Some of the maths is wrong. "if your components would consume 500W directly from the PSU, then with that 70% efficient product, you'd use and draw 650W" More likely to draw 714W not 650W. 500/714= ~70% 500/650= ~76.9% So your calculated 70% and other derived average 80plus power figures are wrong. If a PSU which is 80% efficient it does not draw 20% more power than the load as heat. 125w from wall = 100w for load & 25w of heat = 80% efficiency. 25w/100w = 25% To work backwards, 100÷0.80 = 125. 80% = 0.80 The actual measurements of PSU you have reviewed (power draw at the wall) are OK. I'm just talking about those you made up for comparison. Approx input for 350w load (pg8): 80plus = 420 should be 437.5 Bronze = 402,5 should be 411.7 Silver = 392 should be 397.7 Gold = 385 should be 388.8 Platinum = 378 should be 380.4 Titanium = 364 could be 364.5 (OK, close enough) These days CPU/GPU require much higher sub-second power than what you see with measured averages. More headroom (unused capacity) means better regulation for today's more sensitive components. Diminishing returns to increase efficiency past 95% at ever increasing cost.

It would be great if you could review PSU's of 400/500w for regular gamers like me.

vestibule:

It would be great if you could review PSU's of 400/500w for regular gamers like me.

Serious gamers are 1200W+, gamers are 850W+, weekend warriors are 600W, soooo.... 😀

mdm:

Serious gamers are 1200W+, gamers are 850W+, weekend warriors are 600W, soooo....

Well, thats what you say, you ott power crazed looney bin.

In my life i had about 12 bequiet! PSUs , i can recomment them . None of them died . Some are very old . ( oldest being 12 yo), stil work like new.

Bouhgt the Dark Power Pro 12 (1200w version) just a few days ago. It's doing a great job so far. Completely silent too.

I'm still waiting to hear my Corsair HX-850 in some capacity. Of course, my Noctua case fans, +/- radiator fans & pump (if I had any of those), and GPU fans (maybe) are all a bit louder, so that's likely why. Seems like if you need that much power in a system it's because you are using peripherals that might tend to make some noise. Just an observation. OTOH, a system requiring only 400-600W maximum, with all-silent/fanless peripherals, seems like a good fit for a BeQuiet PSU.

With regards to the 'subjective acoustic testing', was I really the only one who wanted to see a photo of HH with their ear next to the PSU, with a quizzical look on their face?

Another note on the discussion of cost effectiveness of power supply: In many parts of the US, air-conditioning is the norm rather than exception. Where I live (TEXAS) it is on 9/10 of the year. Paying to heat and then to cool effectively more than doubles the costs that you calculate. Besides the direct costs there are the ancillary benefits of total PC cooling and fan noise. I'll take the immediate pain(high up front cost) over the long term pain of loud and hot PC any time. PS, With COVID and work from home...US usage rates are more like 10 hours a day. 😉

mdm:

Serious gamers are 1200W+, gamers are 850W+, weekend warriors are 600W, soooo.... 😀

Serious about what? Causing a fire because the power lines in the house can't handle it? Even for something as stupid as an RTX 3080 with its power limits thrown out the window with a BIOS mod plus a 3900X on roids I have plenty of headroom with a 1KW PSU, even taking into account any spikes... especially considering any reputable power supply is listing its sustained peak, not maximum peak. 800W+ were designed with SLI in mind, which for all intents and purposes is dead no matter what anyone wants to think. The only reason 800W+ is used in single card rigs now is because of nVidia's asshole decision to use Samdung 8nm which everyone keeps telling me is much the same as their 12, not anywhere near TSMC's 7nm in power efficiency.

Neo Cyrus:

Serious about what? Causing a fire because the power lines in the house can't handle it? Even for something as stupid as an RTX 3080 with its power limits thrown out the window with a BIOS mod plus a 3900X on roids I have plenty of headroom with a 1KW PSU, even taking into account any spikes... especially considering any reputable power supply is listing its sustained peak, not maximum peak. 800W+ were designed with SLI in mind, which for all intents and purposes is dead no matter what anyone wants to think. The only reason 800W+ is used in single card rigs now is because of nVidia's asshole decision to use Samdung 8nm which everyone keeps telling me is much the same as their 12, not anywhere near TSMC's 7nm in power efficiency.

