Update! It lives! Modularity?
Finally I found the time to get this together! All the components for the -12V rail arrived, thanks to
@EdZ, who helped me a great deal with component selection! I tested the circuit a week ago, but now I've made a small EPS12V-to-2xPEG6 adaptor to test it with my GPU and made an actual connection to pin 14 on the ATX connector.
Behold:
So I'm running Prime95 and Heaven as I'm typing this, and boy, that unit is a lot quieter than every FlexATX PSU I have ever had, even with the partially blocked exhaust. (Apart from the one I modded to fit an 80mm fan, of course) If you're going for a silent PC, it's not going to be for you, but in idle I can barely hear it, even while it's sitting less than a metre from my head, and when running just Unigine or any Game Benchmark, my dual-fan 970 is a lot louder than the PSU fan.
The fan also has a very nice sound to it when gaming. No whining, just a pleasant and surprisingly deep whooshing noise. It gets a little whiny when stressing the CPU as well, but I don't have a Killawatt yet, so you/ll have to wait for a tangible load-to-noise test.
What's interesting and a little annoying is that the fan will spin up at its full RPM when starting the system, which is quite loud. While this let's me know that the fan is far from it's maximum RPM with the short dirty tests I'm throwing at it now, I'll ask FSP to fix this behaviour in the final unit. I assume this is a self-test so the PSU can refuse to start up if the fan is not turning properly, which is nice for IPC uses, but no good in a consumer PSU.
Most importantly, in comparison to the SSP-300SUG, my setup doesn't crash. The PSU is rock solid and even during heavy testing when the fan spins up a little more than average, it can quickly recover. I'm far from reaching the maximum load on this thing, and that makes it all the better.
Modularity and cables:
So the current state on this is as follows:
There will be no modular connectors on the PSU itself. The poll clearly showed that there are cases where less than 20mm of space will be available in front of the PSU. Most importantly, the Hutzy XS will be quite limited in that area, and it is one of the most popular planned builds that involve this PSU. So even if flush modular connectors were possible (which they aren't), installing the PSU in such cases would be a nightmare or straight out impossible.
But, to redeem this, the SATA, PEG (GPU) and EPS (CPU) power connectors will be on very short cables, which can be extended with any old extension cable from the store, no need to mod anything or make your own extension. These short cables also allow configurations where devices are sitting very close to the PSU and will use up minimum space for people who don't need them at all.
The ATX cable will be long enough to support pretty much all configurations but as short as possible to prevent cable clutter in situations where the ATX connector is close to the PSU.
The current lengths for the cables are:
SATA/PEG/EPS: 8cm
ATX: 18cm
The is the next-best thing to semi-modularity we can get.
The following connectors will be present on the PSU:
SATA: 1x or 2x
PEG: 1x 6+2pin, 1x 6pin
EPS: 1x 4+4pin
ATX: 1x 20+4pin
I'm still a little torn on the SATA connectors. On one hand, more than 40% claimed to be using two SATA-powered devices, but on the other hand even more people will be using one or zero SATA devices. So it seems like having one connector and including a splitter seems like a good middle-of-the-road solution, but maybe there are differing opinions.
Two 6+2 pin connectors will not be possible, though. The limitations on the power draw are just too tight. It might still be doable if you use an adaptor, but you'll be doing that on your own risk.
So, that's it for now. Things are looking good, as far as I'm concerned. I will go on vacation on Tuesday, so don't expect any further updates during that time. I'll have internet, though, so I should be able to reply if you've got any questions or concerns. Have a nice day and thank you for reading!
