Antec HCP-850 Platinum

[testman78]

Introduction

I spend a lot of time reviewing, not surprising given that I'm a reviewer, and it can often get very tedious at times. But one thing that always cheers me up is high quality products that are a bit special and different to what I'm normally used to looking at Antec are one of those brands that always deliver high quality products that are a little bit special.Their power supplies are certainly no exception to that even though they employ other OEMs to produce the internals of their PSUs.The HCP-850 Platinum is quite a bit more than just another power supply, as it also comes with never seen before features and capabilities which will certainly trouble the competition and charm hardcore enthusiasts.This power supply is built to be the ultimate high-end gaming power supply, and comes with all the technologies we'd expect from such a unit.For starters, the unit is 80 Plus Platinum certified. Efficiency levels tower as high as 94 percent. In addition, it has a silent 135 mm fan, as well as 'stealth-wires' for minimal wiring visibility.12 V power is dealt with through four individual 12 V rails that can all operate at 100 percent capacity on a continuous basis. If more power is needed, the PSU has Antec's OC Link technology to allow two of these power supplies to operate together, doubling the effective power available to a single machine.The HCP 850 Platinum also comes with a fully modular cable design, and support for the upcoming 28-pin MBU connector for motherboards (to replace the 24-pin ATX connectors).



Before i proceed onto the rest of the review be sure to check out the product specifications below so you know what i am working with today:




Packaging & Contents

Packaging is well sealed, heavy with plenty of information about the product.Antec likes understated designs and the packaging of the HCP-850 power supply bears no exception.Despite it being one of the company's best products, the packaging is very simple, with virtually no artwork at all. What really matters though is the protection it can provide to the unit during transport, which is more than sufficient.



The features of the power supply are being listed on the similarly plain and dull black back side of the cardboard box, in 6 languages.



Connectors,features,rails and efficiency on the sides.



Both the PSU and the modular cables wrapped inside bags made out of fabric.



I emptied the contents of the bags.The Antec High Current Pro 850w is served in a bag, while on the other side are sent screws,OC Link cable,Velcro cable-wraps,power cable and a prospectus.The full manual is also available as a download from Antec's website.



The modular cables look individually sleeved when you first glimpse at them, these are however normal black coated cabled in a flat design.Yeah, modular designs are the way to go and I'm happy that the Antec High Current Pro 850w got that royal treatment as well. You use what you need in terms of wiring, keeping the innards clean and tidy, plain and simple.All cables detach from the power supply. During installation, this gives you the flexibility of using only the cables you need for a clean system build with optimal airflow.High Current Pro Platinum provides also a revolutionary 20+8-pin MBU socket for the needs of tomorrow. And, when its time to replace or upgrade your power supply, it can be removed from your system without interfering with your cabling the cables stay in place and connect to your new fully-modular Antec power supply.



There's enough connectors for this model, have a look at the supplied connectors, all with decent length by the way.




The Psu

Measuring 190mm x 150mm x 86mm.It ought to fit inside any ATX tower case save from really small and cheap ones but fitting it inside HTPC enclosures could prove to be a problem.



The Antec High Current Pro Platinum 850W is an attractively finished unit. Antec are using a thick "anti scratch" paint on the surface and it works extremely well.Negatively, it does attract fingerprints easily, but a quick wipe with a cloth removes these.



The letter "A" is clearly visible in the center point of the fan grill.I will take a closer look at the fan once i crack the unit open.



Aside from a decorative sticker with the company logo and the unit's series and power output, Antec also embossed their logo at the lowermost right corner of the chassis sides.



I found the sticker with the electrical specifications of the HCP-850 at the top side of the chassis, alongside a minor sticker with the model's revision and serial number.



Predictably, the front side of the High Current Platinum 850W unit is entirely perforated, for the warm air generated by the unit to escape to the exterior of the case. Antec placed a simple on/off switch next to the A/C cable plug and (yet another) sticker with the company logo printed on it.



Since the HCP-850 is a fully modular unit, the rear side of the power supply is littered with connectors for the modular cables. Antec also printed a simple legend which points out on which 12V line each connector is connected to. The Molex/SATA cable connectors and the motherboard connector are all being fed from the 12V1 line, with the other three lines being reserved for CPU and PCI Express cables only.



We can observe modular options, really simple but great stuff.



On the left side is the simple 2 pin OC link connector which lets the user connect two HCP-850′s together for parallel power.I can't imagine many people will need 1,700 watts, but the option is certainly welcomed.




A look Inside

Remove the cover and, from what i can gather, Antec uses Delta technology to power the HCP-850 supply. Layout is very clean and filtering is up to the high-end standard set by some of the recently-reviewed competition.



