Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB 750w Power Supply Review

Introduction Smart BX1 RGB Power Supply Having a good power supply is perhaps the most important single component your system can have. It's a sad fact, but when many people look towards system builds they can often overlook the significance a good PSU can have. Firstly, clearly, one that is well made will work well and generally be much more durable in the long term. Secondly, going for better efficiency ratings means that it'll run better and might even save you some cash on the electric bill. It's not much, but every little helps! With this in mind, we take a look at the Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB. This power supply is rated to 750w and comes with bronze efficiency certification. So far, all the things you'd want to hear from a power supply that suits a reasonable budget but still has plenty of performance to offer. As this is a Thermaltake product, this power supply includes some impressive RGB lighting effects. This is particularly special as they are one of the few brands (at least that we are aware of) that incorporate RGB technology in their PSU designs. A review isn't all about the light show though. This power supply still has an important job to do! Let's, therefore, take a closer look to see if this could be the next powerhouse for your system! Features The Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB power supply comes with a single +12V rail which outputs 672w through a single rail. As this is a non-modular power supply, all the cables come pre-attached to the power supply and can not be removed. Despite this, you are provided with a good variety that should suit the vast majority of gaming systems. It is, of course, always advisable that you check to ensure that you are going to have the right connections to suit your build. The key features of the power supply include; High amperage single +12V rail design. 80 PLUS Bronze 230V EU Internal Certified All flat black cables and connectors Provides 750w of continuous power at 40c Easy to use RGB LED toggle button The fan supports 10 LEDs for added effects. Main Japanese capacitor Please also note that this power supply also comes with a 5-year warranty. A definite testament to the quality Thermaltake feels is within this PSU. Smart RGB The power supply comes complete with Thermaltake's unique Smart RGB design which allows you to have fantastic customisation options for the lighting effects. With 256 colours available, even the most hardcore of RGB fans (or haters) are not going to struggle to find an option that suits them here! Thermaltake has provided a video showing this in action (as well as a product overview) below. Cabling With this being non-modular, it's important to know exactly what cables this power supply is provided with. Although this is detailed on the rear of the packaging we will detail it for you below. 1 x 20+4 main power connector. 1 x ATX 12 V 4 + 4 PIN 8 x SATA 4 x 6 + 2 PCI-E 4 x Molex 1 X Floppy Disk Adaptor Compared to lower wattage models in the BX1 range, the 750w variant has about twice the number of peripheral cables. This should, therefore, suit almost any PC build and even dual-GPU set-ups. The cables themselves are black and sleek. Although they feel quite strong and durable, they are also nicely flexible and a decent length which should make the installation straightforward. A Closer Look The exterior packaging carries that distinctive red and black colouring we have come to associate very well with Thermaltake. The front provides you will all the information you could need at a glance. You are also given a nice bold image of the power supply with the RGB lighting in effect. You will also note that Thermaltake pushes the 5-year warranty and main Japanese capacitor. A strong selling point for anyone with some knowledge of power supplies. The rear of the box is crammed full of good information. This includes the key features, cables (including pictures), the output specifications and also the energy efficiency ratings chart. Not for the first time, we must credit Thermaltake for not only providing so much information in an easy to read format, but also the efficiency charts. Very few PSU manufacturers have the courage to slap that chart right on the box! The sides of the packaging details the RGB lighting effects. It highlights the different colours, modes and cycles available as well as pointing out that if RGB isn't your thing, there is a convenient switch to turn it off. Whats In The Box? A closer look a the power supply shows that in terms of presentation, even with the RGB lights off, it looks pretty good. As this is a non-modular power supply you will notice the bank of cables. In regards to these specifically, the cables are nice and flexible while the coating also feels durable. Getting back to the presentation though, the power supply just have a fair amount of branding and product wording on it. This is, however, all in keeping with the design and actually looks rather good. Despite this being quite a hefty power supply (at 750w) the design is neither large nor is it overly heavy. In the picture below you can again see that while a fair amount of branding is there, it's all in keeping with the overall ethos of