Who doesn’t love unexpected surprises?
Eagle-eyed member of the forum iFreilicht has turned our attention to a new listing on Newegg for Lian Li’s highly-anticipated PE-750, which currently lays claim to the title of the highest wattage SFX-L power supply available, let alone the highest wattage SFF-oriented PSU more broadly.
Most know of Lian Li as a manufacturer of popular (if not occasionally curious) aluminum enclosures, so the company’s entry into the power supply market is a notable departure from their traditional offerings. SFF Network actually covered the unexpected announcement of the unit (alongside a 550W Gold-rated SFX-L PSU) in early April, and the development took the industry by surprise, while simultaneously gathering intense interest from the SFF community.
As James reported at the time:
The 750W has 4x 6+2 PEG connectors, split between two cables. According to the listing on the website, the PE-750 can do its full rated wattage on the 12V rail, so it should be suitable to power a beefy dual-GPU setup like SLI GTX 980 Ti’s. One oddity with the PE-750 connectors is the red 4-pin connector to the right of the 24-pin in the above picture. It seems out of place, but my best guess is that the 24-pin has some of the wires doubled for voltage sensing and those sense lines plug in there.
Thanks to veryrarium in the forum, it looks like the chances are high that the 750W is from Enhance. The “ENP7175” on the barcode sticker on the 750W in the pictures is very similar to the product numbers for other Enhance-based units.
Overall this is a very exciting development, between this and the upcoming SilverStone SX700-LPT, we’ll have not one but two SFX-L power supplies capable of running even high-end dual-GPU rigs.
At a high level, the PE-750 is a Platinum rated modular unit that’s identical to most high-end power supplies on a feature-by-feature basis, though factors such as noise, build quality, and component quality won’t become readily apparent until product reviews are published. That said, the information available on the unit currently is promising, and includes the following highlights:
- 120mm thin fan with variable speed (temperature and output controlled)
- Fully modular cables with a bag for storage
- Two 2 x 6+2 PCI-E power connectors (enough for two GPUs with two power plugs each)
- Three SATA power connectors
- One year limited warranty
It’s always prudent to consider the unproven nature of first entrants into a market, so we’d advise anyone interested in the power supply to wait for third-party reviews before diving in. That said, with Lian Li’s debut unit now on the market, well-established SilverStone’s launch of their SX700-LPT is made all the more interesting, especially given Lian Li’s decision to price their unit at $160. How SilverStone will respond with respect to price is anyone’s guess, but one thing is certain: having both units available to SFF enthusiasts is a massive win for enthusiasts who want as much performance as possible.
Indeed, it used to be that SFX and SFX-L implicitly meant sacrificing use of enthusiast-grade components. With power supplies such as the PE-750 now available, though, that assumption has since been shattered.
Update: Forum member Toast has reached out to Lian Li and received an email from them, confirming that the “official” launch date of the PE-750 (i.e. when it was planned to land on NewEgg) was May 18th. Thus, it seems that NewEgg has posted the PSU on their website a little early, though I suspect most customers won’t mind that one bit.
