Being a enthusiast it's often quite hard to to get excited about the more 'mainstream' components. However, when presented with a power supply that manages to hold its own under the strain of the OC3D PSU testing arsenal it's difficult not to find yourself in admiration of the device. And admire the ECO80+ 350W we did!

 

Not only did the ECO80+ manage to hold rock solid voltages across all of our standard tests, but when pushed to its absolute limits with a load of almost 450W (just before OCP kicked in) it refused to show signs of being beaten. This is certainly better than the Silverstone Strider 350w unit we began testing earlier in the week, which died during a trial run of our MAX load tests before OCP could kick in and save it.

 

Putting each of the rails under even closer scrutiny on the oscilloscope further revealed that ripple was also very much in check with the +3.3v and +5v rails rarely shifting outside of 20mV and the +12v rail only hitting 52mV in Test 7. Simply awesome.

 

The ECO80+ also managed to live up to its name by holding 80%+ efficiency under almost all loads, with the average efficiency being closer to 85%. Only in Test 5 when the unit was placed under a heavily unbalanced crossload did efficiency drop to 79%, but as we've said in the past; it's highly unlikely that the average user would ever be able to replicate these tests in an ordinary PC system.

 

For some people looks also play an important factor when purchasing a new PSU, and Enermax certainly have this covered too.  The ECO80+ 350w could have easily been yet another black box with nothing to distinguish it from any other unit on the market, but instead Enermax have gone all-out with an attractive slate grey powedercoat finish, trademark gold fan grill and of course the awesome looking 120mm Magma Twister fan. Unfortunately we can't really comment on the noise levels of the unit as the testing equipment tends to produce quite a din. But with our ears to the unit while running at full load, it certainly appeared to be whisper quiet.

 

Unfortunately the Enermax ECO80+ 350w is not currently stocked by any retailers in the UK at the time of writing, but Enermax do tell us that a UK distributor (C&J Computers) does have stock and that the RRP is currently set at £45.99. With any luck we will see these hitting the shops shortly.

 

- Excellent voltage stability - even when running at 448w!

- Great looks, especially thanks to the Magma fan.

- Decent efficiency levels.

- Silent operation (as far as we could tell).

- Great ripple results.

 

- 24 Pin ATX cable would have been better as a 20+4 Pin.

- Some cables not sleeved all the way to the ends.

- +12v rail in crossload results a little unruly.

 

- Absolutely nothing.

 

 

  

 

Thanks to Enermax for sending in the ECO80+ for review. Discuss this review in our forums.