Corsair HX620W Power Supply

Throughout all of our benchmarks regardless of what we are reviewing, testing is done in a clean and stand-alone version of Windows XP Professional with SP2. Prior to testing, these conditions are met:

• Desktop and scrap files are cleaned up, including emptying of recycle bin.
• No virus scanner or firewall is installed in the stand-alone installation.
• The stand-alone installation drive is completely defragged using Diskeeper 10 Pro Premier.
• All unnecessary programs are closed, so that Windows should have no more than 15 active processes running.
• Computer has proper airflow.

The testing rig used for today’s benchmarking is as follows:

• CPU: AMD Windsor 4600+ EE @ 2.75GHz
• Motherboard: DFI NF590 SLI-M2R/G (829 BIOS)
• Memory: Kingston PC2-8000 2GB @ DDR2-1100 4-4-4-12
• Video: ASUS 7900GT
• Sound: Onboard HD Audio
• Storage: 2 x Seagate 7200.9 320GB
• Power Supply: Corsair HX620W
• Etcetera: Windows XP Professional w/ SP2, 4 x 120mm Fan
• Cooling: Corsair Nautilus 500

To stress the HX620W, I ran these applications for the period of an hour.

• 2 x Prime95, one to each core
• RTHDRIBL for GPU stress
• Custom PC Mark 05 test to stress everything except GPU
• SANDRA Burn-In to target HDD and CD-Rom

What’s to say? The power supply held up incredibly well. This is by far the most solid supply I’ve personally had in for testing. It handled the stress well and there was only minor fluctuation. The +12v rails were all above the mark but still retain ATX 2.0 standards, and more importantly were super stable.

Many have known for quite a while, Corsair knows their memory and know how to release a blowout product. Well, they apparently took their smarts from that market and put it straight into their power supplies because this is a fantastic result. What’s most impressive is that the HX series came out of nowhere, and then proved to be a huge winner. Besides the obvious performance highs, there are a few other things that help this add up to become a highly recommended product.

I am not a fan of bling. I don’t care if a power supply has fancy LED’s… I’d rather see solid performance. That’s why we see the likes of PCP&C doing so well… they focus primarily on performance. Corsair believed that was the road to take, and developed a simple looking power supply that still looks great thanks to it’s pure matte black paint job.

I’ve also been a fan of modular power supplies for quite some time, because more often than not, a supply will have far more connectors than I need. 6 Molex and 6 S-ATA is overkill when I only have a single DVD-Rom and hard drive. Other things that they did right was include the 4-Pin fan connectors as an adapter instead of another cable that runs straight from the PSU. This helps you keep things towards the center of your case instead of having an abundance of cables running through your case cutting off crucial airflow.

But most importantly, the HX620W proves to be a very reliable product that keeps tight figures on the rails. It was a blast to stress test this supply… trying to throw everything at it and see it laugh at me. Great first showing from Corsair that well deserves a 9 out of 10 and our Editors Choice award!

Pros
• Solid performance
• Simple design, but looks good
• Modular connections
• Plenty of amperage on all rails
• Best packing job I’ve seen in a while

Cons
• $180 price tag?

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