ePower Lion EP-450P5-L1

Installation:

We can�t get over how shiny this PSU is (mirror companies had better watch out!). We were surprised that the rear box that houses extra heatsink doesn�t come in the way of anything. No problems were encountered. The ATX power cable was quite long, longer than Antec�s cable. It would probably be useful when used in full tower cases. I used a midi tower case; just tall enough to fit a full ATX motherboard so I found the extra cable excessive and space consuming.

Test system:

This PSU has plenty of connectors. The highlight is the special shielded connector for the video card.

SATA connectors:

Fan connectors:

Thermal probe:

The thermal probe measures the temperature and sets the fan speed accordingly.

Performance:

On power up the fan didn�t spin at all, after a while of use the fan started to spin. We tested this power supply by measuring the voltages under load and idle.

Measurements were take with a recently calibrated Digitech multimeter. Load was tested by running Prime95 with the maximum power consumption setting. These voltages are quite good, much better than some of the other power supplies we have seen in our time. My highest overclocks were attained using this PSU. We hit 2700MHz 2V 13.5x200 prime stable with our IQYHA 0408 RPMW mobile Athlon XP.

The cooling fan has powerful LEDs that bring the power supply to life when it�s dark.

This picture was taken with the fan at full power (force switch at back). Unless the fan is forced to operate at full speed, it will adjust its speed according to internal temperature. Under normal conditions it spins so slow the sticker on the fan can almost be read!

Conclusion:

This PSU is very impressive to say the least. ePower has done an exceptionally good job with this power supply. A lot of attention has been payed to everything; however, I would like to see another VGA cable for the new dual socket nVidia cards and one of those new 6-pin VGA connectors. I recommend this PSU (ePower Lion) to anyone who is looking for a solid solution to base their system upon. At $150.00US you get what you pay for; a high quality reliable power supply. It may not be cheap but is well worth your hard earned dollars

Pros:

∙ Rock solid rails
∙ Special VGA connector
∙ Fan connectors
∙ SATA connectors
∙ Quiet

Cons:

∙ No 6-pin VGA connector
∙ No rear molex (for water pump start relays)