Giuseppe Parrello

 

Corsair RM850i - Review


Review

I purchased the Corsair RM850i power supply to replace an old Coolermaster Silent Pro M600 that has served me for at least 6 years and that unfortunately was suffering from "coil whine" problems (for this reason I also had to change the damaged computer motherboard).
Purchased for just 150 euros, it was delivered to me after 7 days with the Amazon package. Inside that I found the original Corsair box. Opening it, I found the power supply, an electric cable with schuko plug, and a black pouch containing all the cables - the power supply is completely modular, so you will use only the cables necessary to power the various parts of the computer (motherboard, disk drives, and so on). Once I have removed everything from the box, I have put the box in a safe place, I will need it for the 10 (ten) years warranty.
The power supply is slightly deeper than my previous power supply (180 mm instead of 150 mm), occupying the space reserved for a 12 cm fan on my case right at the power supply.
I tried this power supply with a power supply tester without any problems. Since the fan was off, I tried to press the button on the power supply dedicated to the fan testing, and the fan started working.
After testing the power supply, I mounted it inside the computer. I noticed, during the assembly, that the 24-pin connector of the motherboard has the connectors very hard to be inserted and I had to push it on the motherboard and I had to work a little to trigger the safety lever that holds the connector. Instead, it was simpler to insert the 8-pin cable connector on the motherboard and the sata/molex cable connectors. The above-mentioned 24-pin + 8-pin cables (but also PCI express cables) are sleeved because they contain electronic components in order to reduce electrical noise. Unfortunately, these cables are heavy and you need to be more creative especially in those cases that do not have cable holders, as in my case.
Once the computer is powered on, I have installed the "Corsair Link" software version 4.2.3.41 after downloading it from the Corsair website. The software allows monitoring the fans and temperature sensors of the motherboard, of the disk drives and the graphics card, but mainly monitoring the temperature of the power supply and of its fan.
The fan can always be switched off or you can set a fixed speed in percentage, the minimum percentage is 40%, corresponding to just over 700 rpms, the maximum is 100%, corresponding to just 1500 rpms. At this speed I noticed, in addition to a very excessive fan noise, also the occasional metallic vibration presumably coming from the fan cover grid. In any case, I guarantee that already at 60% the fan is noisy, especially if the computer is very quiet - in my computer I have only the CPU fan that runs normally at 600 rpm.
Obviously in zero rpms mode, the fan will not always be turned off. Depending on the internal temperature but mainly depending on the electric load of the power supply, the fan will be activated and will turn faster. In my case since the load is very low (rarely reaches 250 watts), the fan always remained off.
In the "Corsair Link" program there is the possibility to create profiles, useful if you want to switch from one profile with zero rpms fan to another with a percentage number fan.
In the rear side, together with the cable connectors, there are the connectors for the "Corsair Link" (with a USB cable that must be inserted in the internal USB connector of the motherboard), a button for the fan test (the fan is operative until this key remains pressed), and finally a led that is normally green, if there is a "Corsair Link" connection, it is yellow if the computer is reading the data via "Corsair Link", or it is off if there is not no connection to the "Corsair Link".
I would like to point out that not only the "Corsair Link" program reads the data from the power supply. For example, with some software, such as "Sisoft Sandra" or "FinalWire Aida64", I have seen some data from the power supply, usually the fan and the internal temperature, but also the voltages and even the total power consumed by the power supply. Just check the flashing of the power supply led, if the led turns orange intermittent then the software is reading the data of the power supply.
So far, after a week of use, I have not had any particular problems with this power supply, I confirm what has been written by many Internet sites, this power supply is one of the best, a safe investment, with ten years warranty. Despite a high price, I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to own an excellent power supply and to anyone looking for quality and reliability over time.


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