the product. The 'top' of the power supply looks very impressive with the Thermaltake logo center to the fan case exterior. The bottom of the power supply has all the technical details specific to the way the power is outputted. Although not entirely uncommon, it is nice to see this information physically displayed on the power supply. The rear of the power supply has nice large vents which should help promote good exhaust. As with most things PC related, the cooler they are, the better they run and as you can see in the picture, very little space hasn't been utilised to help promote this as best as possible. Overall, in terms of design, Thermaltake has achieved something a little unusual with this power supply. While there is a lot of branding and wording on it, it all looks very professional and actually aesthetically really nice. This is, dare I say, a damn fine looking PSU! Even when the RGB isn't turned on! Interior A closer look at the inside of the power supply adds to our confidence that this will do well in testing. All the componants look well produces with a nice amount of space between them all which should, by proxy, allow for a good air flow. In addition, there did not appear to be any signs of excessive glue 'blobs'. This has been put together very well. In addition to this, you will note that the 2 banks of heat syncs are located to the near center of the power supply. As these are directly underneath the fan, and well spaced, this should allow for excellent temperature regulation. Due to the position of the main capacitor, it was difficult to get a decent photograph of it. Despite this, we were able to confirm that it is Rubycon manufactured. These are a Japanese electronics brand known to us, albeit one that we don't see as often as, for example, Nichicon. Despite this should, with the main capacitor rated to 105c, this is exactly what you want to see. The main cooling fan is a Thermaltake TT-1225. We have seen this fan regularly used by Thermaltake in the past and in terms of performance, it has never failed to impress. As a whole, in terms of the internal componants, the Thermaltake Smart BX1 looks good. Let's see if it can keep this up with our testing! 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. Test Procedure At eTeknix we take the power supply testing procedure very seriously and have invested a lot of resources into acquiring the appropriate testing equipment. For all power supply reviews, we test the power supplies with dedicated power supply testing equipment. This means we are able to get the most accurate results from our testing as opposed to using software benchmarks (such as OCCT) or multi-meter readouts which are broadly inaccurate. Testing Hardware Sunmoon SM-5500ATE Active Load Tester (1200W rated) Stingray DS1M12 USB Oscilloscope Voltcraft DT-10L laser tachometer What the eTeknix Test Procedure Involves Testing each power supply at 20/40/60/80/100% load (with load balanced across all rails) and measuring PFC (power factor correction), efficiency (actual power divided by power "pulled at the wall") and voltage regulation (deviance from expected voltages of 3.3/5/12 on the main rails). Measuring ripple with an oscilloscope at 20/40/60/80/100% load. Measuring fan speed after a stabilisation period of five minutes at each load scenario using the Voltcraft DT-10L laser tachometer and a reflective strip on the fan. Testing each power supply's OPP (Over Power Protection) mechanism and seeing how many watts each power supply can deliver before shutting down Other Things to Consider We recognise that a single 12-volt cable can provide only 6 Amps before overheating (which corrupts voltage regulation and efficiency) and so we used an adequate number of cables for each power supply to ensure there is not efficiency loss from poor cables selection Our Sunmoon SM-5500ATE power supply tester is not capable of testing more than 300W on each of the 12-volt rails so where a power supply provides more than 300W on a 12-volt rail that power is distributed over multiple 12-volt rails on the load tester. For example a power supply with one 12 volt rail supplying 750 watts would be spread equally over three 12 volt rails on the load tester, a power supply with two 450W 12v rails would be spread over four 12v rails on the load tester, two 225W 12v rails for each of the 12v rails on the unit. We use the same time scale and horizontal millivolt scale on our oscilloscope for all ripple tests, that is a 20ms T/DIV (horizontal) and a 0.02 V/DIV (vertical) meaning the scale is from -80mV to +80mV, ATX spec dictates that the 12v rail must fall within 150mv of ripple and the 3.3/5 within 50mv so that scale allows us to include both 150 and 50mV peaks. (Some older PSU reviews use different scales which were later ditched as the visual representation they give is inadequate, in these reviews written measurements are provided only). Deviance is the terminology used to represent the way voltages diverge from the expected values Voltage Regulation To test voltage regulation we load the power supply to five different load scenarios that give an equal spread of load across every single rail. So that means 20% on all rails, 40% on all rails and so on. We then calculate the average deviance of each rail from its expected