[SOLVED] Are PSU 80+ ratings a marketing gimic, or do they actually make much of a difference?

DogNamedNibbles

Prominent
Mar 24, 2021
25
0
530
So I've been looking to replace my PSU, and have been wondering if the 80+ ratings are a marketing gimic, or not? I've searched what they do, but if the air it flowing straight out the case, do these even make much of a difference?

I'm mainly looking at 80+ White vs 80+ Gold.

(Side Question: If they do make a difference, would it be better to get a Cooler Master 80+ White, or an EVGA 80+ Gold? (I've heard cooler master's are extremely good, but canb't find much about EVGA))
 
As with most power supply resellers Coolermaster and EVGA have very good power supplies and very crappy power supplies.
Neither manufacture their power supplies. They put their label on supply made by different companies.
Most EVGA White are the W1 units which you do not want.
80+ Gold is an efficency rating. Not a power supply model.
If you could link to the 2 models or state their exact model number we can advise much better.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Krotow
80+ Rankings are solely a measure of a PSUs efficiency. Efficiency is somewhat important, but higher 80+ does not always mean the PSU will be more reliable, quieter, and better overall. It's not a marketing gimmick as it does provide useful information about the PSUs efficiency, but many people have misinterpreted higher levels of 80+ certification to mean the PSU is better overall, which isn't accurate.

Also, companies like EVGA make many PSUs with the same efficiency level with varying quality. Something like an GD and G2 are both "EVGA Gold units" but are very different in quality.

Need to know specific units being compared.
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
There is more to it than just ratings, Who to trust also plays a lot in it.
Last 2 times I avoided OEM PSU and gone to the source.
Might cost more but you know who made it, unless you get a cheap model than all bets are off.
 

Zerk2012

Titan
Ambassador
So I've been looking to replace my PSU, and have been wondering if the 80+ ratings are a marketing gimic, or not? I've searched what they do, but if the air it flowing straight out the case, do these even make much of a difference?

I'm mainly looking at 80+ White vs 80+ Gold.

(Side Question: If they do make a difference, would it be better to get a Cooler Master 80+ White, or an EVGA 80+ Gold? (I've heard cooler master's are extremely good, but canb't find much about EVGA))
You heard wrong most cooler master power supplies are just garbage. 80+ white means it never reached Bronze ratting.

% of Rated Load10%20%50%100%
80 PLUS (otherwise known as 80+ White)--80%80%80% / PFC .90
80 PLUS Bronze--82%85% / PFC .9082%
80 PLUS Silver--85%88% / PFC .9085%
80 PLUS Gold--87%90% / PFC .9087%
80 PLUS Platinum--90%92% / PFC .9589%
80 PLUS Titanium90%92% / PFC .9594%90%
Pick your power supply and google it the exact one with the word reviews you should only be looking for professional reviews not user reviews.

Now for what most people never think about for the ratings.
You can start the production line and produce 1000 power supplies and check every one you might have (just for example) 500 that are only 75 efficient, 498 that are 78 efficient, and 2 that are at the magic number of 80 % you send one of those in for certification and boom you just got that design with those parts 80+ certified you can now claim all of them as 80+ certified.

No different then building a PC you can build 10 identical PC's run the same benchmarks on all 10 and one will out perform the rest.

For the brands I've not been keeping up lately but to my knowledge Cooler Master has and will never actually make a power supply their all rebrands. Out of the probably world wide 300 or so different brands most are made by about 5 major manufactures, Off the top of my head Delta, CWT, Anderson, Super Flower, and Seasonic.

The watts are so poorly regulated you can build one and slap a 500 watt sticker on it knowing it will go up in smoke if you pull 250 watts from it.

EDIT I'm sure their a few more no name companies that make some real garbage units.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Krotow

DogNamedNibbles

Prominent
Mar 24, 2021
25
0
530
As with most power supply resellers Coolermaster and EVGA have very good power supplies and very crappy power supplies.
Neither manufacture their power supplies. They put their label on supply made by different companies.
Most EVGA White are the W1 units which you do not want.
80+ Gold is an efficency rating. Not a power supply model.
If you could link to the 2 models or state their exact model number we can advise much better.
Sorry, it's these two

Cooler Master MWE 750W 230V 80Plus White

EVGA 700 GD 700W 80+ Gold Power supply
https://www.evga.com/products/product.aspx?pn=100-GD-0700-V1

The reviews are basically the same.
 
