NZXT E850 850W Gold Rated Power Supply Review

A Closer Look

Packaging

NZXT has established some fantastic brand recognition with its bold white and purple design. It’s a branding that makes it stand out from the crowd and can clearly be seen on the packaging. The front of the NZXR E850 packaging is bright, bold and clear. While it is a little lacking in information on the front, you have to admire the strength of such marketing. They don’t even have the gold-rated efficiency sticker on the front!

Thankfully, for those of you who do need more in-depth information, the back of the packaging is not found wanting. You are provided with all the key information you could possibly need. This includes details on the power supply, the system requirements (largely for the CAM software), the product specifications as well as the details on the fan efficiency. Given that this is a gold rated power supply, it is a little strange why they chose to give the figures for the fan performance rather than for the efficiency.

We will, of course, test efficiency and provide you with our own results to this regard later in the review.

Power Supply and Accessories

The power supply is provided inside a fantastic canvas covering. This is a great idea as ultimately it guarantees that it should not get scratched or marked during transmit. That doesn’t mean to say that the NZXT E850 isn’t well packaged in the first instance. Trust me, it is! This is, however, a nice touch that speaks volumes about a strong product and a branding that cares about presentation.

The power supply itself is actually remarkably understated. Aside from the lightly embossed NZXT E850 to the sides, it would arguably be difficult to nail down exactly who had manufactured this power supply. Being understated is one thing, but at a glance this power supply is practically anonymous!

Thankfully the underside of the power supply does give you some excellent information on the technical specification of the power supply. Specifically the gold rating and how it outputs the power across the difference voltage settings. I would note that the purple outline to this isn’t necessary, but it is a nice touch that highlights and reinforces the NZXT brandings colour.

Getting to the more technical level of the design, both the top and rear exhaust areas have nice large openings which should allow for some good air flow. As can be particularly seen on the back, very little room isn’t utilised forexhauste vents and this should hopefully translate to some good fan speeds and running temperatures.

Accessories

In terms of accessories, the NZXT E850 doesn’t give you much. Then again, it’s not like you actually need much for a power supply, is it? You are provided with the fully-modular cables within a fantastically durable canvas bag which again sees the NZXT brand colouring. In addition to this, you are also provided with a product manual and warranty information. That’s it. Nice and simple!

A Closer Look Inside!

De-lidding the NZXT E850 is a relatively simple process. Although you, of course, don’t want to do this as it will invalidate your 10-year warranty. At an initial glance, everything looks good and exceptionally well designed considering that this is quite a compact power supply. It’s particularly impressive given that this produces 850w of power. Let’s take a closer look!

A closer look at the interior electronics finds things are a little bit cramped. At the same time though, nearly every component is allowed a little breathing room. The heat syncs are a little smaller than we would usually expect to see and in addition, the one located to the side of the power supply may struggle to get a good flow of cool air. It isn’t, after all, set very well in relation to the fan. We will, of course, see how this does in the testing, but from a design point of view, it’s always prefereable to see the heat syncs more centralised.

The main capacitor on the power supply is an HU design which is a branding owned by Hitachi. Given that the NZXT E850 claims to have 100% Japanese capacitors this is both confirmed and backed up in our photographs. Given that the main capacitor is rated to 105C as well, this is about as good as it gets or, at the very least, good news in terms of the products design and durability.

Cooling Fan

As you may already know, power supplies can get rather warm. It is, after all, dealing directly with the power and rather a lot of it too. As such, good cooling is a strong factor in any power supply. In this regard, the NZXT E850 power supply uses an ‘Ong Hua’ fan. I will admit that this isn’t a well-known brand. It appears to either be of Chinese or Singapore manufacturing and that might raise a few concerns. That being said though, don’t forget that this product, as a whole, is backed by NZXT’s 10-year warranty. As such they clearly feel that every component in this power supply is good enough to last at least that length of time. What better assurances could you need?

CAM Powered Management System

The NZXT E850 power supply is fully compatible with their own designed CAM Powered software. This software has been designed to provide a complete management of NZXT powered systems. Overall, it can tell you everything you could want to know as well as be the managing hub for how your components perform and even overclock settings.

Following a recent update to the software, we found it to be both highly informative as well as easy to use. It is, perhaps, best aimed towards those who like to micro-manage their systems. That being said though, even a beginner or ‘regular’ overclocker would find it informative and helpful if nothing else.

“CAM is a free PC monitoring software created by NZXT for PC enthusiasts and gamers. In years past, users needed multiple apps to keep track of key components’ temperatures, overclock GPUs, and display FPS in game. CAM has now consolidated all those functions into one easy-to-use utility for beginners and advanced users alike.” – NZXT Cam

You can download the CAM Powered Software in the link here!

Important – Please Read

To understand the results on the new few pages, please take the time to read our detailed testing methodology page. The next page of this review will help you understand what the results of our testing mean, and educate you on the various qualities we look for in a good PSU.