Rosewill Capstone 450W and 650W 80Plus Gold

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• just4U - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  I am also Canadian and English is my first language. That being said, I am a really really bad speller. Don't worry about getting a spell checker Martin there are plenty on here who will do it for you! (grin..)
  
  Good review btw.

• ggathagan - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  And Martin is a proud German whose first language is not English.
  Given the structural differences between German and English grammar, I find it amazing that Martin or anyone else who doesn't have English as their primary language writes as well as he does.
  I wish *I *could read/write/speak multiple languages.

• Hrel - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  Except for a few niche markets, I really don't see why anyone would ever buy anything besides a Seasonic. They're on sale on newegg so often you can't tell me price is a barrier, 750W of power supply that's totally silent up to 50% load for 100 bucks? Yeah, no one else even comes close to that. I don't think I'm ever going to use anything else ever again... why? Because FUCK NOISE!!!
  
  ...he says as he puts a 200 dollar GPU in his system. Eh, whatever, that's only audible under load, and it's only under load when the speakers are making too much noise to matter.

• just4U - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  Seasonic needs the competition.. or they'd go down hill. They make some nice power supplies though for various companies. Superflower isn't bad either.. and hmm.. CWT can be on the ball now and again to.

• Southernsharky - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  "That's 3 more than the number that have failed on me in nearly the same time period."
  
  That's impossible to believe if anyone is a power user, unless you just took it in to the shop and said "fix this" please and never found out what was wrong with it. In my experience, at least living in Florida where electrical surges are common, power supplies fail pretty regularly.
  
  As for Gold/Silver/ Bronze............... anyone who has used computers for 20 years knows that these are pretty new terms. Back in the 90s we did not have those terms. So people who say they have always bought Gold power supplies are younger than they are letting on.
  
  As for price, I've always bought around a 60-75 dollar unit and see absolutely no reason to ever go over that amount.
  
  As for cost savings for 200 units......... the cost savings are no greater than 1 unit. If I have 200 units running, they will cost 200 times as much as running 1 unit. But I will still have to make up the price difference between a 75 dollar PS and a 180 dollar PS, which is roughly 100 bucks per unit. If I have 200 units, I have to make that up 200 times. And I seriously doubt that the amount will be made up over the life of the unit or units.
  
  As for the PS killing the video card, I've never had it happen. I've had lightening do it, but a 200 dollar unit wouldn't stop lightening (and neither will anything else in many situations including surge protectors, as lightening striking right out side the window tends to fry everything regardless).

• ZekkPacus - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  Every time a PSU review is posted, someone comes up with the same rebuttal that these 'expensive' power supplies are 'nothing but a myth'.
  
  It continues to amaze me that the same users that think nothing of dropping $200, $300, $400 on a videocard, same figure on a processor, will then use a potentially dangerous piece of equipment to power them. Although your figure of $60-75 is absolutely fine for most single-GPU machines, a number of good units around the 500W mark reside at that price. There are better units at a small premium, and the energy savings are noticeable over time.
  
  There seems to be an attitude amongst certain levels of enthusiasts (a lot of hardcore gamers, though they're by no means the only ones - a lot of guys who are just attracted to tech for the sake of tech do this too) that if it doesn't affect FPS or tangible performance, it's not worth spending a premium on. It's the same attitude that keeps me seeing incredibly powerful machines, built in poor cases on poor motherboards and powered by unsafe, inefficient power supplies. Anecdotal evidence is fine, and I've seen machines run for years on bad power supplies with no problems - but then I've seen machines blow up 3 weeks after assembly on bad power supplies.
  
  An important point to note - the best and worst power supplies each have a failure chance. The chance probably isn't that much different - maybe 5% for the low end kit, 2% for the high end. The difference in my experience has always been that the low end kit will take the rest of your machine with it, the high end kit won't.

• mdk777 - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  at least living in Florida where electrical surges are common, power supplies fail pretty regularly.
  
  Well, you do know Florida has some of the highest incidence of lightning strike density in the World right?
  Couple that with significant humidity, temperature and insects and I would say you have a rather aggressive environment for PSU.
  
  The irony is you initially said EL CHEPO, and then went back to 60-70$.
  
  60-70 $ is certainly in the middle range. There are plenty of quality Bronze rated units in this range for many years.
  
  Today you can get these Gold rated units for that price.
  
  PSU have gotten better and prices on gold and PLAT (around $100) have come down.
  
  Depending on your usage, and esp. under air conditioning loads, getting that 20-30$ delta in price back over the life of the unit is very easy.
  
  My 1975 Chevy was a deal. I only paid $1000 for it used. Sure it only got 12 miles to the gallon, but heck at $1.2 per gallon, you could buy a shed load of gas compared to a new $12,000 car.
  
  However, here you really need to look at the cost of new verses new.
  
  A decent. 550 Watt is going to cost 40$ no matter the efficiency.
  Today you can get that same wattage for $64.
  http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
  Foolish to pass up that quality and energy savings for $24

• quanstro - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  if you have common surges, i'd really recommend that you get a good ups.
  unlike power supplies, they're designed to deal with bad power.
  
  i have a lot of power issues at the house and was having trouble with premature
  failure of motherboards, psus, memory, etc. getting a good apc ups solved that.

• just4U - Wednesday, March 21, 2012 - link

  I'd like to see these companies come out with better cables.. Shouldn't really be seeing any colored wires at all. Some nice sleeving, or ribboned.. goes a long way in my purchasing decisions..
  
  Always make sure to include pics of those (as you did in this article!)

• Martin Kaffei - Thursday, March 22, 2012 - link

  A Corsair TX550M would be the perfect PSU for you.