[SOLVED] which is a better quality psu?

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refillable said:
I'm curious, how do you know that Su'cson makes trustable capacitors? Did you test them out? If so, how? Not saying that they are not trustable, just curious.
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Because all of the factories get audited by the product engineering teams. Caps, fans... even something like changing an IC supplier requires, even if it's SMT, gets a full R&D analysis.

Most recent example: An SMD 1A/200V diode went EOL. Factory thought that a higher voltage diode would be an easy drop in replacemment. One production run was performed and all of the units passed. But the Chromas used for QC only perform static load. When a unit was grabbed to perform dynamic load testing failed, the analysis was that the new diode was what failed inside the PSU. When we pulled up the data sheets of the old and new diode, it was found that the original diode had a faster reverse recovery time. So increasing the voltage alone did not mean that it was a suitable replacement. None of those units got to see the light of day until all of the diodes were replaced with another option.
 
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jonnyguru said:
Because all of the factories get audited by the product engineering teams. Caps, fans... even something like changing an IC supplier requires, even if it's SMT, gets a full R&D analysis.

Most recent example: An SMD 1A/200V diode went EOL. Factory thought that a higher voltage diode would be an easy drop in replacemment. One production run was performed and all of the units passed. But the Chromas used for QC only perform static load. When a unit was grabbed to perform dynamic load testing failed, the analysis was that the new diode was what failed inside the PSU. When we pulled up the data sheets of the old and new diode, it was found that the original diode had a faster reverse recovery time. So increasing the voltage alone did not mean that it was a suitable replacement. None of those units got to see the light of day until all of the diodes were replaced with another option.
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Wow, I never actually thought it was that complicated. I hope other manufacturers are practicing this too, better yet I hope reviewers like Aris would follow suit as well. We need these information to go public.

Actually I am still curious of how you determine the longevity of a capacitor, fans or ICs. Is it just factory audit, analysis of existing product failures, or are there are some testing specifically done for these?
 
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refillable said:
Wow, I never actually thought it was that complicated. I hope other manufacturers are practicing this too, better yet I hope reviewers like Aris would follow suit as well. We need these information to go public.

Actually I am still curious of how you determine the longevity of a capacitor, fans or ICs. Is it just factory audit, analysis of existing product failures, or are there are some testing specifically done for these?
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Different factories make different series capacitors. Some are better suited than others for different applications. There is no "get this brand and everything is good". And in reality, all of the Jap caps we use are made in China and usually made under contract by some of the companies that people say "ewww! That's a bad brand!"

Do other companies do the level of R&D? Afraid not. During EVT, we intentionally make PSUs fail. One time, we found a competitor had discontinued a digital platform that was really nice and reviewed well. Figured we could pick it up and make it iCue compatible. So I bought a bunch of units from Newegg and killed them all. OPP did not kick in at low mains voltage (90V). So we knew what killed them, but not why the protections didn't work to prevent death. Since the PSU used an MCU for protection instead of a housekeeping IC we looked at the code. Turns out we could just add a simple if-then statement that would lower the OPP threshold if the mains voltage was below 110V. Voila! But this proved to us that neither the ODM nor the "brand" ever tested these PSUs at under 100V. Same goes with OTP. Rated at 40°C? So you test at 40? No. You test at 45. Rated at 50°C? Test at 55.

Does Aris test to these extremes? No. And he knows it. But that's OK. They're extremes. I still use his Cybenetics beta testing service throughout the dev process because it's always good to have an extra set of eyes on a project. In the past, I would just rely on the ODM's engineering team. Boy was that a mistake! Unfortunately, that's what most companies do. They don't have engineers. They have product managers. There are some exceptions. Like beQuiet! and Cooler Master, for example. But it's not the norm.
 
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jonnyguru said:
Different factories make different series capacitors. Some are better suited than others for different applications. There is no "get this brand and everything is good". And in reality, all of the Jap caps we use are made in China and usually made under contract by some of the companies that people say "ewww! That's a bad brand!"

Do other companies do the level of R&D? Afraid not. During EVT, we intentionally make PSUs fail. One time, we found a competitor had discontinued a digital platform that was really nice and reviewed well. Figured we could pick it up and make it iCue compatible. So I bought a bunch of units from Newegg and killed them all. OPP did not kick in at low mains voltage (90V). So we knew what killed them, but not why the protections didn't work to prevent death. Since the PSU used an MCU for protection instead of a housekeeping IC we looked at the code. Turns out we could just add a simple if-then statement that would lower the OPP threshold if the mains voltage was below 110V. Voila! But this proved to us that neither the ODM nor the "brand" ever tested these PSUs at under 100V. Same goes with OTP. Rated at 40°C? So you test at 40? No. You test at 45. Rated at 50°C? Test at 55.

Does Aris test to these extremes? No. And he knows it. But that's OK. They're extremes. I still use his Cybenetics beta testing service throughout the dev process because it's always good to have an extra set of eyes on a project. In the past, I would just rely on the ODM's engineering team. Boy was that a mistake! Unfortunately, that's what most companies do. They don't have engineers. They have product managers. There are some exceptions. Like beQuiet! and Cooler Master, for example. But it's not the norm.
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Testing PSUs until they are dead sounds like a very fun activity. I wish I have the tools available to do that and publish it sparking discussion.
 
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refillable said:
Testing PSUs until they are dead sounds like a very fun activity. I wish I have the tools available to do that and publish it sparking discussion.
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Been doing this for almost 20 years and I still learn something new every day. A lot of the guys that were reviewing PSUs back when I was say the same thing. "If I knew then, what I know now."

Another fun story: Our thermal chamber in Fremont only goes up, not down. But we figured if the product is tested at the ODM as low as 0°C, we should focus on testing at higher temperatures. At the factory, you're testing from room temperature (on the line) to 40 or 50°C (burn in). Imagine my surprise when this happened (read my response): https://forums.tomshardware.com/thr...me-hx1200-and-hx1200i-power-supplies.3684019/

OnSemi is a good vendor, no doubt. So imagine my surprise.
 
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Archaic59 said:
Wow, how strange. What browser are you using? I'm using Brave. I don't know if it matters, just saying. I tried it again and a TX opens on Amazon.
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Using Chrome. The link "appears" as an Amazon link, but when you click on it it actually takes you to a GeniusLink Georiot referral link so Tom's can get paid when someone "buys now".

geniuslink.com

Geniuslink - URL Shortener for Creators and Affiliates

Geniuslink is the world’s most intelligent URL shortener. Create links that dynamically route users to different destinations based off their devices, operating systems, countries, and even date of click.
geniuslink.com geniuslink.com

Does the same thing in IE and Edge, BTW.

The second link goes to a specific product: "Corsair RM650 Certified Modular Supply". so my guess is Georiot knows where to go specifically.

The first seems to go to a filtered search result, "Corsair Certified Hybrid Modular Supply", which is very non-specific, so it probably breaks the affiliate link.
 
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