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- Date:
- Wednesday, September 08, 2010
- Author:
- Paul Johnson
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
Enermax Revolution85+ 1020W Power Supply Review
Efficiency as a goal. Future CPU proof and future GPU proof as a goal. Enermax has set the bar high and that is what we like to see out of one of our favorite PSU companies. Does the new Revolution85+ bound over that bar or just limbo under it?
Overview
The first thing we are going to look at with the Enermax Revolution 1020W 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 packaging for the Enermax Revolution85+ 1020W represents a slightly revised version of the packaging we found on the Revolution85+ 1050W. As such there is little new to discuss here and we find the same useful information that was provided before including the power table (reproduced below), connector count, efficiency graph, plenty of marketing points, and 80Plus silver logo. This time however we don't find a CrossFire certification logo, and a quick check of both the CrossFire webpage and the SLIZone webpage find that it is not currently (at the time of writing) certified for either multi-GPU configuration. This will likely change at some point as the previous 1050W model was certified for various multi-GPU arrangements. Moving on, we find this unit is advertised as being 80Plus Silver rated and indeed the 80Plus website has the unit listed as such. Lastly, the Revolution comes with a 5 year warranty which is an improvement over the previous Revolution85+ 1050W which was covered by just a 3 year warranty. This is an excellent upgrade to the Enermax' warranty service length for this line of products and it was certainly overdue in the high-end enthusiast realm.
*Modular connector location is relative to the fixed wiring being on the left hand side of the unit.
From the power label supplied with the Enermax Revolution 1020W we see that this unit is very similar to the Revolution85+ 1050W as it is once more a heavily 12v oriented unit with up to ~100% of its DC output capacity available on the 12v rails for a total of 85A. This is just 2A fewer than what was available on the 1050W model. This 12v output is paired up with no less than six PCI-Express connectors, twelve SATA, and six Molex connectors. This arrangement does represent a step down from the eight PCI-Express connectors and 16 SATA connectors found on the 1050W model, but it should be sufficient for most everyone. Also differing from the 1050W model, we find that this unit's 12v capacity is broken up into just four 12v rails. Further differing from that previous unit is the fact that each rail has seen a bump in capacity from 30A to 35A. This new breakdown should be sufficient given the reduction in connectors and their current distribution; however one has to wonder why Enermax has gone to all of this effort with this product when it is just 30W less than the 1050W model. Or one has to wonder why there is a 1020W model when there is already a 1050W model in this model line.
Once we open the Enermax Revolution85+ 1020W we are greeted by more boxes inside of boxes, again. In addition to these boxes we find the user manual, an advertising insert, a pouch for the modular cables, a case fan, the mounting screws, cord keeper, and zip-ties. Inside of those two smaller boxes is the power supply, the AC cord, the modular cables, and silica. The user manual for the Revolution85+ 1020W is a hefty 67 pages long in twelve languages. Included in this manual is a wealth of information including the majority of the normal electrical specifications, warranty information, 12v rail layout, PowerGuard decoding information (only available for the 1250W model), cable count, and installation instructions. The manual provided with this unit is very well thought out, presented, and should provide users with the majority of the information they could need regarding this unit.