Sparkle Gold Class Series 80 Plus ATX 750 Watt Power Supply Review

Up for review today I’ve got a power supply from Sparkle, it’s their Gold Class Series that features 80 Plus certification. This power supply is their top of the line model, and rightly so as it comes with more than enough power to handle most any system. It features plenty of connections so you’ll have more than enough for your needs. It has a large and quiet 13.9cm fan to help keep it cool even under the toughest loads. Read on to learn more…

 

Tech Specs,Features or the Basic Info:

SPARKLE SCC-750AF GOLD CLASS SERIES 80PLUS 750W ATX POWER SUPPLY

Features:

-750W Modular Power Supply

-80 Plus Gold Certified

-Double Ball Bearing Fan

-All connector AU coating to keep Ultra high efficiency

-Full Thermal Control with super silent fan

-12V peak at 70A

-Temperature control design mode

-Active PFC design

-Keep PSU fan running for 5-10 seconds after shut down to dissipate the remaining system heat and prolonging system lifetime.

-Ultra-quiet 13.9cm Fan with intelligent RPM control guarantees cool performance and silent operation.

-99.9% 12V Power

-SYNC Transformer Array

-Double main electrolytic capacitors

-DC to DC circuitry design with solid capacitors

-Forward Safe Guard Circuitry Design

-Dual Layer main PCB 1.6mm thickness

-Quardruple 12V Rails

-100A Mosfet 12V Rectifiers

-20k µF low ESR secondary 105℃ electrolytic capacitors

-Triple AC EMC Filtering stage

-Dual capacitors design to protect system safety when sudden shut down

Specs:

Series: Gold Class Series

Intel Specification: ATX12V / EPS12V

Energy Efficiency: 80Plus Gold

Modular Cabling: Yes

Fan: 139mm Fan

Fan Type: Double Ball Bearing

+12V Rail: 4

AC Input Range: Full Range: 100~240Vac

Frequency: 50/60Hz

Input Current: 10-5A

+5V: 30A

+3.3V: 24A

+12V1: 16A

+12V2: 16A

+12V3: 16A

+12V4: 18A

-12V: 0.5A

+5VSB: 3A

Total Power: 750W

24P Mainboard Connector: X 1

4+4P CPU +12V Connector: X 1

6+2P PCI-E Connector: X 4

SATA Connector: X 9 (Max.)

4P Molex Connector: X 9 (Max.)

4P FDD Connector: X 3 (Max.)

Dimension: 175mm X 150mm X 86mm

Price: $139.99 (from NewEgg at time of review)

 

A Better Look at Things:

The Sparkle power supply comes in a nice looking box.

When you open it you’ll be greeted with a folder containing user manual, warranty and the 80 Plus Gold Certificate.

 

Beneath the folder are two boxes, one big and one small, and the power supply wrapped in a cloth bag. It’s nice looking presentation.

In the smaller box you’ll find a rather thick power cord, screws and a bag of Velcro fasteners instead of zip ties. I like the Velcro much better as it is reusable.

In the larger box you’ll find a black bag which contains all of the cables for the power supply.

 

The connectors are:

24P Mainboard Connector: X 1

4+4P CPU +12V Connector: X 1

6+2P PCI-E Connector: X 4

SATA Connector: X 9

Molex Connector: X 9

FDD Connector: X 3

This power supply is advertised as modular and for the most part it is but then it isn’t as it does have the main and CPU power hard wired into the unit. So it’s not 100% modular and from what I’ve learned modular can mean different things to different companies.

The PSU has a big 13.9cm purple fan in it for cooling. The look of the PSU is pretty good, it’s a bronze color.

 

On one side the Sparkle logo and on the other you’ll see the standard specs label.

 

On the back you’ll see the now common honeycomb style ventilation with power connection and a nice large main power switch. This is something I like, the large switch; I hate PSUs with those tiny switches on them.

Here are all of the connections with a little diagram to let you know which is for what.

 

Installation, Testing and Comparison:

It’s a mostly modular power supply so installation is easy and being modular it does help keep your case clean and free of lots of wires. One thing I like about modular is that you don’t have to try to hide the extra wires somewhere in your case.

The one thing I can’t understand is why each set of Moles cables has to have a floppy connection on it? I don’t think they’re all needed. In some cases you might need more than one, but it’s highly doubtful really.

The system I’m using is a Core i5 based one with dual ATI 4870 video cards.

For load and testing I used OCCT 4.0 which is a good way to test your PSU and get some nice graphs. I’ve got three graphs for you that show the voltages and the CPU load at the same time during testing.

+12 VDC ±5% (±0.60 V) +11.40 V to +12.60 V

+3.3 VDC ±5% (±0.165 V) +3.135 V to +3.465 V

+5 VDC ±5% (±0.25 V) +4.75 V to +5.25 V

Essentially you want your rails to be within certain tolerances, about 5% plus or minus or a 10% total fluctuation. For example the 12v rail should be between +11.40 V to +12.60 V when working properly. If it’s not between those voltages then there’s obviously a problem with the power supply.

So here are the graphs for you starting with the 12v line:

It looks like a lot of difference between the fluctuations but the graph goes in small increments, the voltages never get near the tolerance levels. Still though there is a quite a bit of fluctuations, it’s not exactly what I would call stable.

The next chart is the 5v line and this one looks a lot more stable until there’s no load, which is odd.

Here again we can see the voltages never get close to the acceptable tolerances.

Finally is the 3.3v graph for you.

This one is much more stable than the 12v but not nearly as the 5v rail, but it only jumps around slightly. The voltages here again never even approach the tolerances of the rail.

 

Summary and Comments:

For the most part this power supply works very well, it’s quiet and it’s well made and it performs well within tolerances. The voltages though aren’t exactly stable, but I’m not too worried about it as it’s the voltages we should focus on and those are decent.

The Sparkle PSU is modular which makes for a cleaner looking system with less clutter. There are more than enough connections for even the largest system I think.

 

Pros:

+Lots of connections

+Quiet fan

+Long cables

+Includes Velcro cable ties

+Runs within tolerances

 

Cons:

-Not quite stable running