The filtering stage starts at the back of the A/C receptacle, with two Y capacitors and one X capacitor soldered directly on the terminals. This continues onto the main PCB with another four Y capacitors,one X capacitor, two chokes and a MOV.



Antec uses the now-popular DC-to-DC conversion for the minor lines. Masses of wiring, often present on 850W PSUs, is actually conspicuous by its absence.



Antec uses the PSU-maker's favourite: Nippon Chemi-Con primary caps that are rated to 450V, 390uF and at 105?C.



The APFC transistors and diode are installed on their own dedicated heatsink near the edge of the unit, while the primary side transistors are on another heatsink, closer to the huge transformer. The transformer itself is a little special, as it does voltage regulation on its own through transistors embedded inside the body.



The secondary side is so tightly packed with components, it is not even funny. The transistors forming the secondary side LLC type converter are on a heatsink next to the large transformer, after which heatsink a myriad of capacitors are forming a voltage regulation and filtering array.



All of the voltage regulation and the DC to DC circuits have been moved onto the two vertical PCBs which are sandwiched together over the main board. Instead of cables, Delta installed two thick metallic bars to connect the main PCB with the vertical boards, which are definitely better and more stable when having to deal with great currents.All the converter boards are mounted to the modular DC connector board.With this method there is more boosting efficiency and reducing current losses.



The 135mm dual ball bearing fan is from Delta (AFB1312M ).It provides 140 CFM, 48.5 dBA at 2800 RPM.



Here is the module front plate PCB.We can find some solid capacitors for filtering each line.



The overall layout, build quality and component selection appears to be excellent.




Test System

In order to review power supplies the right way i needed some key pieces of equipment. Briefly those pieces of equipment are shown below.



SunMoon SM-8800 SMPS ATE
CSI3710A Programmable DC load (+3.3V and +5V outputs)
CSI3711A Programmable DC load (+12V1, +12V2, +12V3, and +12V4)
Extech MultiMaster MM560 digital multimeter
Extech 380803 Power Analyzer
SkyTronic DSL 2 Digital Sound Level Meter (6-130dBa)
Oscium iMSO-104 signal oscilloscope
Oscium WiPry-Combo peak power meter and spectrum analyzer
Sperry DT-506 4 Channel Digital Thermometer
Powerstat Variable Autotransformer, 1.4 KVA, 0-140 VAC


Voltage Variance

All rails held close to nominal value, regardless of the demand.




Cross Load

The power supply exhibited no problems when dealing with my intensive Cross Loading test. It was tasked with 60A on the +12V rail and it held at 12.10V. The other rails delivered good results also.




AC Ripple

Can it get any better than this?Both +3.3V and +5V peak at 10 mV and +12V peaks at 25mV.




Efficiency

Very solid results generated by the Antec High Current Pro 850w Platinum Certified power supply, hitting 93.89 percent efficiency at 50 percent load. At full load the efficiency drops to just over 91.88% which is very strong.





Noise

I'd class the 135mm fan as very quiet at all loads below 450W. It begins to produce a low, consistent hum when running at 600W-plus, in-line with other high-end supplies. And, of course, if you do manage to pull near the capacity of the supply, which takes some doing, the noise from the other fans in the system are likely to drown out the supply's.




Temperature

Barely getting warm internally when pushing 100W and decent, if not outstanding, at 50 per cent and 100 per cent loads, the very fact that the supply is rated to produce huge outputs at a 50C ambient temperature means it's easily performing within specifications.




Conclusion

Based on an elegant design from Delta and boasting top-class internals and solid performance, it becomes yet another genuine contender in the ultra-premium segment of the market.As is the norm with modern PSUs, you can shunt the entire continuous power down the throat of the four 12V lines. Rated to perform to specification at a toasty 50C ambient temperature and imbued with the usual raft of protection technologies, there's really not much to dislike.The voltage regulation was well under 2% variance consistently at all load scenarios.The ripple and noise suppression was also exceptional showing the quality of the Delta platform this unit is based on. Efficiency was also right where we would expect it to be, at the 80 Plus Platinum level which is immensely impressive.I tested this power supply with a system comprising 16GB of 2,400mhz DDR3 memory, two AMD HD7970 graphics cards in Crossfire, and an overclocked Core i7 3960K with liquid cooling.The Antec HCP-850 Platinum was perfectly silent and rock solid throughout.



Straight away i can see that no this product is not cheap at all. It is hugely expensive for a power supply of its wattage though considering its 80 Plus Platinum certification.190 Euro's is a heck of an outlay for any consumer PSU, regardless of quality, but think of it as, say,27 Euro's a year over seven years - which is the length of the warranty - and the price becomes more agreeable.Do put it on a shortlist if your next PC takes in multiple high-end graphics cards and overclocked, over-volted CPU(s), because Antec's HCP-850 has power and performance to spare.It's a good bet for a genuinely high-end build.