Testbed and Methods
Test Setup

• Case: Vigor Force
• Power Supply: Antec NeoHE 550W | PCP&C Silencer 750 EPS12V
• Motherboard: Intel Desktop Board D975XBX (Bad Axe)
• Processor: Secret (Varying MHz)
• Hard Drive: Western Digital 2500KS 7200RPM, 250GB with 16MB Cache Buffer
• Video: eVGA NVIDIA GeForce 7900GT KO Superclocked (580/1580)
• Memory: 1024MB (2x512MB) Corsair XMS2 PC2 6400 (TWIN2X1024A-6400)
• Optical Drive: Lite-ON SHW160P6S05
• Cooling: Vigor Monsoon II
• Audio: Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic
• NIC: Killer Network Interface Card

Software Configuration

• Motherboard BIOS: D975XBX Express BIOS Update (Rev. 1351)
• Operating System: Windows XP Professional with Service Pack 2
• Video Driver: NVIDIA ForceWare Version 91.47 WHQL Certified (September 14 release)

I originally planned to test this power supply on our Core 2 Extreme X6800-based testbed, but the maximum system power consumption I was able to squeeze out of that system was a measly ~330 Watts. With a, umm, different processor (secret!), I was able to consume significantly more power – enough to adequately test the abilities of the Silencer 750 EPS12V. The test system is also using the Monsoon II TEC cooler from Vigor Gaming, which consumes a lot of power itself.

Testing this power supply on a stock system, in my mind, would wholly defeat the purpose of buying a high-end power supply in the first place. There are very few systems out there that consume enough power on stock settings to justify buying a power supply over 550 Watts. Such systems include Quad-SLI configurations, RAID arrays, and extreme cooling – no two ways about it. That said, I will be overclocking this system quite significantly, somewhere on the order of 30%.

The main aspect of this power supply that I will be testing is the stability of the rails. Rail stability is one of the most important traits a modern power supply can have, as it typically defines the quality of the product, and indeed, insures the stability of the system it is being used in. To test rail stability, I will be using a digital multimeter to measure the voltages on each rail at four relevant loading conditions. These loading conditions are the initial system startup, idle Windows operation, typical gaming load, and an augmented full system load. The gaming load will consist of playing Half-Life 2: Episode 1 on high settings to stress the graphics card to its limit. To achieve a full system load, I will also be playing HL2: Ep1, but will be running 4 instances of Folding@Home in the background as well. This will ensure that both the processor and video card are operating under full load. This method will be used two times over on two separate power supplies, once at stock settings, and once when overclocked.

Overclocked system settings consist of the following:

• Processor Clock Speed: 3.47 GHz (roughly 30% overclock)
• Processor Voltage: 1.4875 (1.35 stock)
• MCH Voltage: 1.65 (1.50 stock)