Thermaltake Toughpower XT 750 W Power Supply Review

Posted By Gabriel Torres on Jul 30, 2009 in Power

Introduction

Toughpower XT is an updated version of the famous Toughpower series from Thermaltake, featuring two novelties. First, a set of three LEDs that gives you basic status about the power supply working conditions. Second, a switch where you can configure the power supply fan to keep spinning for 15 or 30 seconds after you turn off your PC, which in theory can increase the product life-span. Another difference is the use of a single-rail design, while the original Toughpower series uses a four-rail design. Let’s test the 750 W model and see if it is a good buy.

Like the original Toughpower series, Toughpower XT is manufactured by CWT. Since we have already disassembled the original Toughpower 750 W unit, we will be able to do a detailed comparison between the designs used on these two units.

It is important to note that even though this power supply is manufactured by CWT like Corsair HX750W they use a complete different design. Toughpower XT 750 W uses the traditional PC power supply design, while Corsair HX750W uses a DC-DC design on the secondary, which proved to provide superior efficiency.

Toughpower XT 750 W is 80 Plus Bronze certified, meaning a minimum efficiency of 85% at typical load (50% load, i.e., 375 W) and a minimum efficiency of 82% under light (20% load, i.e., 150 W) and full (750 W) loads.

Toughpower XT units are available in two versions: standard and cable management, which features a modular cabling system. We reviewed a sample from the standard version.

Figure 1: Thermaltake Toughpower XT 750W power supply.

Figure 2: Thermaltake Toughpower XT 750W power supply.

Toughpower XT 750 W is relatively short for a 750 W product, being 6 19/64” (160 mm) deep. It has a 140 mm fan on its bottom, active PFC, single-rail design (the original Toughpower has four rails) and optional modular cabling system (available on the “cable management” models).

In Figure 3, you can see the switch available on the rear from the unit where you can configure the fan to keep spinning after the computer is turned off. Three positions are available: “auto,” “15 seconds” and “30 seconds.”

Figure 3: Fan delay control.

Toughpower XT has a set of three LEDs that monitor the standby (+5VSB) voltage, the power good signal and the over temperature protection, see Figure 4.

Figure 4: Status LEDs.

All cables have a nylon protection, but the sleevings don’t come from inside the power supply, as you can see in Figure 2. The cables included on Toughpower XT 750 W are:

Main motherboard cable with a 20/24-pin connector (24 7/8” or 63 cm in length).
One cable with one EPS12V connector and one ATX12V connector (25.25” or 64 cm to the EPS12V connector, 5 ½” or 14 cm between the EPS12V and the ATX12V connectors).
Two auxiliary power cables for video cards with one six-pin connector each (20 ½” or 52 cm in length).
Two auxiliary power cables for video cards with one eight-pin connector each (20 ½” or 52 cm in length).
Two SATA power cables with three plugs each (19 ¾” or 50 cm to the first connector, 5 ½” or 14 cm between connectors).
Two peripheral power cables with four standard peripheral power plugs and one floppy disk drive power connector each (19 ¾” or 50 cm to the first connector, 5 ½” or 14 cm between connectors).

There is a big problem here: two of the video card power cables use an eight-pin connector without the option to convert them to six-pin models. This prevents you from installing two high-end video cards that require two six-pin connectors each, like the GeForce GTX 260 and similar cards. Thermaltake should have used six/eight-pin connectors.

The number of peripheral cables is terrific, but we think this unit could have more SATA power connectors.

All cables use 18 AWG wires, which is the correct gauge to be used.

Figure 5: Cables.