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Thermaltake Toughpower 1000Watt Power Supply Review
Author: Jim Manis
Published: Monday, September 22, 2008
The Look of One Kilowatt
The PSU is carefully encased in foam and a plastic bag to ensure it arrives looking as good as it did when it left the factory. The first thing I noticed is the color. In the information it states it comes with a Hi-Tech Black coating, although it appears to be more of a gold/brown color than black. In fact the black warranty void sticker only magnifies this. The psu does have a very nice finish and seems exceptionally well made. On the input end you will find a large lighted rocker switch and the standard honeycomb mesh.
Obvious at first glance is the 140mm fan (according to a few other sites it is a yates loon fan). And it does move a remarkable amount of air.
The cabling found on the Toughpower 1000w is done very nicely with decent quality black braiding and the customary heatshrink tubing applied nicely. There are also Ferrite chokes on all of the PCI-E cables just before the plug. Thermaltake also did a wonderful job in labeling each PCI-E power plug to help the end user properly distribute power.
Obvious at first glance is the 140mm fan (according to a few other sites it is a yates loon fan). And it does move a remarkable amount of air.
The cabling found on the Toughpower 1000w is done very nicely with decent quality black braiding and the customary heatshrink tubing applied nicely. There are also Ferrite chokes on all of the PCI-E cables just before the plug. Thermaltake also did a wonderful job in labeling each PCI-E power plug to help the end user properly distribute power.
Power Supply Issues
A couple things came up during testing that you should be made aware of. As you can see in the following pics the distance between the SATA and/ or Molex plugs seems unreasonably long. I am aware that a lot of pc companies have a similar spacing however I still see no reason for it. After several years of ATX case standards you would think that power supply cables would be created to match. The extra length is nice to have however does give your cable job that “not so clean” look.
The second issue is with flaking hotmelt glue. This glue, used to bundle the wires during sleeving has a nasty tendency to flake off and litter the case with tiny chunks of glue.
The second issue is with flaking hotmelt glue. This glue, used to bundle the wires during sleeving has a nasty tendency to flake off and litter the case with tiny chunks of glue.
The Thermaltake Toughpower 1000w has been certified for SLI. Especially interesting is the choice to include three 8-pin VGA power connectors as well as three 6-pin cords allowing Tri SLI 280's or even three 4870X2's which would be sextuple -fire (sex-fire sounds cooler). Rest assured this unit is designed for future upgrades. And with a five year warranty it should see you through several upgrade cycles.
* Drivers currently support a maximum of four GPU's for ATI. But during the projected life of this PSU who is to say that won't change.
* Drivers currently support a maximum of four GPU's for ATI. But during the projected life of this PSU who is to say that won't change.
