FSP, a Taiwanese manufacturer of power supplies, announced a new PSU that carries a relatively small power envelope of 400 W while boasting an 80 Plus Titanium rating.
As you may know, 80 Plus Titanium is the highest efficiency rating in the 80 Plus certification system, making this quite an achievement. At this efficiency rating, PSUs need to manage 90 percent efficiency at 10 percent load, 94 percent at 50 percent, and 90 again at 10 percent. For use on the 230 V grid, this even jumps to 96 percent at 50 percent load. FSP claims that its unit is up to 94.18 percent efficient on the 115 V grid.
Considering that PSUs are generally most efficient at about 50 percent load, a 400 W unit is likely to be very well suited for many of today’s systems, ranging from more powerful office PCs to light gaming systems. This is because those systems will operate around a 200 W load level more often than more powerful gaming or production systems may. The fact that a PSU is most efficient at half-load is also the reason why buying a PSU with a much higher wattage than necessary will almost never be optimally efficient.
For many manufacturers, FSP acts as an OEM, so there’s a good chance that over the coming weeks you’ll be seeing various other PSU vendors announcing 400 W 80-Plus Titanium PSUs, too. Those units often use the electronic design of FSP’s PSUs but have a different casing, different fan, and different cables and connectors to add value. FSP also sells its PSUs directly to consumers, though.
This 400 W unit comes with a 120 mm fan (which you could argue isn’t necessary anymore due to the low heat output thanks to the higher efficiency), a plain casing, and a non-modular cable design.
FSP did not announce pricing or availability.
