More or less rails on a PSU?

[Yellowhello]

What is better: Multiple 12v rails or one big 12v rail.

The reason I ask this is because I saw an ad for a PC Power and Cooling 1000W PSU and it was advertising 1 huge 12v rail (72-80a). I also saw another ad for the Enermax 1000w PSU and it was advertising 5 12v rails!!

[Panda Man]

IF YOU REALLY, REALLY need that much power, I'd go with the 5 rails. One rail that huge has a tendency to blow, hence one of the reasons they starting splitting rails in the first place. Enermax is also alot more reputable than PC Power and Cooling.

[gvblake22]

This is currently an interesting debate right now. Personally, I like the idea of fewer, more powerful 12V rails because that way you know that one (or several) power hungry devices (like an 8800GTX or two) don't get stuck on one 12V rail with only 17A or something while you have an optical drive and a couple fans on the other 17A 12V rail. If you had one really powerful 12V rail of 60A or more, there is no way that a single power hungry device will ever get starved of 12V power because the 12V rail was hacked up into a bunch of little pieces.

Originally Posted by Panda Man

Enermax is also alot more reputable than PC Power and Cooling.

I would have to disagree. If anything, they are on an equal plane; but many would argue that PC Power & Cooling has a reputation all it's own ahead of even Enermax, Antec, Fortron, etc...

[polobunny]

Originally Posted by Panda Man

IF YOU REALLY, REALLY need that much power, I'd go with the 5 rails. One rail that huge has a tendency to blow, hence one of the reasons they starting splitting rails in the first place. Enermax is also alot more reputable than PC Power and Cooling.

ER, WHAT?
PCP&C > Enermax. End of discussion.

[Panda Man]

>_> I've never even heard of PCP&P until this thread.

[gvblake22]

Originally Posted by Panda Man

>_> I've never even heard of PCP&P until this thread.

Well, consider yourself enlightened..

[Panda Man]

Originally Posted by gvblake22

Well, consider yourself enlightened..

Indeed. Its a nasty market really, because of so many bad companies with failing products, its pretty much gotten to where if its not a very well known company or you've not heard of them/heard bad things, run away screaming "STRANGER DANGER!".

[Quakindude]

PC Power and Cooling makes the best damned PSU's in the world. And they command a high premium for owning one.

A single 12v rail is going to deliver more overall usable wattage. Multiple 12v rails offer no clear advantage over a single 12V rail. The only reason that multiple rails came about was due to Intel sticking their head up their butt and Europe coming up with some weird way of trying to limit the amount of Amps on one rail IIRC.

PC Power and Cooling = Lamborghini. Ultimate performance for the ultimate price.

OCZ/ Enermax/ Sparkle/Hiper/FSP-Fortron group/High end Thermaltakes are the work horse PSU's that we can all afford.

Something I think Paul wrote in one of his posts on this topic that Blake alluded to above. If you have 4 12V rails and you install a couple of opticals on one rail, you might be using 20-25 watts on a rail that supplies 150w. The other 125w on that rail is unusable. A single 12V rail allows you to use the large part of the rated wattage. If it's a 12V PSU and a 72A single rail, in theory, that would give you 864w usable (12v x 72a = 864w). The rest of the wattage would go to the 5v and 3v lines for the mobo and CPU.

[Panda Man]

Originally Posted by Quakindude

Multiple 12v rails offer no clear advantage over a single 12V rail.

This can easilly be debated. IIR, I read that one of the main reasons for Dual rail in the first place was because once you get over 35A on the 12V rail, the higher the tendency for the PSU to blow. That probably is not the case for this PSU though. Alot of people at XtremeSystems prefer Dual rail as well, except during VERY heavy Overclocking. Either way it won't matter, the chances of this making a difference anyways is none to none.

Now before there is a hard fought battle ending in a kool-aid party over this, what's the amps on those rails anyways?

Originally Posted by Quakindude

The only reason that multiple rails came about was due to Intel sticking their head up their butt and Europe coming up with some weird way of trying to limit the amount of Amps on one rail IIRC.

>_> erm, wha..???

[Capper]

PCP&C might be the most overrated PSUs on the market. Sorry, but you can spend half the price they charge and get a fantastic PSU from Fortron/Sparkle, Enermax, ANTEC, Thermaltake, OCZ, or Corsair. I'm not arguing that their power supplies aren't excellent, I'm just saying that MAXPC among others, way overhype them.

Moving on, After visiting with all the major PSU manufacturers at CES, they all seem to be going back to the single rail PSUs.......