![[H]ardOCP](/images/blank.gif){kind=small}
- Date:
- Tuesday , October 07, 2008
- Author:
- Paul Johnson
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
Topower PowerBird Series Power Supplies
The PowerBird PSUs come in at 900 and 1100 watts. This puts these power supplies firmly in upper-end market where weaknesses are identified quickly. But how does the PowerBird with its Blackbird heritage and impressive feature list fare when you put it to work? Let’s find out!
Overview
The first thing we are going to look at with the Topower PowerBird series is its packaging, accessories, and documentation. While none of these items is a real make or break item for a power supply the packaging quite often contains a lot of information about the product we are purchasing. The inclusion of an owner’s manual that provides actual information about our product is also of great help. Accessories are almost unnecessary with a power supply as the unit is self contained, unless it is modular, but there cases where a manufacturer can include useful accessories to make installation, routing and use more efficient.
The two PowerBird boxes are identical to one another with just a simple sticker defining which unit is a 900w and which unit is an 1100w. On these black boxes we find an 80Plus sticker and a Silence decal emblazoned in the upper right hand corner while the sides of the boxes carry some marketing points, the power labels for both the 900w and the 1100w, and the cable count. The rear of the packaging contains more marketing points (including all the copy from the product page on Topower's website), an efficiency curve, and various safety certifications. Of particular interest on these units is the inclusion of the 80Plus certification logo, and the lack of an SLI certification logo. A quick check of the SLIZone website and 80Plus websites made everything as clear as mud. In an interesting twist the SLIZone website lists the Topower PowerBird 1100w as being certified for GTX260 SLI while the 900w PowerBird is not listed as certified for any level of SLI at the time of writing. More interestingly, when we looked through the 80Plus website we found that neither unit was listed as being 80Plus certified. This is an odd omission unless of course the PowerBird 900w (model number TOP-900w) is the TOP-900 which was 80Plus certified 2 years ago. This turn of events could be possible but it seems rather unlikely.
Moving on, the packaging for the Topower PowerBird series does not list a warranty length but the Topower website does. On the Topower website the warranty length is denoted as:
All Topower Products are under a one-year manufacturer warranty unless otherwise implied at the time of purchase.
If this were the case this would be an exceptionally short warranty as we recently commented on the same length warranty in the Kingwin ABT-1220MA1S review, but as it appears from the user manual this is not the actual length of the warranty on this product. Seemingly, the PowerBird manual falls into the "otherwise implied at time of purchase" clause as it states:
Topower Computer is proud to warrant the original purchaser of this power supply unit that the Product will be free from defects in material or workmanship for a period of Three (3) year from the original date of purchase, when given normal wear and proper usage.
Now while three years is certainly better than the one year we initially feared, it is still on the short end of the spectrum when it comes to high end power supplies. Also, given that this unit appears to be an exception to the general warranty period for Topower it would probably behoove users to hang on to their receipt and the manual in case they need warranty service.
The power labels for the PowerBird units are very similar with the only real differences being where the combined OCP settings are set for the 12v rails combined and the minor rails individually. The 900w PowerBird for instance is capped at 70A on the 12v rails while the 1100w PowerBird is capped at 81A on the 12v rails. The difference with the 5v/3.3v cap between the two units is smaller as the 1100w PowerBird has just 20w more capacity than the 900w PowerBird. Interestingly though, while the output on the 12v rails is a full 11A different between units, both units come equipped with the same number of connectors. These connectors include a whopping 12 SATA connectors for the storage enthusiasts out there and also included are a smattering of old fashioned Molex connectors for what are now becoming legacy connections for many users. The 4 PCI-Express connectors are spread across 3 12v rails giving them a possible 60A of capacity for both the 900w and 1100w PowerBird which should keep most any SLI or CrossFire user in business for some time to come as 720w is an awful lot of power.
Once we open the Topower PowerBird units we find the usual assortment of power supply items including the power supply itself, the power cord, mounting screws, manual, and since the unit is modular all the cables. The included manual covers both the 900w and 1100w PowerBird units and is 9 pages long. In that 9 pages we get the same power table as on the unit themselves, some installation instructions, pinouts, warranty information and some text describing the OCP conditions. Overall the manual is better than some we have seen and not nearly as complete as others. Think of this is as the middle of the road amount of information.