Not a gimmick at all. But you still have to check the brands as just having 80 Plus does not mean its a good quality PSU. Most gold or higher are but there are still a few that take shortcuts here and there while still qualifying for the rating.

I can't find much on the reviews for the EVGA but the Coolermaster one I found gave it a "meh". The info I can find about the EVGA is that its not the best of the best.

Do you have a price range you are trying to stick to?
 

Karadjgne

Titan
Ambassador
80+ isn't a standard, nor a ranking. It's a certification by a 3rd party only. Vendors send their units to 80plus for testing and verification, and 80plus sends it back with their findings.

80+ in itself is just a measure of efficiency. But take into consideration that in order to get that efficiency, better grade components, additional circuitry etc must be employed to do so. So an honest 80+Gold will not only be more efficient, but more than likely be better built as well. Part of the efficiency is also translated to voltage outputs, you can't have an efficient unit and craptastic voltage regulation.

So an 80+White has nothing much more than a couple caps, couple coils, a few regulators and transistors. Most of which will be low grade cheap crap because a White unit is a sub-standard unit. A Gold unit is its opposite.

AC is alternating current. Up and down in a sinusoidal wave. DC is direct current, dead flat. It's next to impossible for a psu to convert AC to DC and not get ripple. Ripple is an OC and stability killer. The flatter the DC, the higher the chances of stability. That applies to gpus as well, or any modern equipment, higher ripple tears them up.

So yes, there's a marked difference in the 80+ certs.

But, buyer beware. Not everyone is honest about those certs, some are flat out BS, never being sent, not verified or certified, complete fabrications, which becomes a marketing gimmick.
 

DogNamedNibbles

Prominent
Mar 24, 2021
25
0
530
Okay, that looks like the FSP variant since the model number ends in a V#. The Andyson built variant ends in B#.

User reviews are generally rubbish.

Looking at the MWE white, it claims to have LLC and DC-DC, which is typically good. However, for a unit to have a modern design and still only manage to barely squeak 80+ White while being on 230v where its efficiency should be high, it makes me think something about the platform or component choice has to be crappy in order to cause this...

Honestly, I would not buy either without a proper review.

For context, what is your budget and what are the specs of the pc this PSU is going into.
 

DogNamedNibbles

Prominent
Mar 24, 2021
25
0
530
Okay, that looks like the FSP variant since the model number ends in a V#. The Andyson built variant ends in B#.

User reviews are generally rubbish.

Looking at the MWE white, it claims to have LLC and DC-DC, which is typically good. However, for a unit to have a modern design and still only manage to barely squeak 80+ White while being on 230v where its efficiency should be high, it makes me think something about the platform or component choice has to be crappy in order to cause this...

Honestly, I would not buy either without a proper review.

For context, what is your budget and what are the specs of the pc this PSU is going into.
Currenly my budget is in the range is ideally capped at £150 NZD (£75 GBP, or $100 USD), but I'd be willing to go higher.

Currently I have:

EVGA GTX 1080TI
i5- 9400f (6 core, 3.8GHz - 4.1GHz)
16GB (2666 - 3000MHz)
3x SATA3 2TB
1x SATA3 SSD 500GB
(Don't think they use much, but I have 7x 120mm fans)

That's the main.
 

jtk2515

Distinguished
I'm not a PSU expert but I have bought around 70 of these 600 watt psu's. Had a few come in DOA but only had 1 fail that I know of. They are dirt cheap to buy and I get them between 33-35$. usually load these around 250-300watts.

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/evga-w...us-power-supply-black/8511029.p?skuId=8511029

Then for higher end systems I usally buy Used dell workstation PSU's Gold/platinum 1000w-1400w off of ebay. They run around 55-80$. They are made in China and are heavy as 2 bricks. Delta makes Good PSU's .

I never see reviews that give testing to failure which is the most important thing. That is why you always see people go conservative with their recommendations because no one really knows what a certain model can do.
 
Last edited:

jtk2515

Distinguished
W1 series is fine for a very budget pc but should not be used aside from in these scenarios.

