Ultra PowerPartner

[Reaper]

I have a Arctic Cooling Silentium, and I love the design, accessibility and quiet of the machine. The only drawback is that it has a fully custom Seasonic 350W PSU. Now this PSU was just dandy for my 2500+, 2 Hd's, 1GB RAM and 6800 Ultra, but since I want to build an AM2 w/ an 8 series card and probably a 6000+, the proprietary PSU just won't cut it.
So late last night I'm cruising the FS/T forum and I see an interesting product known as the Ultra PowerPartner. Curiosity strikes me and I go to Ultra's site. It is a 5 1/4 unit that provides an additional 325W to the system. The Silentium has only 2 5 1/4's, but I figure I'm just going to run 1 SATA DVD-Burner, so now onto the question (I've been told I talk too much)

Does ANYONE have any hands on experience with this unit?

If so I'd love to hear. I still fully plan on buying it and running my vid card and the 2 planned HD's off it, and in which case I'll let everyone know what I think. The idea alone is genius to me, especially since I have a case where I cannot upgrade the PSU, or for others who have a nice PSU and lots of open 5 1/4's. I'll let you know what I find, but I probably won't finish the build until after Christmas, as I am in the middle of a triple server HTPC and new main rig build plus I just added a mortgage to my rent (I live away from the house my sister and I are purchasing)

 

[BillR]

I’m not familiar with that exact product and jonnyguru hasn’t reviewed it yet. The concept seems simple enough especially the requirement (as I read it anyway) to pass your 24 pin plug through this unit there by assuring you won’t have any ground issues.

After that it simply adds an additional claimed 26 Amps of current to your 12v BUSS and 5 Amps to your 5 volt BUSS.

I also noticed some from other companies but none I’d have any confidence with a purchase.

Back in the day Ultra pretty much sucked, but the past couple of years they seem to have put that behind them. Their current line of PSU product usually gets pretty good reviews as well.

All that said, if you like what you have and are short on bucks it sure looks like a logical solution. My only additional thought would be to carefully monitor the heat build up inside your case as that is where that unit exhausts.

Luck

 

[jonnyGURU]

I actually used on in my SFF to power an AMD 4100+, one drive, two fans and a 7950 GT (board powered using a Pico PSU with +12V coming from the PowerPartner.) Worked great.

Pros:

Quiet
Has +5V rail (others are +12V only)
Looks cool

Cons:

No PFC
"V-Series" build quality (Wintech design, built by Yue-Lin)
Rated at 25°C with a steep de-rate (since it intakes air from the room instead of from inside the case, this may not be a problem.)

If all you're powering is one graphics card and two hard drives, it's almost overkill. Like I said, I powered a whole computer with one.

 

[BillR]

I actually used on in my SFF to power an AMD 4100+, one drive, two fans and a 7950 GT (board powered using a Pico PSU with +12V coming from the PowerPartner.) Worked great.

Pros:

Quiet
Has +5V rail (others are +12V only)
Looks cool

Cons:

No PFC
"V-Series" build quality (Wintech design, built by Yue-Lin)
Rated at 25°C with a steep de-rate (since it intakes air from the room instead of from inside the case, this may not be a problem.)

If all you're powering is one graphics card and two hard drives, it's almost overkill. Like I said, I powered a whole computer with one.

Damn, did I miss your review? Search didn't show it.

My big concern was the problems one sometimes encounters when running dual PSUs in conjunction with each other. Their soulution to solve the uncommon ground issues seemed logical.

Thanks

 

[jonnyGURU]

Damn, did I miss your review? Search didn't show it.

My big concern was the problems one sometimes encounters when running dual PSUs in conjunction with each other. Their soulution to solve the uncommon ground issues seemed logical.

Thanks

There never was a review. I bought one of these, a Thermaltake and an FSP 5.25" bay for madmat to review some time ago, but the review's never been published. Maybe it'll see the light of day by the end of the year.

 

[mavalpha]

I actually used on in my SFF to power an AMD 4100+, one drive, two fans and a 7950 GT (board powered using a Pico PSU with +12V coming from the PowerPartner.) Worked great.

Pros:

Quiet
Has +5V rail (others are +12V only)
Looks cool

Cons:

No PFC
"V-Series" build quality (Wintech design, built by Yue-Lin)
Rated at 25°C with a steep de-rate (since it intakes air from the room instead of from inside the case, this may not be a problem.)

If all you're powering is one graphics card and two hard drives, it's almost overkill. Like I said, I powered a whole computer with one.

Dammit, you beat me to that idea!

I wanted to do this with my SG-01 or the V300 that'll be replacing it hopefully in January, that way I could use a Minja to cool what will by then be a mATX Phenom X4 HTPC. I hadn't seen Ultra's offering, but I already gave a friend of mine a TT 250W to help his X-Finity 500W. Microcenter actually carries a 450W version called the JuiceBox, which I was curious about as well.

 

[jonnyGURU]

Well, the TT and Juicebox don't have +5V output. The PicoPSU does, but not a lot. So I opted to let the Pico only power the board via the ATX connector.

 

[Reaper]

The reason I'm planning on using it is that I don't think a 350w, even a Seasonic, will power a 8800 (be it GT/X/S), AM2 6000+, 4GB RAM and a couple HD's