MAD DOG Multimedia MD-500SCPS Author: JonnyGuru Date Posted:03/04/2005 10:43.40 SLRating: Bottom Line: If you have a computer that loads up heavy on the 5V or won't load the 12V up over 20A while the 5V is also over 20A and you don't want to spend more than $100 on a modular power supply, this might be a good power supply for you. But if you've got an SLI system... Article Navigation Introduction First Impressions Observations Technical Overview Test Results and Conclusions Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 Discuss This Article

Test Results and Conclusions

Ok.  I'll eat my some of my words... I managed to get the PSU up over the label rating of 500W, but there was NO WAY this PSU was going to do 30A on the 12V rail and do anything more than 30A on the 5V rail at the same time.  What I had to do was lower the 12V rail down to 26A.  I then was able to juice up the 5V to 32A and the 3.3V to 4A.  Anything more than 26A on the 12V caused the rail to go WAY out of spec.  Anything more than 505.3W total power caused the overload protection to trip the power supply within an hour.  That's perfectly fine with me.  The PSU pulled off full load without any red numbers.

How I got to full load, in addition to the out of spec 12V rail being out of spec on every test where the 12V load was equal to or greater than the 5V load was very disappointing.  Where am I going to NEED 45A of 5V power in this day and age?  Especially if I can't load the 12V rail equally!

So in features, I give this power supply a 7.5.  If it had active PFC and a PCI Express power connector, it would've scored higher than the A.C. Ryan because the cables that came with the Mad Dog were actually a bit nicer.  Not as nice as the Ultra X-Connect, but nicer.

For performance, I'm going to give this power supply a 7.5.  If you have a computer that loads up heavy on the 5V or won't load the 12V up over 20A while the 5V is also over 20A and you don't want to spend more than $100 on a modular power supply, this might be a good power supply for you.  But if you've got an SLI system... forget it.

This power supply gets an overall rating of 7.5.

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Article Navigation Introduction First Impressions Observations Technical Overview Test Results and Conclusions

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