Gutless wonders (pics and discussion)

[Behemot]

Bought few of these wonders for about 5 bucks on discount to check. Fortunatelly I've tested them right as they arrived on my loading tester. Guess what I found They can manage up to 3 A with voltage already under 12 V. At 3.5 A it started to heavily oscillate and than it began restarting itself. I asked 40 % back as these are 3A bricks at best. How close I've been to the truth

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So I cracked it open - which was very easy to do actually - to find most likely the worst carnage I've ever seen. Missing components? Forget about that, this is better Well, is it?

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Something missing? Forget about missing components, there is half of the board missing

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Oh yeah grounding/earth reference my ass!

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Where did the cables go?? The rectifier is actually capable of delivering the power, I think its some 10 or 15 A part. Not sure what the switchers is right now, can check later, but as long as it provides at least 1 A, it should also be OK (on 230 V). But the transformer is too small…

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Oh, look, they are even using quality caps. But wait! What's the silicone glue doing on the top of it? Using? Maybe re-using aren't we? I mean 31st week of 2008?

After this experience I resigned on even trying chinese makers ever again. If you approach them directly, the prices are not really nice already, if you'll want quality upgrade, you'll pay even more and with all those stupid import costs & taxes you end almost on the price of really quality stuff…yeah, you make 2 bucks more but have to hold the warrant all on yourself. Nah, not doing that. I've started looking after quality bricks from european distributors instead. As for the 5A ones, I think Seasonic will be the choice, already got one, just have to find the time to crack that one open…

[ArchOlson]

Hi..i am a new user here. Its true what you said. You should always go for the better one instead of cheaper Chinese products. Ofcourse the quality matters in the power supply. First thing is the transformer and the capacitors also plays the main role on the quality output. So transformer should be of good quality as well as the capacitors used for filteration.

[Behemot]

The problem is, absolute most of the market wants cheap crap for 10 bucks. Kinda the same situation as with ATX PSUs some 10 years ago. The power brick market has to evolve as the ATX PSUs did…

[Behemot]

I was to have a quick look at this chinese wonder, R-Senda SD-1600EPS. As usually, there is no word about this model anywhere on their site or even on the Internet so who knows what the heck this is. Also no 80 PLUS certification papers available from Ecova so it is likely bogus, though it does provide slightly over 80 % peak efficiency (close to bronze actually). Close to maximum power it was barely 80 %. The maximum output is about 1300 W than it shuts down. I wonder what is actually the rated power, 1800 W, 1600 W, 1600 W peak or what?

Notice the complete lack of input filtering, there is not even place for it, with the exception of the three Y ceramics (only two of them actually populated). The ripple on two rails I was looking at (+5 V, +12 V) was high over 200 mV Uses ancient CM6802.

[LongRunner]

Well, for a gutless wonder it's fairly impressive.

But I'm not sure what the point of making it is; the manufacturing cost of it is obviously much higher than a typical A-Power or Powmax, so anyone willing to pay that much really ought to just get a decent unit of whatever wattage they really need. And it's the first unit I've seen with a relay to bypass the NTC thermistor, but without input filtering.

[Behemot]

Been told it costs 1/3 of EVGA G2 1300 W.