I-Star TC-620PD3 Power Supply Review

      When you look at a power supply these days you need to think about what components you will be putting into your system.  The current dual core offerings from AMD and Intel consume higher wattages, that coupled with a high end video card or SLI/Crossfire setup and you have the makings for a power hungry system which will be the kiss of death for lower wattage units.  Lets take a look at I-Star's 620 watt PD3 unit and see how it stacks up.

     Nice clean looking unit, I just love the ones with 120mm fans!  They move plenty of air and are near silent.  The unit feels solidly built.  It comes SLI/CrossFire ready with the extra 12 volt rail.  It comes with connectors for molex and SATA devices as well as the ever present floppy connector.  The main plug can accommodate the 20 and 24 pin connector without a cheesy cable adapter.

Specifications

Output

Specs look beefy enough, how will the stand up to real use?  Let't take a look.

     I first installed the TC-620PD3 as part of my review for the I-Star S8 Storm seen here.  To really push this power supply we will need a bit more of a gaming PC.

The Install:

     The test system is a Gigabyte GA-K8N Pro-SLI motherboard running 2GB of Kingston Value ram.  The CPU is a SanDiego core 3700 AMD 64 with a Thermaltake SI-97A.  Rounding it out is a PowerColor X1900XTX video card and a Western Digital 150GB disk drive.  After a run using the nTune system stability test for 10 minutes to place the load on the system we see how this unit performed. 

     The idle numbers look right on the mark and comparing them with the bios readings shows that they are accurate.  Everything looks good, the only thing I would raise an eye over would be the +5 readings, but looking at the current and averages, they seem to be reasonable enough.  Of course I will attach the disclaimer that software monitoring is at the mercy of the sensors on the board and how the system interprets them, so I'm not overly concerned. 

Conclusion

     I-Star brings a solid performer to the table with this unit, the 120mm cooling fan performed as expected with very low noise.  The factory sleeving on the cables is a nice touch.  The voltage readings were within the 2.0 spec and I'm sure applying a voltmeter to them would prove this true as well.  Still, the design is nothing out of the ordinary which explains the low marks on innovation.  It would have been nice to have modular cables, especially when it comes in at $169 retail.  Still a very solid unit with plenty of juice for power hungry systems.