PSU tier list 2.0

[Karadjgne]

Darkbreeze, you confuse intellect for ability. My wife is intellectually far smarter than me, yet she is as tech savvy as a rock. To this day she's still confused as to how to change channels on the cable box if the remote happens to be on 'tv' not 'cable'. As far as pc's go, in software she runs circles around me, yet all she worries about is 'push button' to turn on or click start to turn off. She wouldn't know the difference between a $100 psu and a $50 gpu. She's never heard of AMD, and the only reason she knows Intel is due to commercials. There's very few nerds with the social abilities of a cheerleader and very few cheerleaders that understand quantum physics. Sure ppl can add and understand price differences, but then you get the older Corsair RM at over $100 which were not nearly as good as the Seasonic M12-II at almost 1/2 the price. And yet natural assumption would lead to the more expensive being betterbetter.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

The PSUs today in general, though, are much better than they were in the past.

I wish I knew more about like what good 90s PSUs were. That'd be interesting. Or good PSUs from like 2000-2003.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Darkbreeze, you confuse intellect for ability. My wife is intellectually far smarter than me, yet she is as tech savvy as a rock. To this day she's still confused as to how to change channels on the cable box if the remote happens to be on 'tv' not 'cable'. As far as pc's go, in software she runs circles around me, yet all she worries about is 'push button' to turn on or click start to turn off. She wouldn't know the difference between a $100 psu and a $50 gpu. She's never heard of AMD, and the only reason she knows Intel is due to commercials. There's very few nerds with the social abilities of a cheerleader and very few cheerleaders that understand quantum physics. Sure ppl can add and understand price differences, but then you get the older Corsair RM at over $100 which were not nearly as good as the Seasonic M12-II at almost 1/2 the price. And yet natural assumption would lead to the more expensive being betterbetter.

This is irrelevant to my statements though. I clearly said, several times, "units that are otherwise scored the same".

Further clarifying a scenario, the RM 850 for example, scored a 9.2 at JG. The M12II 850, scored a 9.4. While not a wide difference in scoring, there clearly IS one. Then the factor I'm talking about comes into play when the average person who as you say, does not know anything about power supplies looks at the prices of the two units and finds the M12II is 105 dollars while the RM 850 is 130.00. Even a cheerleader can figure out that the unit which costs 25 dollars less is probably the better deal, EVEN IF those units had the same score.

I know a lot of people are clueless, I don't disagree with that, but anybody who has found their way to and had the desire to bother with, reading a PSU review, I have to believe is smart enough to make cost based decisions if they have otherwise sound comparison data to work with.

 

[Karadjgne]

Which is kinda my point, the natural assumption is that more expensive = better. If my wife bought me a psu for my birthday (fat chance of that happening to me, but it does to others) she'd have no worries about spending the $130 over the $105 simply assuming that if I needed a 850w the RM (which as you know wasn't up to par) should be the better unit as it's more expensive. Not everyone shops completely due to a minimalistic budget, many just want better, even if it costs more.

 

[MajesticFailure]

Hi Karadjgne, i notice you edited your original reply to me 😉 I suppose we must be careful of putting a brand down. It's kinda sad to read the Tier 5 blacklist, i hope you tell those manufacturers where they're going wrong. Anyway, my final question: if a PSU has shortcircuit protection (which can save an amateur a whole lot of money, because surely that would prevent a mobo, RAM, GPU and CPU frying from a shortcircuit, right? Or not?), then does that not save it from Tier 4? No names in particular.

 

[turkey3_scratch]

Hi Karadjgne, i notice you edited your original reply to me 😉 I suppose we must be careful of putting a brand down. It's kinda sad to read the Tier 5 blacklist, i hope you tell those manufacturers where they're going wrong. Anyway, my final question: if a PSU has shortcircuit protection (which can save an amateur a whole lot of money, because surely that would prevent a mobo, RAM, GPU and CPU frying from a shortcircuit, right? Or not?), then does that not save it from Tier 4? No names in particular.

All PSUs are required to have short circuit protection, legally. The only thing is, some protection circuitry in certain power supplies suck.

 

[MajesticFailure]

Does the shortcircuit protection on the Corsair CX600M suck?

 

[turkey3_scratch]

Does the shortcircuit protection on the Corsair CX600M suck?

I wouldn't think so. I'm not like adept at looking at protection circuit spec sheets, aside from looking at the UVP and OVP kick-in voltages.

When shopping for a power supply, I try to look for something that has low ripple, good voltage regulation, doesn't burn up, and has good capacitors. Or going by other things, I like to have good crossloading performance, good transient response, and a whole bunch of other stuff.