The W1 series will fail if loaded very hard due to a design flaw.
View: https://youtu.be/60jVEwq44ZU

Is is failing from max load or because of the fan Speed curve in low load conditions? I dont see what he was testing when it died. I'm very suprised he tested it at 100% load and it did not blow up.
 

jtk2515

Distinguished
The only gpu I'd put on a W1 or N1 series of any vendor would be a GT710 or other 20w older card. Newer cards seriously get affected by the miserable ripple especially OC versions which have very little tolerance for voltage fluctuation as is.

Failing because EVGA cut costs and didn't give the bridge rectifier adaquate cooling. As such, when the psu is loaded I think to 110% (which it should be able to handle as per atx spec) it overheated and exploded.

Honestly I'm impressed more now with that evga 500w after this review. It's in the 30-37$ range. Has less then 100mv of ripple at 100% load and 19mv of ripple at 60% load. For the price the 600w and 500w seem like awesome PSU's. Would you not recommend these as budget options for a 250-300 watt load?

10400f+3060ti system is around 300w I feel like a 600 watt evga is perfect for this budget system.

Edit. Replaced 7mv with 19mv for load at 60%
 
Last edited:

DSzymborski

Titan
Moderator
Honestly I'm impressed more now with that evga 500w after this review. It's in the 30-37$ range. Has less then 100mv of ripple at 100% load and 7mv of ripple at 60% load. For the price the 600w and 500w seem like awesome PSU's. Would you not recomend these as budget options for a 250-300 watt load?

Yuck. A system with a $400 GPU -- and that's if you can get it at retail -- is not a budget build. But it's your equipment. Bragging about 100mv of ripple is...interesting. A bit like a restaurant advertising that only 10% of their customers come down with a case of food poisoning.

Nobody here is going to recommend this.
 

Karadjgne

Titan
Ambassador
No. Ton of CapXon 85°C caps, badly designed, limited heatsinking, worthless protections.

And while the ripple across all the rails isn't terrible, it's not exactly good either.

Really have to ask wtf you'd want to trust a $1300 (ish) 3060ti and $400 worth of cpu/mobo/ram to a realistically unprotected $35 pos. There's nothing viable you could come up with to justify that kind of wanton (eh, not gonna say it)...

Motorcycle riders wear helmets, leathers, gloves, boots etc to remain in 1 piece should the unfortunate happen. Putting a 3060ti/10400F on an Evga W1 would be like that same motorcyclist wearing shorts, tank top and flip-flops.

Yes, it'll work. Until it doesn't. And it stands a really good chance of getting really ugly afterwards.

If you can afford a 3060ti, you can afford an appropriate psu.
 
Last edited:

jtk2515

Distinguished
No. Ton of CapXon 85°C caps, badly designed, limited heatsinking, worthless protections.

And while the ripple across all the rails isn't terrible, it's not exactly good either.

Really have to ask wtf you'd want to trust a $1300 (ish) 3060ti and $400 worth of cpu/mobo/ram to a realistically unprotected $35 pos. There's nothing viable you could come up with to justify that kind of wanton (eh, not gonna say it)...

Motorcycle riders wear helmets, leathers, gloves, boots etc to remain in 1 piece should the unfortunate happen. Putting a 3060ti/10400F on an Evga W1 would be like that same motorcyclist wearing shorts, tank top and flip-flops.

Yes, it'll work. Until it doesn't. And it stands a really good chance of getting really ugly afterwards.

If you can afford a 3060ti, you can afford an appropriate psu.

I'm saying if you buy a 600w evga and put it in a system pulling 300 watts your only going to have +18mv ripple @ 50% load. To me that is awesome for a 35-40$ PSU. I just dont see the purpuse recomending a 80-90$ PSU For a budget system pulling 300 watts unless you need the cleanest power possible.

Yes I do think a 3050-3050ti is Super budget, 3060-3060ti is a budget system, 3070-3070ti mid tier and 3080-3080ti is high end. 3090etc would be super high end.


"Yuck. A system with a $400 GPU -- and that's if you can get it at retail -- is not a budget build. But it's your equipment. Bragging about 100mv of ripple is...interesting. A bit like a restaurant advertising that only 10% of their customers come down with a case of food poisoning.

Nobody here is going to recommend this. "

I'm recommending it. A 300watt system on a 600 watt PSU exactly what I said in my 1st post. +18mv@50% of ripple and +26mv@90%. The ATX specification requires that the 12v have a maximum ripple of 120mV. It is within specifications. I consider below 60mv Very good.
 
Last edited: