Tagan ITZ 1300W & Thermaltake ToughPower 1200W
Moving onto the Thermaltake ToughPower 1200W, it's a very sharp looking unit. Thermaltake calls the finish a "Hi-Tech Black" coating. Again, what marketing was thinking on this one. As far as we can tell, the color is pretty far from Black on the color wheel as it's more like gunmetal. This unit features modular cables. Modular cables used to be another marketing gimmick because usually you were easily able to use all of the cables. However, with these kilowatt monsters, you will most likely have more cables than you can use, thus modularity is a good idea for case organization.
The cables are all very nicely sleeved. The PCI-E connectors also have the ferrite core for high frequency interference reduction. All of the cables are nicely labeled. On one of the ends of each cable, there is a tag specifying which power supply slot it corresponds to. The slot name also corresponds to the specific rail that powers it. The length of the cables are approximately the same as the Tagan cables. The lengths are sufficient.
Cracking this power supply open isn't as easy as it usually is. There are two screws on both the left and right side of the case. Unfortunately, on one of the sides, the metal plate with the big Thermaltake logo blocks the two screws. We had to carefully pry back the metal plate in order to reach the screws. We don't recommend you do this because the metal plate will not return to normal easily. Ours kept sticking out afterwards so we removed it completely. Inside the power supply is a massive 14cm fan. Thermaltake has used a fairly nice fan this time. It is a Yate Loon D14BH-12 fan. Yate Loon has six different 14cm fans and this is their most powerful one. This is also the ball-bearing version as denoted by the "B" in the model number. The sleeve-bearing version is denoted by an "S." Sleeve-bearings are usually quieter than ball-bearings, but they tend to fail more frequently. We would take reliability over the tiny noise difference any day in something like a power supply. The fan is configured to blow into the unit. Air escapes out the back through the metal grill. The design is simple, and should keep this kilowatt beast extremely well ventilated.
The layout is very clean. There are a total of 8 heatsinks and the design allows air to reach to the very bottom of the unit. We would bet that the extra length of the unit aided in making this design possible. 1200 Watts is a lot to cram in a standard sized power supply case. Among the connectors on the ToughPower 1200W was the main 20 pin, one 12V 4pin, one 12V 8-pin, eight 4-pin molex, eight Serial ATA, two floppy, three PCI-E 6-pin, and three PCI-E 8-pin connectors.