Worrying about short circuit protection is silly because reviewers don't even test short circuit protection, excerpt Gabriel Torres would on Hardwaresecrets.

 

[MajesticFailure]

Thanks. I was thinking retrospectively (trying to figure out a new build problem).

 

[Darkbreeze]

Which is kinda my point, the natural assumption is that more expensive = better.

Natural assumptions don't apply if using my premise that two units have the same score and both reviews have been read, which was the original point. Two units, same score based on reliable review, different prices = anybody with half a brain can figure out which unit represents the better value, therefore, no need to include cost in the overall score, especially since prices change like a bad day at the stock market anyhow. What might be a 9.5 score for a unit one day, factoring in price, might be an 8.9 score unit three days later, factoring in price. Therefore, do not factor in price, scores have a level playing field, use judgement as to what price represents the better value THAT DAY.

And with that, as I said before, we'll just have to agree to disagree, since clearly neither of us is going to change our views on this point.

 

[MajesticFailure]

I guess price is a variable, whereas specs are not, and you're only looking at specs.

 

[deepakt]

Which PSU is better for my pc - Seasonic S12II 520 watts psu, Corsair CX500 or corsair vs550?
My build-
Intel Core i5 6600
Msi GTX 960 2GD5T OC
MSI H110M PRO VH
Kingston Hyperx fury black 8gb
Seagate Barracuda 1tb.
Also tell me in which tier the psu is.

 

[CTurbo]

The Seasonic is by faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaar the better psu of the 3.

 

[deepakt]

Can you please tell me the tier of the seasonic psu also.
And will it be okay for my rig?

 

[Darkbreeze]

Tier 2.

 

[deepakt]

Thanks for fast response.

 

[CTurbo]

Well, the first post in this Psu Tier List thread we're posting in tells me that it's tier 2.

 

[Darkbreeze]

I just figure, anymore, it's faster to just tell them than go through the trouble of making them find it themselves, since somebody else is just going to tell them anyhow and since they are going to come back and say "well, I'm not sure which one it is on there". Saves time, gets them the info they want and done deal. Takes more time trying to explain that they could easily find it themselves than it does to just say what tier it is.

 

[Karadjgne]

Well it's been a minute since any updates as DT has been busy irl, and considering the original page is some 90 pages back for me, I'd guess that it's entirely possible that it's a little out of date. So the responsible thing to do would be to ask, since there are always regular posters who will be more up to date with any info.

I know, sounds like a perfectly legitimate excuse, but of I tell myself this on a regular basis, I'll not be peeved. But then again, it's impossible to fly past page 1 when on a mobile.

 

[Dickson_NZ]

Can you update the list with the Cougar CMX V2 and V3 power supplies? I see the V3 reviewed on JonnyGuru and the V2 on HardwareSecrets. Both seem to have scored pretty well, might be Tier 3?

 

[Onus]

Something else I consider is the effect of load on the outputs. If a PSU begins to wander (not necessarily out of spec) at 80% load, suffering major dings (as it should), in an application where it will never even hit a 50% load, the bad numbers at 80% are, IMHO, essentially irrelevant as long as there is no dishonesty on the label.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Sorry Onus, I have to disagree on that one. Since there is no way of knowing what applications any consumer may decide to use, or whether or not some numbskull will assume he can run anything up to and including 100% of the capacity of the unit with a given hardware configuration, the unit needs to be able to stay in a predetermined range (That also needs to remain level across the playing field of reviews) to gain a specific score. Otherwise, we'll have a ton of unit's that are "good if you only use them at 50%" capacity, but "not so good at 80% or higher", which creates too much confusion for a standardized reviewing parameter.

Not that there is one, clearly, since everybody apparently scores differently for different things, but still. No need to complicate it further IMO.

 

[Onus]

I think I wasn't clear. For any general tier list, you're right; the full range of loads must be assumed. If I need a PSU for an application that will only need 125W-150W, if a unit got knocked down to tier-3 for wandering at 400W, but is solid at 150W-200W, it may be just as acceptable as a tier-2 unit.
Edit: ...which sort of hits on why a tier list isn't a be-all, end-all on what is acceptable, but is certainly a decent guide for newbies. When they are no longer newbies, and can understand technical reviews, they will realize when a lower tier might be acceptable.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Oh, well that's a different story. I wasn't even referring to tier lists either, I thought you were outlining review criteria. My bad.

 

[Onus]

Nope, I was very unclear. Review criteria should indeed be consistent; it's our job to know when specific criteria might not matter. We know to ignore the non-modular -.5, we know to ignore the sleeving -.5, the manual -.5, and the pricing -<whatever>; sometimes it is acceptable to ignore even the more technical criteria, if they won't apply.