Define S and the new Define C series have been such a widespread success is because our customers have been so forthcoming with such detailed feedback.
Click to expand...

Nothing to do with PSU's but an even smaller ITX Define S which isn't bloated up to support watercooling would be cool. Something around 18 L while maintaining the other aspects of the design. Having had the R5 previously was disappointed to see the ITX version to be so huge.
 
It's too bad you guys didn't have this for sale last year, when I replaced the PSU in my Node 304 with a non-modular unit.

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817580013

I've known about this stuff for years, but until this year your US distribution has been shit. What guarantees do we have from you that this is a long-term effort? There were reviews for your products back in 2015, but no real volume commitment until now.
 
just an fyi if it don't get a gold on [H] or silver because of price at the time of review and then comes down to a good value the odds of me buying or recommending it are very very low.
A good power supply is the cornerstone of a good build and I like how the [H] reviews are done.
 
I recently did a build with a Define R5 and immediately replaced the stock fans with much better Aerocool DeadSilence fans. Perhaps add an option for no fans included with the case to lower the price? Also, I'd recommend removing the latch that you have to press to open the left side panel, and have it open using screws only like the right side panel.
 
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