Installation

     Installing the unit is very easy, however you need to ensure that your case will house such a PSU. My file server happens to be housed by a Chenming 601 Case. This particular series of case has a removable PSU adapter. You simply remove the adapter and use the mounting brackets that comes with the I-Star PSU. Once installed, all you have to do is hook up your power cables and you're done.
 

Testing

     For testing the I-Star TC-400R8A, I'll be using my file server that is based on the Iwill MPX2 dual Socket-A motherboard. This baby is loaded with multiple SCSI and IDE hard drives, SCSI and IDE RAID interface cards, CD burner...the list goes on. The power drain of this system alone is enough to kill a generic PSU.

     On first boot, I went straight for the health menu in the bios to see what the voltages were being measured at. Everything was pretty much dead on except for the all important +5v power rail. The +5v power rail is extremely important in order to maintain stability with an AMD system. With this PSU, I show a +5v of +4.82v. This is a much lower reading that I receive with my other AMD certified PSUs. Fortunately, the machine boots just fine and after two weeks of running the system, I have yet to have a problem.

Hot Swapping

     Being that this is a redundant power supply, the hot swappable feature is the most important part about this PSU. Testing this feature is pretty easy. I simply turned off one power supply unit and pulled it out. To my delight, nothing bad happened and the system kept on performing like a champ. I performed this test on each PSU several times and each time the secondary PSU took over and powered the system perfectly. No flickers, no crashes, no errors. Just flawless performance.

Conclusion

     After playing around with this PSU for a couple weeks, I would have to say that I'm very pleased with my investment. The PSU performs flawlessly and the hot swapping feature works perfectly. The only thing that you should be aware of is the +5v power rail. Although I did not experience any negative performance issues, this is something AMD owners should be cautious of. Intel owners have nothing to worry about what so ever.

     Overall, this redundant PSU was a wise choice for my file server. Of course the price is more than twice that of a standard PSU, but you have to remember the redundancy of  two power supplies is well worth the price when 24/7 uptime is a must. The only thing you should consider when purchasing this PSU is adding a third power supply unit so you have a spare on hand. Power supplies do not burn up very often, sometimes never, but it's best to be prepared.

Pros:

• Rugged construction

• Power Redundancy

• Hot Swappable

Cons:

• May not fit all standard cases

• Less than 5v on the +5v power rail