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Chieftec’s products continue to be at the forefront of our market offerings. And this is not surprising, given the former glory of this brand, as well as a good price / quality ratio for the solutions offered by the manufacturer. Recently, the company has been pampering the consumer with all sorts of new products, one of which we have already met in a recent article. Now the turn has come with another one – with the Element series power supply. Solutions of this line have one +12V line and a maximum efficiency of 85%, are equipped with a 120 mm fan, active PFC, but are designed only for networks with a voltage of 230 V. The Element series includes devices with power from 350 to 700 W, and we the oldest of them got tested.
Chieftec Element 700W (ELP-700S)
The packaging of the power supply is in a laconic corporate style for Chieftec – only the series and model of the device are indicated, the user will not find anything more useful on it.
The delivery set turned out to be no less modest, which included a set of mounting screws and a power cord.
All power cables are non-removable:
- one to power the motherboard (52 cm);
- one with 8-pin (4+4) CPU power connectors (54 cm);
- one with two 8-pin (6+2) connectors for powering PCI-E video cards (53 cm);
- two with three power connectors for SATA devices (53+16+16 cm);
- one with two power connectors for IDE devices and one for FDD (53+15+15 cm).
Only the motherboard power cable is enclosed in a nylon braid, the rest have an archaic look, which not all users may like, even economical ones.
The appearance of the Chieftec Element is no different from other solutions for the retail market: a black body and a chrome wire grille. The depth of the device is only 140 mm and the block will fit into the vast majority of cases without any problems.
If you look at the characteristics of the novelty, they promise 648 watts along the +12 V line and a combined power of 130 watts at +3.3 and +5 volts. Pretty good for a modern device.
The rest of the channels are up to date as well.
| Chieftec Element ELP-700S | +3.3V | +5V | +12V1 | –12V | +5Vsb |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Max. load current, A | 22 | 22 | 54 | 0,3 | 2,5 |
| Combined power, W | 130 | 648 | 3,6 | 12,5 | |
| Total maximum power, W | 750 | ||||
The power supply is equipped with protection against low and high voltage, against short circuit, overload of output lines, and there is also automatic fan speed control. There is an APFC module, but the mains voltage is limited to only 230 V, and when working in problem regions, it is better to additionally acquire an uninterruptible power supply.
The circuitry of the model under consideration is made on an affordable CWT platform with group stabilization of output voltages. The same we met earlier in the Chieftec PSF-400B block.
The installation is neat, but the budget of the device is visible.
Despite this, no savings were seen anywhere, the inlet filter was fully assembled.
The power elements are cooled by thick aluminum plates with petal-shaped fins at the ends, which increase the heat dissipation area. The diode bridge is devoid of a radiator, although it is usually found at this power, even among competitors on the same platform.
The unit is controlled by a CM6805BG PWM controller, the standby voltage is assigned to the TNY177PN chip, and the ST9S313A chip is responsible for monitoring.
The input circuit has a 390 uF capacitor with an operating voltage of 400 V manufactured by Elite. To be honest, in the power supplies that we tested, I meet such a brand for the first time. In the rest of the chains, JunFu, CapXon and … Nippon Chemi-Con containers were noticed. Too bad there aren’t many of the latter.
The soldering of the board is more or less neat, but there are minor scratches on the textolite.
The unit is cooled by a 120mm Yate Loon D12SH-12 fan based on a sleeve, with a two-pin connection and a maximum speed of 2200 rpm.
When the system is idle, the fan spins at 890 rpm, which rises another 15 units during the launch of gaming applications. The noise level is at an acceptable level. With increasing load, the speed rises to 1350 rpm.
Test Methodology
It is difficult to carry out full testing without an appropriate stand, so the power supplies were tested using a conventional system assembled from the following components:
- processor: Intel Core i7-6700K (4.0@4.5 GHz);
- motherboard: ASUS Maximus VIII Formula (Intel Z170);
- Cooler: Prolimatech Megahalems;
- RAM: HyperX HX430C15PB3K2/16 (2×8 GB, DDR4-3000, 15-16-16-35-1T);
- video cards: Gigabyte GV-N770OC-2GD (GeForce GTX 770);
- drive: Kingston SSDNow UV400 240GB (240 GB, SATA 6Gb/s).
