Specifications

The PSU is very long and probably many chassis will not support it. So before you buy it just make sure that your case can accommodate it. The maximum operational temperature, according to Zalman, is 40°C but we will blatantly ignore this since the PSU is ATX compliant so it has to operate without problems at 50°C and with full load. Finally, except OPP (Over Power Protection) all other protections are present.


What we have here is four +12V rails with weird Amp rating since one rail is rated at 25A, two at 28A and the stronger at 35A. The PSU can give almost its full wattage to the +12V rails, something that is very convenient especially in modern systems where power draw from 5V & 3.3V is low.

Cables & Connectors, Power Distribution

Distance between connectors is close to the optimal 150 mm and cable length is sufficient. The main ATX, EPS and PCIe connectors use 16 AWG wires while all the rest use 18 AWG. Finally six PCIe connectors for 1000W capacity are a sufficient number however we expected all to be 6+2 pin. Also in a 1000W PSU we expected to see at least two EPS connectors.


The ZM1000-HP, like its smaller brother, does not utilize the optimal power distribution among the +12V rails. Half of the EPS connector along with two PCIe and the peripheral connectors share the same rail while 12V2 has only the rest of the EPS connector and the ATX one. For a much better power distribution the full EPS connector along with the peripheral connectors should be fed through 12V2. Finally 12V3, the rail with the highest amp rating, feeds only two PCIe connectors while 12V1 and 12V4, that are weaker, feed additional connectors along with two PCIe! Next time Zalman should plan the power distribution more carefully.