voltage. Ideally, anything of +/- 2% regulation is seen as a very good result. Power Efficiency Power efficiency is measured by calculating actual supplied wattage divided by the wattage drawn at the wall/plug, multiplied by 100 to give a percentage. We then compare that to the particular 80 Plus certification the company claims to see if it meets that. You can see the 80 Plus certifications below, we always test power supplies at 230v. Power Factor Correction Power Factor Correction is the ratio of the real power flowing to the load, to the apparent power in the circuit. The aim of PFC is to make the load circuitry that is power factor corrected appear purely resistive (apparent power equal to real power). In this case, the voltage and current are in phase and the reactive power consumption is zero. The closer the number to one the better as this allows the most efficient delivery of electrical power (Source - Wikipedia). Ripple Noise and Ripple can easily be measured by an oscilloscope. These show how much voltage fluctuation there is on a particular rail. We tested the rail stability of the 3.3-volt, 5-volt and 12-volt rails using an identical time and millivolt scale for all graphs. millivolt ripple is measured by the peak to peak size of the voltage curve. The latest ATX 12 volt version 2.3 specifications state that ripple from peak to peak must be no higher than 50 millivolts for the 3.3-volt and 5-volt rails, while the 12-volt rail is allowed up to 120 millivolts peak to peak to stay within specifications. Millivolt figures are stated to the closest increment of 5 given their variability. OPP Power supplies often quote as having various protection mechanisms such and the most important of these is Over Power Protection. In our testing we crank up the power draw until the power supply either shuts down (meaning the OPP mechanism is present and working) or blows up (meaning it is either not present or not working). We then note the maximum power consumption before the power supply shut down, or before it blew up. Fan Speed When testing in a power supply laboratory it is difficult to take fan noise readings as the noise from the Sunmoon test equipment and air conditioning corrupts everything. The next best thing in our circumstances was reading off the fan speed with a tachometer to get an idea for the noise. The ambient temperature during testing held constant at 22 degrees, with 1 degree of variation. Each power supply had a consistent time period of 5 minutes to stabilise between each load scenario. In my experience, the following general relationships apply between noise levels and fan speeds, though it can vary greatly between the type of fan used. Below 800 RPM - Inaudible/Silent 800 to 1000 RPM - Barely audible 1000 - 1200 RPM - Audible but still quiet 1200 - 1400 RPM - Moderately noisy 1400 - 1800 RPM - Noisy 1800 RPM or above - Intolerable Efficiency, PFC and Voltage Regulation Voltage Regulation Voltage regulation is important as it ensures that despite the load the power supply is outputting, the level of power is consistent. In this regard as can be seen in the results below, the Thermaltake Smart BX1 was remarkably consistent. The variance to the average is very minimal and only gets higher than 1% in the -12V category. In that regard, the voltages are consistently a little lower than they should be. Given that this rail is hardly used though, such results are not concerning and will not affect the overall operation. Power Efficiency As the Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB power supply is bronze rated, this does have to meet certain efficiency standards. Put simply, this must achieve a minimum of 81% efficiency at maximum and minimum loads while around 85% at mid/average loads. As you can see, the Smart BX1 easily achieved this rating by a massive margin. It achieves a near silver level of efficiency and in terms of max-min loads, it's even pushing into the gold-rated territory. At the risk of hyperbole, we should point out that it isn't unusual to see a power supply perform slightly better than the rated amount. It is, however, pleasantly surprising to see this PSU do it so comfortably that it borders on much higher standards. Standards which, incidentally, usually come with a much higher price tag. We should note that our results are not quite as optimistic as those Thermaltake put on the packaging in terms of the starting efficiency. On the whole, though, our results are very consistent with theirs. Power Factor Correction While the PFC ratings do struggle under low-load, as soon as you crank the power-up, the Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB Power Supply achieves some excellent results. After the 40% load, the results see a slow but consistent rise towards the higher figures. In terms of the results here, there is, again, absolutely nothing to raise any concern over. Ripple If this power supply does have a fault in terms of the output testing, it lies in the ripple results. While the 3.3V and 5V results are perfectly normal (good actually) the 12V rail does get a little excitable at full load. While the results are within the accepted parameters, 46.8 is a little closer to the edge than we usually see. With this in mind though, we have seen this in other Thermaltake