PSU Advice for mini-ITX system.

[djostizier]

Hello everyone, I have to choose the PSU for my mini-ITX, the configuration is the following:

CPU: Intel i5-4670
MotherBoard: Asus Z97I-Plus
RAM: Mushkin DDR3 2133 996997 2x4Gb
HDD: Crucial SSD M550 250 Gb
Case: Lian-Li PC-Q27B
CPU Fan: Noctua NH-L9i
2nd HDD: WD, 3.5", 1 TB
(At a later time a graphic card, almost certainly a R7 250 2GB)

I'm searching for a vey very Silent CPU, that's reliable too. The budget is about 80-100 € (I'm writing from Italy). The models I saw are:

Be Quiet! E9 480W CM (FSP OEM);
Corsair RM450-550;
Seasonic G-550;
Enermax Platimax 500W;
Cooler Master V450S.

I have excluded the completely fanless PSUs because the case is little, and there is just the Noctua CPU Fan, so I'm worried about overheating.

Please, post your opinion about and your ideas, perhaps dictated by your experience.

Thanks in advance to those who respond !!

 

[freeleacher]

Enermax is the best make there.
Ignore anyone who spits out corsair there fine for memory not power supplies.
You will see many 18 y olds saying there fantastic then 6 mths down the road there graphics card stop working and they wonder why.
Seasonic caps explode from my experience they do and frighten the life out of you.
Be quiet are fine for fans but its just a badge for there power supplies.
So enermax all day long in my opinion

 

[de.das.dude]

Enermax is the best make there.
Ignore anyone who spits out corsair there fine for memory not power supplies.
You will see many 18 y olds saying there fantastic then 6 mths down the road there graphics card stop working and they wonder why.
Seasonic caps explode from my experience they do and frighten the life out of you.
Be quiet are fine for fans but its just a badge for there power supplies.
So enermax all day long in my opinion

Wow. Care to back up your claims with some proof?

 

[INSTG8R]

Enermax is the best make there.
Ignore anyone who spits out corsair there fine for memory not power supplies.
You will see many 18 y olds saying there fantastic then 6 mths down the road there graphics card stop working and they wonder why.
Seasonic caps explode from my experience they do and frighten the life out of you.
Be quiet are fine for fans but its just a badge for there power supplies.
So enermax all day long in my opinion

That was just one big LOL!

 

[freeleacher]

See above his going to spit out corsair and his going to try and defend his poor purchase now.
My proof is called my opinion take it leave it , Its that simple.

 

[INSTG8R]

See above his going to spit out corsair and his going to try and defend his pure purchase now.

You gonna call me out my Seasonic too? I got a 8yr old M600 in my closet I would trust over any Enermax

 

[freeleacher]

After saying that I just turned off to what ever you have to say because enermax and silverstone are the only make I care to ever look at,
anything else is just a waste of money in my opinion.

I had a seasonic all the specs were spot on I was happy but after 6 mths use it chose to explode due to poor quality caps being used.
Hope you have a good one and don't experience an exploding cap because its very loud and can kill your machine.

 

[64K]

Seasonic G 550

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story6&reid=323

 

[RCoon]

See above his going to spit out corsair and his going to try and defend his poor purchase now.
My proof is called my opinion take it leave it , Its that simple.

You're not likely to get very far that way, and certainly not likely to have your advice taken. This is a tech forum, and as such people like to have factual proof before they take something into account, as this is hard earned cash they're spending. If people were looking for off the cuff opinions on PSUs, they'd go down to their local ripoff merchant.

While I shall say Enermax make very fine PSUs, saying that Sea Sonic caps explode (and are therefore bad), makes it more difficult for people to trust your advice, as they are among the most highly regarded PSUs by most of us, and they do consistently well in reviews. I recommend touching on Johnny Guru's review before you start hating on random manufacturers, then you can come back with some evidence to backup your Enermax recommendations.

After saying that I just turned off to what ever you have to say

This is a forum, and therefore is based around discussion. If you're not willing to discuss politely and positively at all, with anyone, then I recommend you take to writing a blog instead.

I got a 8yr old M600 in my closet I would trust over any Enermax

Enermax aren't that bad in honesty. Quite underrated.

 

[GhostRyder]

Hello everyone, I have to choose the PSU for my mini-ITX, the configuration is the following:

CPU: Intel i5-4670
MotherBoard: Asus Z97I-Plus
RAM: Mushkin DDR3 2133 996997 2x4Gb
HDD: Crucial SSD M550 250 Gb
Case: Lian-Li PC-Q27B
CPU Fan: Noctua NH-L9i
2nd HDD: WD, 3.5", 1 TB
(At a later time a graphic card, almost certainly a R7 250 2GB)

I'm searching for a vey very Silent CPU, that's reliable too. The budget is about 80-100 € (I'm writing from Italy). The models I saw are:

Be Quiet! E9 480W CM (FSP OEM);
Corsair RM450-550;
Seasonic G-550;
Enermax Platimax 500W;
Cooler Master V450S.

