Power Supply Silverstone Discussion (Split from NJ450-SXL Thread)

[SilverStone]

Absolutely! I have just bought one and very happy with it. Even though the ST45SF-G that it replaced was still working fine (albeit with the fan mod), I thought I should try one of the newer models.

I have always been a bit of a Silverstone SFX PSU fanboy, but recently it's impossible to argue on forums against the Corsair models because:
a) SF600 high score on JohnnyGuru, while SX650-G arbitrarily lost two(!) points for being $10 more expensive and OklahomaWolf doesn't think people will need the extra 50W. Even though the recommended min PSU for RTX2080(ti) is now 650W people are still assuming SF600 will be fine because of perceived quality.
b) Corsair fans are better than 6 year old design of the ST45SF-G, and so fan noise is poisoned for Silverstone in people's memory, and the improvement with current models is ignored.
c) Similarly, coil noise in v1 SX600-G is remembered and influences opinion about build quality of recent models.
d) Brand goodwill - I agree with what Duality mentions regarding social media presence.
e) Corsair giving a 7 year warranty says to customers "we stand by our product and it's quality" - but Silverstone giving only 3 years warranty says to customers "this thing will break before you have saved up for your next PC". Look at Kia market share improvement since it offered 7 year warranty on all car models since 2006.

Being a trailblazer to create new markets is great. But it seems like you took many of the risks and didn't find all the deserved reward. Example, Sugo SG05 and the ST45SF-G proved that you can have a decent gaming PC in 11 liters. It directly inspired the NCase M1 - the thread name on [H] was something like "please design me an aluminium SG05!". And your own example the RZV01 showed that GPU risers can be reliable and cases don't have to be shoebox shaped. So indirectly Silverstone inspired the next gen of boutique aluminium gaming cases like Dan A4 and Louqe Ghost. Unfortunately you don't have a competing product in the uSFF case niche, and also people buying those cases are preferring the SF600. What chances you missed!

While I'm here: I really liked the idea of the LD03, because it's like a renewal of the FT03-mini which was not the smallest case I owned in terms of volume, but had the smallest footprint on the desk.

Thanks for your support and your observations are pretty much all spot on! Being a trailblazer and not fully realizing all the rewards is fine, it seems to be our calling dating back to when our team was still with Cooler Master in the early 2000's. We helped brought mass-market aluminum computer cases to the world (before it was only available in Japan), but others like Lian Li jumped in and sold more with cheaper models. Other new markets such as premium, full tower enthusiasts cases, HTPC cases, and PSUs over kilo-watt were also good examples. We have no regrets!

Since we are here: have you considered releasing a 2.0 of the SFX-L PSUs especially the 800W, dropping two peripheral 2x3 connectors and adding a second 4+4 motherboard connector instead? I know in theory this "oversubscribes" the PSU but it already is as a single 8 pin can deliver 235W and a single PCIe 8 pin can deliver 150W and there are four of those. So just let's trust people they will use the PSU sensibly? These days more and more motherboards add extra power connectors and for stability it'd be great to populate all of them?

Yes we have, but changes take time so we may not see a SFX / SFX-L PSU with a second EPS12V cable until next year sometimes.

 

[chx]

It's coming? Sweet!