The fact is my system draws 720W measured. So I need 850W minimum, not want... 😉

mdm:

The fact is my system draws 720W measured. So I need 850W minimum, not want... 😉

I have: - 3900X @ 4.25-4.35GHz (per CCX OC'd) /w 1900MHz Fabic/Controller/RAM sync - TUF X570-Plus (Wi-Fi) - TUF 3080 OC @ +135 core +1000 VRAM; resulting in 1.94-2.12GHz core, "21GHz" VRAM - 16GB DDR4 @ 3800MHz - 6x 3.5" HDDs - NVMe M2 SSD - 2.5 SATA SSD - Optical drive - Sound Blaster ZxR + daughter board - 3x 120mm fans - 5x 140mm fans - 5.25" 3.5" drive hot swap bay so it takes more power than directly connecting I have more hardware, and more power hungry hardware than 99.99% of people, and it would have been impossible for me to reach "720W measured". My GPU alone draws up 375W with hovering from 340-365W constantly being the norm, and with a different BIOS it was drawing up to 475W. The highest I see my OC'd CPU reach even under artificial load is 120W last I recall. Still couldn't have hit 720W, considering all that hardware isn't on and blasting all at the same time under any scenario because it doesn't exist. And yes I'm taking into account my PSU efficiency. So what the hell are you doing with what hardware that you can pull that off? A chunk of headroom is a good idea to account for capacitor aging (and assist with efficiency), but you're making it sound like rigs sucking down 700W+ are common or something. Edit: I'm so used to Ryzen CPUs that I forgot ridiculous power sucking CPUs are still a thing, nevermind. Thanks Intel.

Neo Cyrus:

Edit: I'm so used to Ryzen CPUs that I forgot ridiculous power sucking CPUs are still a thing, nevermind. Thanks Intel.

This! 😀 Yes you have in my information, and Fury is hungry too (OC edition); GPU alone with 275W + 50% power limit = 413W !! 😱

Neo Cyrus:

Serious about what? Causing a fire because the power lines in the house can't handle it? Even for something as stupid as an RTX 3080 with its power limits thrown out the window with a BIOS mod plus a 3900X on roids I have plenty of headroom with a 1KW PSU, even taking into account any spikes... especially considering any reputable power supply is listing its sustained peak, not maximum peak. 800W+ were designed with SLI in mind, which for all intents and purposes is dead no matter what anyone wants to think. The only reason 800W+ is used in single card rigs now is because of nVidia's asshole decision to use Samdung 8nm which everyone keeps telling me is much the same as their 12, not anywhere near TSMC's 7nm in power efficiency.

300w is way too much for a gpu that said,is it nowhere near ? compare 6800xt and 3080.they aren't worlds apart,and both are way too power hungry with lower gpu load amprere is running circles around rdna2 in efficiency.compare 3060ti/3070 vs navi counterpart 6700xt Images removed, lets stick to Guru3D content please.:

cucaulay malkin:

300w is way too much for a gpu that said,is it nowhere near ? compare 6800xt and 3080.they aren't worlds apart,and both are way too power hungry with lower gpu load amprere is running circles around rdna2 in efficiency.compare 3060ti/3070 vs navi counterpart 6700xt

I don't see what that has to do with me saying Samdung's 8/12nm process can't compare to TSMC's 7nm. What AMD or nVidia do with it is on them. And we already know AMD pushed way past the efficiency point to compete, which I think was the right call. The point is that these 3K cards would run at much lower power draws if they were on TSMC's process instead of Samdung's. And I wish it was just 300W, only the stock FE 3080 doesn't blow past that by a huge amount, all the higher end and higher performing models do. It's worth it for me though, an extra 5-8% fps (which is what my OC typically gets me) on top of my already factory OC'd card brings my performance not far from a stock FE 3090.

both big navi and ga102 are ridiculous to me. 6900xt with 620w spikes stock. 250w is absolute max for me.

Neo Cyrus:

I have more hardware, and more power hungry hardware than 99.99% of people, and it would have been impossible for me to reach "720W measured"

try running cinebench + kombustor or furmark together I was already doing this (kombustor) to stress test my water cooling when I noticed Linus from LTT also did the same but with furmark both together will show you completely unrealistic loads but should definitely draw more watts edit : just tried with a 9900k@5.1ghz and a 3090 power limited to 350watts max power 782watts, average hovering around 700 during the whole cinebenchr23 run (powerIN powerOUT was 30watts less) edit : numbers coming from my "smart" Corsair PSU a fellow ZXR user yay 😀 really wish I could remove it for better airflow but the headphone output is too good

Is 850w enough to power a 3090 Gigabyte gaming OC it's a 2x8pin card with a 5900X not overclocked? Or would you go with a 1000w to be safe? 3-450w for the GPU 105W for the CPU 100W for the mobo/chipset 50-100w for the ram/m.2 x2 SSD x1 50w for mouse/keyboard/headset/controller That's already 800ish watts. about to pull the trigger on a Seasonic 850 Platinum but am having doubts if it's enough.