Lokie has a new review up on yet another Cooler Master product (we seem to have been on Cooler Master streak lately, eh?). The Real Power 550W PSU proved to be a good performer but is a bit lacking in features.


Check it out here.

It is actually kind of nice to see a flat black PSU for a change.

Great review Lokie!

its hard to understand how a company like this can be so hit and miss. Great review though!

that looks amazingly close to a FORTRON psu without the wire sleeving....
good review...

They look very similar. But, the heatsinks are different and the fan on the Aurora 350 is off center compared to this one.

Thanks everyone, I have since this review purchased a Kill-A-Watt meter. The display is actually reading a little more than 50 watts less than actual usage. I was a bit shocked to see with all this gear my system peacked at 300 watts on boot up. While runnnin and playing BF2, 205w was the highest wattage being used in my system.

Great review Lokie!

Quote: Originally Posted by Digital-World that looks amazingly close to a FORTRON psu without the wire sleeving.... good review...

The Coolermaster is actually made by Acbel Polycom. Same as an Asus Atlas. Good company. Made OEM PSU's for companies like IBM for yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeears.

Next time you do your "surge test", have a DMM hooked up to the 12V and watch the voltage when you click on the Peltier. I bet it drops quit a bit. That would mean it's not overload protection that's shutting the PSU down, but undervoltage.

Sometimes a sudden load on just the 12V rail can cause it to dip below spec and that in turn will click off a PSU.

It wouldn't necessarily do this once installed in a running machine because a PC would also have a load on all of the other rails and this helps stabilize the 12V rail. Whenever you load only one rail of a switch mode power supply, without loading the other rails, the voltages drop exponentially. It's the nature of the beast.

That's why it's important to put a dummy load on the 5V rail of a second power supply you may be using to power a pump, peltier, etc. Otherwise, the 12V rail will drop way below spec. Not good. Ever see those little ceramic resistors inside some power supplies? That's a load on the 3.3V/5V combined rail that helps stabilize the 12V rail. Ever open up an old IBM, the kind without a hard drive because you boot everything off of the floppy? The had big resistors on the 12V rail because the lack of load on the 12V rail wouldn't keep the power supply stable enough to even power up the computer!

The reason the cheap power supply didn't do this is because it's simply not programmed to shut off at that voltage. Like Lokie pointed out, the Coolermaster may be programmed to shut off if the 12V drops to 10V (just throwing nice even numbers out there.) The cheaper power supply may be programmed for something like 9V under because it's known by the manufacturer that the rails may not be able to maintain +/-5% even under normal circumstances. Some power supplies may not trip simply because the rails are more stable with just a 12V load on it (like some really tight regulation, or just a dummy load on the other rails.) But it's certainly not a bad thing if the PSU trips.

Maybe you could try the test with a dummy load on the 5V rail (light bulbs, a big resistor, whatever) before kicking on the Peltier. Check the voltage then and see if the PSU trips.

Great review Lokie.

JC, thank you for the clarification. I was wondering about that while reading the review.

I myself have a 450W version of this power supply. I believe I paid $25 or $30 for it after rebates.

Thanks for the Info JC...JUst to let you know that there is another PSU I'm workin on and it hasn't faultered once...Peltier load or not.

I did test the Waffer Cooler in an Enemax noise taker and it was installed in a PC and did shut off. But would boot up just fine with it on. but to go from off to back on....no go.

Cool info, JC. I think a shot of rep is in order here.

Quote: Originally Posted by Lokie I did test the Waffer Cooler in an Enemax noise taker and it was installed in a PC and did shut off. But would boot up just fine with it on. but to go from off to back on....no go.

Hmm... Check the 12V rail with a multimeter as you do it. If the rails drop way out of spec, then there may be something wrong with the PSU.

Typically, I can usually jam quite a bit of load on a 12V rail from idle and the power supply won't cut off IF there's at least a minium load on the other rails (as there would be in a PC.) And typically, the voltage will drop, but never enough for the undervoltage protection to kick in.

If the rails don't drop before it cuts off, the power supply may be simply anticipating an overload and shutting off. Which would be normal, but results can vary from PSU to PSU depending on how the IC in the PSU is programmed.