Testing was carried out in the Windows 10 x64 environment on an open stand. The Valley benchmark was used to create a game load on the system, and LinX 0.6.7 was launched in parallel for additional load.
Also, for maximum load, the following system was assembled:
- processor: Intel Core i7-975 (3.33@4.02 GHz, Bclk 175 MHz);
- motherboard: ASUS P6T7 WS SuperComputer (Intel X58);
- cooler: Noctua NH-D14;
- RAM: Kingston KHX2000C8D3T1K3/6GX (3×2 GB, DDR3-2000@1750, 8-8-8-24);
- video cards: ASUS ENGTX295/2DI/1792MD3/A (GeForce GTX 295);
- hard disk: Samsung HD502HJ (500 GB, 7200 rpm, SATA-II).
Here testing was carried out in the Windows 7 x64 HP environment on an open bench. To create a load on the system, the OCCT 3.1.0 utility was used with a 30-minute power supply test in full screen mode with a resolution of 1920×1080.
To measure the total power consumption of the system, the Seasonic Power Angel was used, which can also measure the power factor, voltage and frequency in the network, the consumed current and the amount of energy spent per unit of time. Net power consumption calculated based on 80 Plus certification – i.e. possible efficiency of the device. Errors in such calculations can be 5%. The voltages were checked with a UNI-T UT70D digital multimeter.
In addition, we decided to slightly expand testing by taking temperature readings inside the power supply, fan speed and noise level under a particular load.
The temperature was measured using the Scythe Kaze Master Pro panel, the sensors of which were located on the radiators inside the block and at a distance of 1 cm in front of the fan (#1) and behind the outer wall (#2).
For fan speed results, a UNI-T UT372 non-contact tachometer was used. The maximum speed was fixed for each of the power supply testing modes.
It should be borne in mind that such a technique at this stage is far from ideal and will be supplemented and changed as it is used.
Test results
The obtained data are entered in the table. In brackets for voltage are percent deviations from the norm, for power consumption – the approximate net load on the power supply.
| GTX 770 | GTX 770 | GTX 295 (LGA1366) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mode | Idle | Burn, Game+LinX | Burn, OCCT |
| Power consumption, W | 50 (42) | 376 (320) | 720 (600) |
| Line +3.3V, V | 3,38 (+2,4) | 3,38 (+2,4) | 3,39 (+2,7) |
| Line +5V, V | 5,13(+2,6) | 5,18 (+3,6) | 5,16 (+3,2) |
| Line +12V1 (MB), V | 12,04 (+0,33) | 11,84 (–1,35) | 11,85 (–1,26) |
| Line +12V2 (CPU), V | 12,05 (+0,4) | 11,84 (–1,35) | 11,86 (–1,18) |
| Line +12V3 (VGA1), V | 12,05 (+0,4) | 11,82 (–1,5) | 11,80 (–1,7) |
| Line +12V4 (VGA2), V | – | – | – |
| Fan rotation speed, rpm | 890 | 915 | 1350 |
| Thermosensor No. 1 | 22,3 | 22,9 | 22,3 |
| Thermosensor #2 | 25,2 | 32,1 | 40,4 |
| Thermosensor No. 3 | 28,8 | 43,2 | 60,3 |
| Thermosensor No. 4 | 37,3 | 54,4 | 72,8 |
| Thermosensor No. 5 | 30,8 | 55,4 | 76,7 |
The CWT platform used in such power supplies has long been studied, so there is nothing surprising in the results. I am pleased with the slight drawdown along the + 12V line at a load of 600 watts, which does not even reach 2%. But for a voltage of +5 V, the indicator is overestimated by 3.6%.
conclusions
Affordable Chieftec power supplies tend to be aimed at undemanding users, and the reviewed ELP-700S of the Element series was no exception. A spartan package with a small number of cables is suitable for assembling a medium power system. The capabilities of the block will easily provide power to an overclocked processor and one powerful video adapter with several drives. The noise level, even under gaming load, is at an acceptable level, but lovers of silence will still have to look at quieter solutions. So, if the budget is very limited, then the ELP-700S will be a good choice, given its modest price of $55.
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