Super Flower Leadex Platinum 750 W: semi-fanless and fully-modular unit

Conclusion and evaluation

The Super Flower Leadex Platinum 750 W passed the combined and crossload testing in accordance with the ATX specification, so according to my evaluation methodology, it is deserving of an evaluation. This unit showed probably the best ripple suppression I have ever seen of all the rails but −12 V, which was not able to suppress ripple from the connected fan. The voltage regulation was very nice, mostly within ±2 %, but there are already slightly better units, and especially the stand-by rail voltage regulation is nothing spectacular. I should also mention the unit failed to meet ATX minimum for Power Good signal hold-up time.

And in this manner we can continue.  The unit is silent as long as the fan is off, but, when it finally does start, it is definitely audible in a silent room. So unless you take model with enough headroom to stay in passive operation, it is not entirely good for supersilent configurations. However, in a normal computer you will most likely not even notice it over other components.  The efficiency is somewhat lower, that may very well be because of the new UNI-T power meter. Or I could have made some mistake, anything is possible so until I have further results, I do not want to make any conclusions.

Otherwise, although the price is somewhat higher, the unit is equipped with high quality capacitors (besides few of the general purpose C(r)apXons on the cabling near the connectors). For that you get fully-modular unit with backlit connectors, semi-passive and covered by 5-year warranty from Super Flower. Once again, there is this but: While all these things seem to be nice, the competition is pressing very hard and what was nice last year, is not that great this year. Five years is already on the shorter side of warranties with EVGA units having as much as 10 years in the high-end segment. Corsair and Seasonic offer 7-year warranty and Seasonic has already announced increasing to a decade for new units.

So at the beginning of 2016, the Leadex Platinum 750 W is still a very decent unit, but there are other players to consider. Plus the availablity is fairly limited to mostly some European countries and eastern Asia. So lets have a look at the numbers.

The value of the Super Flower Leadex Platinum 750 W as a high-end unit is as follows:

• components used: 8.5 p. (− for thin wires, − for lack of golden-plating, + for molex unplugging clips, + for working OTP)
• built quality: −1 p. (− for solder balls and messy soldering, − for rubber sealing stuck in a heatsink)
• voltage regulation: 7 p. (− for combined loading, + for crossloading)
• ripple: 10.5 p. (− for combined loading, − for crossloading, + for low ripple on all main rails)
• efficiency: 12 p. (+ for higher efficiency)
• hold-up time: 5 p. (− for shorter voltage hold-up time)
• others: 12 p. (+ for modular cabling, + for backlight of modular connectors, + for extra equipment, + for semi-fanless operation, + for longer warranty)

We have the same results as with the Be Quiet! Dark Power Pro P11 550 W. In some areas it is better, in some areas it is worse, I still think the Bronze award is the right one for such value. The price per watt is better though.

Assuming the cost is 143 Eur (equals about 3900 CZK), then the price per value ratio would be 100×54/3900 = 1.38. So after six high-end units, we can see that the Super Flower Leadex Platinum 750 W is second in value, together with the Be Quiet! Dark Power Pro P11 550 W. However, considering the price per value ratio, it is better than the Be Quiet! unit.

Pros	+ all protections working + quality capacitors + fully modular cabling + longer warranty + OK efficiency + semi-fanless operation
Cons	− worse +5 V SB voltage regulation − worse ripple suppression of the −12 V rail − short hold-up time
Be aware of…	/?\ limited availability

Thanks

I thank the Caseking company for providing the Super Flower Leadex Platinum 750 W unit.

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