products where the tests results are fantastic, but the 12V ripple is a little higher than usual. Despite this though, there is still no cause for concern. The 12V results, as above, are within the requirements. It would, however, have been a little better to see the 100% load below 45. Load (%) 3.3V Ripple 5V Ripple 12V Ripple 20 8.4 7.8 20.8 40 10 11.2 21.8 60 12 13.4 29.2 80 15.2 18.6 38.6 100 19.2 22.8 46.8 Over Power Protection and Max Wattage As this is a 750w power supply, the Smart BX1 should be more than competent for use in a gaming PC. Despite that though, at times you might need to push it a little harder than the wattage on the box. In this regard, the Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB is not found wanting. It isn't unusual to see power supplies capable of anything up to 10% above their rated wattage before the protections come into place. In this regard though, the BX1 is closer to 30%. Despite being rated to 750w, the power supply achieved nearly 1000 watts before the OPP kicked in. When you consider that this is 226w above the rated value, if you ever did have to push this power supply a little beyond its limits, there's no reason why this couldn't handle as high as 8500w without too much effort. Fan Speed We should note that the result chart for this power supply does look a little crazy. Upon closer inspection, however, the results become a lot clearer. As you can see, it would appear that the Thermaltake Smart BX1 power supply operates with a set static fan speed. The variance in the results is no greater than about 25RPM across the whole range of testing. In addition, the noise levels are entirely unobtrusive. As this power supply does not have a hybrid mode, no testing in that area could be conducted. Regardless of that though, this power supply is definitely quiet enough to be a positive factor for any low-noise system build. Final Thoughts Pricing The Thermaltake Smart BX1 RGB 750w power supply retails for a price in the region of £70-£80. In terms of bronze rated power supplies, particularly one that does so well in testing and comes with a 5-year guarantee, this is a very reasonable price. In fact reasonable gets to be an understatement when you also take in the RGB lighting effects to this power supply. Don't forget as well that despite this bring a 'bronze' power supply on the box. It could make an argument for silver and even at times gold ratings. For the latter in the 750w category, you're lucky if you can find one for less than £100. Overview Having reviewed many Thermaltake power supplies, we have always been impressed with the design of the product and the quality of the build. Given that they are a brand they look to offer a quality product on a budget, there can sometimes be consumer concerns that this might mean it's cheaply made. Nothing could be further from the truth here or indeed with any of their products. When you also bring their unique RGB lighting into the mix, in terms of looks and design, this ticks all the right boxes. Yes, non-modular power supplies are not particularly popular these days, but there's no reason why that should stop you considering this. The cables provided are nice both in terms of quality and length and you are not given any more than you could (realistically) need even in the most impressive gaming PC setup. Efficiency and Beyond Although this is a bronze-rated power supply, it does on occasion tip-toe into the realms of silver and even gold. That is exceptionally impressive for a power supply that at least in terms of its official rating is so modest. Across the vast majority of our tests, the results were highly impressive and clearly speak volumes of a product that has been put together with a lot of care and attention. The only slight flies in the ointment would be the -12V voltage regulation scores and the +12v ripple scores. These are, however, relatively minor points in what are otherwise exceptionally good test results. It isn't perfect, but considering this is as bad as it gets, then it tells you just how good this power supply really is! Should I Buy One? In terms of 750w power supplies, you would not exactly struggle to find a wide variety of products on offer. So what makes the Thermaltake Smart BX1 750w stand out from the pack? Well, firstly, as can clearly be seen throughout our testing, this is a power supply that performs massively better than it has any right to. With near gold-levels in efficiency and nearly 1000 watts achieved in the OPP testing, you're getting a great power supply here. Secondly, you would struggle to find a power supply that offers genuine aesthetics. Although RGB lighting isn't everyone's cup of tea, the options available to you are nice, bright, vivid, but even then if it's not your thing you have the option to turn them off. Finally, the price. For around £70-£80, when you take all the above into consideration, this power supply reflects fantastic value. Based on the test results, this power supply easily competes with many other models which have performed just as well in our testing, but come with a much higher price tag. Think about it? A power supply that has near gold efficiency ratings but costs around £40 less than an actual certified one. How can you go wrong here?... Two words - You can't!