I have excluded the completely fanless PSUs because the case is little, and there is just the Noctua CPU Fan, so I'm worried about overheating.

Please, post your opinion about and your ideas, perhaps dictated by your experience.

Thanks in advance to those who respond !!

For that system you do not need much power so a 450 should suffice so long as its gold rated. For the money I would say just get a RM450 from corsair as it should serve you quite nicely as a value to performance perspective.

Otherwise if you wish to have a bit extra, the seasonic is not a bad deal and one of my favorite manufacturers but it maybe overkill for your system at 550Watts.

 

[freeleacher]

The guy wanted from peoples experience and that's what happened to me, It went bang I stopped using them its that simple.
also I once had a tagan 900 watt that stopped working due to its method for controlling the green wire.
That stopped working aswell so tagan also bad experience from me.
My experience and opinion is what he asked for like it or not agree or disagree this is all factual truth from my own experience and my own opinion. lol

 

[OneMoar]

I would not use a Enermax unit in anything they switched oem's to cmw/seasonic awhile ago so they aren't as terrible as they used to be back a 5 or so years ago but I would still avoid them
simply on past history

@freeleacher if you managed to "explode" a psu it was most likely your fault

 

[freeleacher]

says the man using a Corsair.
I just wet myself loling

 

[RCoon]

I would not use a Enermax unit in anything they switches oem's cmw/seasonic awhile ago so they aren't as terrible as they used to be back a fews years ago but I would not used them based on there history of low quality
@freeleacher if you managed to "explode" a psu it was most likely your fault

They're not useless. Their performance is actually pretty good, but their value needs a lot of work

As for the PSU exploding, it's quite possible he had a defective unit, and wasn't necessarily his fault. I had an ASRock motherboard that went pop within 2 weeks, but that wasn't my fault, it was just a faulty motherboard

 

[OneMoar]

says the man using a Corsair.
I just wet myself loling

says the man getting a infraction for ignoring a moderators warning about senseless bashing ...
I set fire to a psu once shot fire out the back for 10 seconds it was a enermax ... or one of there OEM's I don't remember that was 2004
modern psu's are resistant to most types of catastrophic failure if you manage to make one go thermo-nuclar odds are you had a hardware failure or the issue was on the input side of the psu e.g your home wiring

 

[RCoon]

Last warning to all. Keep the thread on topic or posts will be removed and infractions given.

 

[freeleacher]

They're not useless. Their performance is actually pretty good, but their value needs a lot of work

As for the PSU exploding, it's quite possible he had a defective unit, and wasn't necessarily his fault. I had an ASRock motherboard that went pop within 2 weeks, but that wasn't my fault, it was just a faulty motherboard

I was just sitting there checking out the web and suddenly the loudest bang I ever hered,
For an electrical piece of equipment plugged into a 240 volt wall socket I don't expect it to explode.
My opinion was sealed from that day forward
The guy who posted wanted peoples experience and opinions, That's far from a factual topic because we all have a different opinion.

 

[OneMoar]

back on topic:
this is what I would be looking at
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817104132&ignorebbr=1
made by sea sonic and supports haswell sure its not 80+ gold but you will be hard pressed to find a mico-atx/itx that is

 

[thebluebumblebee]

Welcome to TPU!
First, PSU capacity. This system, as listed will pull no more than 200 watts. A 380-430 watt PSU would do fine.
What I know about the PSU's listed:
The G-550 is not know for being real quiet, but its fan will most likely never spin very fast with the load that your system will put on it.
The RM series are "hybrid fan" PSU's. That means that the PSU's fan won't even turn on until it reaches 40% of capacity. On the RM450, that's 180 watts. Most likely, the fan will never turn on in that system. If you are counting on the PSU to move air through your system, this might be a bad choice. On fist glance, it looks like that case supports a fan on the bottom of the case. Have you considered putting a fan down there and using a fanless PSU?
I don't know the rest, but here's a database of PSU's for your reference. http://www.realhardtechx.com/index_archivos/Page364.htm

 

[OneMoar]

I was just sitting there checking out the web and suddenly the loudest bang I ever hered,
For an electrical piece of equipment plugged into a 240 watt wall socket I don't expect it to explode.
My opinion was sealed from that day forward

if your wallsocket was only 240W then something is wrong unless you mean 2300W witch is 115V@20A ~240W would be 115@2.15A witch if that was the case was why it blew up due to lack of current on the input side lack of power on the input side will burn stuff out faster then to much
btw I didn't buy this corsair psu it was given to me

 

[de.das.dude]

After saying that I just turned off to what ever you have to say because enermax and silverstone are the only make I care to ever look at,
anything else is just a waste of money in my opinion.

