GlacialPower GP-PS550BP 550 Watt Power Supply

GlacialPower is a fairly new name in the power supply arena.  I've heard of them through their Igloo series of CPU coolers via the GlacialTech brand.  They assure me that their power supplies offer a great value to customers who purchase them.  Today, we take a look at the GP-PS550BP, a 550 Watt Power Supply.  After having seen so many fancy looking power supplies, this particular model is very plain, with its grey casing and unmeshed cables.    

Upon opening the box, you will find the manual, that offers enough information to install this power supply; a power cable and 4 screws. 

Here are some of the main features and specifications from the box:

The Power Supply:

The power supply features a metallic grey housing.

GlacialPower's Logo is imprinted into the casing

Looking at the side of the power supply, there is an GlacialPower label with their logo on it, the model number and a condensed specification list.  Note that there are two +12v rails, each supplying up to 18 Amps, which is good for peripherals requiring more power. It is also RoHS compliant. 

The rear (inside of case) features a  honeycomb style grille for exhausting air from the power supply via the 80mm fan on the back of the power supply. 

There is an 80mm fan, on/off switch and AC Power Input.  This power supply does not feature Active PFC, so there is a switch to select the input voltage.  Note that this switch was set to 230v instead of 115v during testing, so it did not switch on at first. 

This power supply features the following cables:

-A 24-pin ATX power connector with removable 4 pin for backwards 20-pin compatibility.

-A 4-pin CPU Power Connector

-2x  6-Pin PCI-Express Power Connectors

-5x Molex Power Connectors with a grip to allow easy removal from devices

-2x Serial ATA Power Connectors

-1x Floppy Power Connector

Cooling:

There is a 80mm fan on the back of this power supply.  During testing, at idle speeds, this fan is completely silent (not spinning at all), which is great for anyone looking to build a quiet system.  With loads, the fan constantly made whirring sounds, but it was not loud enough to be annoying.

Inside the Power Supply:

* Taking this power supply apart will void the warranty.

Inside the power supply, there are two T-shaped finned heat sinks that offer fins to cool down the voltage rectifiers.  There are also two transformers, one large and one one smaller transformer in the middle.  Two slim OST branded primary capacitors can be seen.  Note the large block that is attached to the frame.  This is the component that contributes to the Passive PFC properties of this power supply.

The fan inside is a Gale Motor fan , with a maximum draw of 0.36Amps.

Testing:

For this power supply, the test system consists of the following:

-Antec Nine Hundred Case

-AMD Opteron 165 Dual Core Socket 939 CPU @ 2.9 GHz (1.62v)

-ThermalTake Blue Orb II Heat Sink

-DFI LANParty nF4 SLI-D

-2GB of Corsair XMS Platinum PC3200 Memory

-320GB x 4(2)* Western Digital 16MB Cache Hard Drives

-2(1)**nVIDIA GeForce 8800GTS Video Cards @ 625MHz Core / 1000 MHz Memory

-Sound Blaster Live! 5.1 Digital Sound Card

-Sony 16x DVD-RAM / 18x Samsung DVD-RAM Drives

-3x 120MM fans, 1x 200mm fan

-2x CCFL Lights

*Only two Serial ATA power connectors are available on this power supply.

**System stability issues occur when trying to run in SLi Mode

(Multimeter Results)

*For additional / larger pictures of the GlacialPower 550 Watt, Click Here

*Voltages are at 'Max Load', running 3DMark06 CPU Test 1 and 2 / Deep Freeze HDR test, and read with a Multi-Meter.

The results are okay for this power supply. Everything ran fine during testing, although I was not able to use SLi, due to system instabilities; otherwise, the system was stable and performed the tests as expected.  The +12v voltages could have been better.  During the tests, the fan speed varied from completely off to a medium speed. When the system is idle or doing simple tasks, the fan is nearly or completely silent.  I was satisfied with the noise characteristics during the testing. Installation of this power supply was easy.  Overall, the GlacialPower GP-PS550BP 550 Watt offers a great value.  The intelligent fan controller keeps this power supply silent when doing non system intensive tasks and fairly quiet when under load.  There is a lack of power connectors though.  With only 2 Serial ATA and 5 Molex connectors, users are limited as to what peripherals they can add to their systems.

Pros +

-Good power output

-Silent / Quiet Fan

-Good Price (~$65)

Cons -

-High end users may want more power than 550 Watts

-Only 2 Serial ATA and 5 Molex Connectors

-No 8-pin EPS CPU Power Connector

-Cables do not have sleeving (only the 24 pin motherboard connector)

Techaddicts.net would like to give this power supply a 8 out of 10 rating

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