Seasonic Super Tornado 300W
Score: 95% Developer: Seasonic
Function: While Seasonic has only been around since 1975, the company has forged a formidable lineage by focusing their R&D on power conversion products. This modest but respectable company first started out supplying power supply units for Apple and IBM PCs in the 1980s. Their principal focus is something referred to as 'Green Power' or, more generally speaking electricity, that is generated from renewable resources, such as solar, wind, geothermal, small hydro, and biomass, which have minimal effects on the natural environment. More importantly they are particularly keen on trying to 'keep da noise down' especially in their PC power units. So what does this have to do with a PC power supply, you might ask? Well a lot. Here's why. Seasonic's extensions into the IPC & Server Power Supply and Open Frame power markets have helped hone its skills. This results in a power supply for your PC that is reliable, durable and efficient. Simply put, voltage irregularities found in commonly used mass-produced power supply units, or PSUs, tend to breach their power integrity thresholds rather often, which can result in nasty system anomalies such as freezes, program errors and memory inefficiencies to name a few. Remember, almost everything in your PC is reliant upon the PSU's ability to supply clean and available power on demand. The key words here are clean and available. If you have too little power, you have problems, if you have dirty power, you have problems. Get my drift? Good. Let's move on. So let's talk about the Seasonic Super Tornado 300. You will immediately notice on the box that this PSU sports a 120 mm (cyclone) cooling fan, maximizing internal air movement at approximately half the rotational (RPM) noise. Larger fans can give you higher CFM (cubic feet per minute), in this case 70CFM to be exact, and spin slower moving at fewer RPMs; hence less noise. Then they tout the Smart & Silent Fan Control. This technology is stated to reduce noise from the fan without increasing the temperature. Additionally, they claim extended fan life and automatic adjustments to prevent errors. This takes us to Ultra Ventilation which employs a honeycomb type vent that reduces air resistance and accelerates the ventilation process. This particular technique proved to significantly aid in reducing airflow noise emanating from the PSU's fan casing. Moreover, Seasonic claims super high efficiency for this unit claiming an up to 80 percent efficiency rating - some 20 percent higher than the standard PSUs found in many of today's PCs. That covers the main identifiers, but one of the most notable is also the simplest of the bunch, the cable management system. This 'Dr. Cable' rig aids in tidying up loose wiring which also serves to improve the airflow restrictions inside your PC case thus aiding the cooling effect. Installation Installation of the unit is standard fare, and even if you have never done this type of work inside your PC case before, the manual has a rather well written set of instructions to guide you through the screws and plugs of the process. Specifications This unit meets Intel ATX Ver 2.03 spec and is AMD recommended. The Super Tornado has very high efficiency and reliability ratings (as previously alluded to) and boasts Active PFC, 220VAC full load @ 0.99 typical power efficiency of 80 percent. Active means that the fan will regulate its rotational speed in accordance with internal temperatures, and DO NOT gloss over the fact that this fan will auto-detect if your are connected via 115V or 240V standard current. Now, add to that the low ripple and noise at less than 1 percent; the super low noise fan control; impressive acoustic properties of 25.8dba typical at 70W; short circuit protection and over-power protection; AC input voltage of 100-240V, 5A @ 50/60Hz; DC output voltage, +3.3V @ 28A, +5V @ 30A, +12V @ 18A, -12V @ 0.8A, +5Vsb @ 2A; a host of power connectors; 7X 4PIN(5.25 inches), 2x 4PIN(3.5 inches) 1x 4PIN(Pentium 4), 1x 6PIN, 1X 20Pin, 1x 3Pin(fan); the Dr. Cable Kit; EMI/RFI compliance; safety compliance, UL, VDE, cUL, FDD, and CB; MTBF 100,000 hours @ 25c 340W Peak. This rather mind boggling yet impressive list of technical specs may not mean much to the average user, but trust that they mean a lot if you are trying to improve the reliability of your PC rig. It is there that these hieroglyphics matter most. Connectors are not in short supply here either. The Super Tornado is equipped with 2 cables that are approximately some 32 inches in length. These have three 4-pin IDE drive connectors and a floppy drive connector. Pretty standard stuff. Then there is a cable with two 4-pin IDE drive connectors, another with the main 20-pin ATX connector, another with a P4 connector for the 12v a cable for 3.3v connector and one for PSU fan monitoring kits or software.
Performance: I tested this rather quiet PSU using an ASUS P4PE motherboard. The rest of the test system employed a gig of Kingston Hyper X DDR 2700 over-clocked, an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro, an Intel P4 2.4 processor over-clocked to 3.1 GHz, all coupled to a Maxtor 160 GB HD and two Samsung CDR and DVD drives. The case used in this test was an Antec full tower. Oh yeah, and the CPU fan is a Zalman CNPS7000 flower type heat sink and 92mm fan. CPU temp before the Super Tornado was fitted, after three hours of idle and 30 minutes at load was 39C idle and 44C load. Motherboard temps were steady at 25 to 27C at all times. Upon loading the Super Tornado into the case and letting the system idle for 24 hours and then cheating a bit and using a burn in utility for 2 hours told me what I needed to know right off. Although I used longer load times in my test of the Super Tornado, my CPU and MB temps decreased. This is likely due to the fact the RaidMax 400W PSU I regularly use emits heated air in the direction of the CPU and motherboard that add to the overall temperatures within the Antec case. With the Super Tornado in place, my CPU load temp was actually 2C lower and my motherboard temp stayed solid at 25C. Considering that PSUs are designed to exhaust their air, it became apparent that the Seasonic Super Tornado was exponentially more efficient in that regard, likely drawing scads more air 'in pull' across the MB and PSU resulting in additional cooling that a PSU is simply not (in essence) designed to produce. The 120mm fan in this PSU is a quiet giant and lives up to the accolades the folks at Seasonic cast its way. Additional testing was of the practical and 'normal use' type. This is what really matters to the average user and PC gamer. After several, and I mean several, hours of non-stop 3D gaming, while simultaneously downloading lots of multimedia content, and while running a webcam feed :o) , I knew I had properly heated the core of my PC to my normal daily levels. Noise never ascended past 23dBA @ 1meter. This was very impressive given the constant and stringent nature of the computer's use and the heavy over-clocking going on inside as well.
Features: 120 mm Cyclone Cooling Fan >70CFm Smart & Silent Fan Control [S2FC] Ultra (Honeycomb) Ventilation Active Power Factor Correction [99 percent PFC] Super High Efficiency [up to 80 percent] Forward Converter [more reliable and efficient] Universal Free Input [100-240V full range] Cable Management Kit [Dr. Cable] 340W max output
Drawbacks & Problems:: Stability never proved to be a problem for this PSU and easily matched or bested other benchmark tests of similar Seasonic and competitive products. While the Super Tornado 300 is not going to power the space shuttle, its stability at high loads, and sustained wattages will easily meet the demands of PC aficionados with a penchant for the 'cool and quiet.' I highly recommend this PSU for serious consideration with one caveat. If you are truly a manic over-clocker, I would nod towards the Super Tornado 400 with just a bit of a sacrifice in overall noise reduction. But if you just like to chunk in state-of-the-art components, like pricey Nvidia and ATI cards, esoteric RAM solutions, and engage in the occasional BIOS tweak - this could be the right one for you. The Seasonic Super Tornado 300 with its rated and documented 340W max output is a sexy, unique, quiet power source that will give you loads of clean, dependable power at an affordable price for around 56 dollars.
-Fabz, GameVortex Communications AKA Fabian Blache
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