I had a seasonic all the specs were spot on I was happy but after 6 mths use it chose to explode due to poor quality caps being used.
Hope you have a good one and don't experience an exploding cap because its very loud and can kill your machine.

well i think the pluto should be a planet in my opinion but that doesnt matter just like your opinion. if you cannot give good advice then please refrain yourself.

my corsair PSU was the best purchase i ever made. look at my signature and you will know. Plus no warranty void on sleeving it?... good luck with that.

also there was a recent case here itself where corsair paid shipping(more than $100) both ways internationally for a customer in eu who couldnt have it RMA'd as there were no distributors there or something like that.
but i guess in your books that makes corsair a waste of money.

 

[McSteel]

BeQuiet or Corsair if you demand almost complete silence (and I assume you do), Seasonic otherwise.

I give slight advantage to BeQuiet, even though Corsair features semi-fanless operation. Or rather, because it does. You did say you'd like to avoid a fanless PSU, which is exactly what you'd get by using the RM450 in such a low-power rig.

 

[djostizier]

First of all, thanks to everyone for submitting your opinion, you're a lot!
Going to order, the most important thing is to keep the noise preventing overheating. Based on this review http://www.computerbase.de/2014-08/netzteile-500-550-watt-vergleich/8/ my choice would be between the BeQuiet, the Enermax and Corsair (RM550 - that would be completely fanless though). What do you think, explosions and mishaps included? XD

PS: The wattage is higher than necessary to keep the load of around 50% so the psu working less, heats less, and makes less noise

 

[AsRock]

After saying that I just turned off to what ever you have to say because enermax and silverstone are the only make I care to ever look at,
anything else is just a waste of money in my opinion.

I had a seasonic all the specs were spot on I was happy but after 6 mths use it chose to explode due to poor quality caps being used.
Hope you have a good one and don't experience an exploding cap because its very loud and can kill your machine.

A single one and i like to see this PSU you talk about as i would love to see a Seasonic with cheap ( original ) caps. Sure there might be some but never seen one which is why i love to see.

In the end even the best made psu can fail even with the highest quality parts, shit happens.

Maybe Some thing Changed over the last 2 year or so but yet i have still had to hear mine to make a noise and if your not putting a high load on the PSU there is a switch to turn the fan off even.

 

[thebluebumblebee]

back on topic:
this is what I would be looking at
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817104132&ignorebbr=1
made by sea sonic and supports haswell sure its not 80+ gold but you will be hard pressed to find a mico-atx/itx that is

I know of someone who went with a SFX PSU in an mITX build to aid in air flow.
SILVERSTONE ST45SF-G 450W SFX12V 80 PLUS GOLD Certified Full Modular

way to many cooks here I don't envy this guy who is asking for help.
only one chef though. <<

The best way to get a cat fight going around here is to ask about PSU's. Why? I blame the PSU manufacturers. Ever wonder why the PSU manufacturers don't have "what size PSU do I need" tools? I think they want people to purchase PSU's that are larger than they need. I'd think that there would be bigger margins on the bigger PSU's. Look at the PSU reviews here on TPU. The average wattage for the last 10 PSU reviews is 1013 watts and 954 watts for the last 25!

PS: The wattage is higher than necessary to keep the load of around 50% so the psu working less, heats less, and makes less noise

So you are sizing your PSU for 100% load at 50% of PSU capacity. Will you run this system at 100% load 100% of the time? Where PSU's are most inefficient is at low wattages. Take that Silverstone that I linked to. Yes, it is most efficient at 50% load, but it stays close to that peak efficiency up towards 80%. But if you look at the curve below 50%, you will see that it quickly drops off. (look at the chart carefully, it's 100% to the right, but 20% to the left) I believe in sizing the PSU so that 100% system load is 80% capacity. In your case, you only need a 275 watt PSU! (pcpartpicker says 219 watts for that system) Although this isn't as big of a deal as it used to be, I think you should still try to stay above 20%, which is 110 watts on that G550. Do you think you'll use 110 watts browsing the Internet? Now we just need the PSU manufacturers to start making 80+ Gold PSU's with capacities under 400 watts. Nothing wrong with an Antec EarthWatts Green EA-380D.

Seasonic G 550

http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story6&reid=323

Actually, that's an older version of that PSU. Current version: http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=373