PC Power & Cooling MK III Silencer 1200 review - Introduction

Industrial-grade - the new enthusiast standard ?

Fierce, competitive, tough ... keywords that pop into my mind when I thing about power supplies these days. In a completely oversaturated market it is really difficult to separate yourself and your brand from the competition.

PC Power & Cooling is a company that manages to do that though, and albeit after the OCZ takeover it became a little quiet with them here in the EU, last year they started pumping out power supplies again for both the US and EU market.

What I frowned upon in the past with the PCP&C is that they never made any modular power supplies -- they where  proclaiming that it would hurt efficiency. Time completely passed them by and due to market demand big brands surpassed the single rail, non modular and a bit too noisy products from PC Power & Cooling with all highly efficient and modular power supplies.

It's now Summer 2012 and PC Power & Cooling is offering a modular power supply that is actually Platinum certified, see it can be done. And realistically it won't get any better then this anytime soon either as the product reviewed today is the all new Silencer Mk III in the 1200 Watt flavor.

The new Silencer Mk III  series are all about being quiet, being awesome and very efficient and again, the PSU as tested today carries a Platinum certification. Bronze, Silver but really Gold or Platinum is what you want, however the upper stack in hardware is expensive.

Platinum certified means it's 92% efficient at 50% load. Efficiency matters; years ago PSUs were as low as 70% efficient, meaning that 30% of the used power simply vanishes, whilst you are paying for it on that electricity bill. If your components eat away 500W then with that 70% efficient product you'd actually use 650W. With today's Silencer Mk III 1200 Watt Platinum you'd be using 540W. The math is that simple.

The PSU itself is modular for the bigger part (aside from primary ATX leads and cables), for most of you with a side panel window in their chassis a must really as you'll want modular cables. The Mk III 1200W also sports a new Dual Thermal Control System, a sophisticated operation that allows the PSU to switch between normal and silent mode seamlessly. The new PSU also improved on the audibility front as it comes with a switch, enabled it and up-to 600 Watt (!) the fan will remain disabled and at that load your PSU merely lukewarm.

The 1200W PSU is massive in performance, the one massive 99.5A 12-volts says it all really. Excellent for multi-GPU solutions and hardcore overclockers. The PSU is engineered with merely premium components, including Japanese 105°C capacitors and heavy-duty protection circuitries.

All in all we have plenty to show you and test. Mind you that these PSUs are backed by an excellent 7-year warranty. But have a peek at the product and then let's head onwards into the review. Sunglasses on ? BAM !