Seasonic, Silverstone, Asus, and Thermaltake ATX 3.0 power supplies are ready for prime time in capacities ranging from 750W up to 1,650W for the most demanding graphics cards.
With next-gen GPUs right around the corner, PSU manufacturers are scrambling to release their products featuring the (in)famous 16-pin VHPWR connector and its 600W power rating. While AMD seems to be keeping the trusty 6+2-pin connectors, Nvidia is all about this new format on upcoming RTX cards. This will allow Nvidia GPUs to be powered with only one cable unless they go beyond 600W consumption, which seems to not be the case according to the latest rumours.
While these PSUs are most likely going to cost a pretty penny, as long as they keep working decently for, say, five to 10 years, then price shouldn’t be a concern – we can call it an investment. Furthermore, with upcoming GPUs’ rumoured higher transient load, PSUs will have to cope with high power spikes during short durations – if not able to, your computer will shut down. Best case you just turn it back on and continue gaming, but if you get unlucky, you could lose your progression, corrupt Windows files, or even lose any data still in cache.
Seasonic Vertex
Starting with the Vertex series from Seasonic, we are in front of 1,000W and 1,200W capacity PSUs, each available with 80 Plus Gold or Platinum certifications. All are fully modular featuring a single 16-pin VHPWR alongside two PCIe 6+2-pin and two 8-pin CPU power connectors.
@harukaze5719 on Twitter has published screenshots of a retailer asking for $243 for the 1,000W Gold, $271 for the 1,000W Platinum, $281 for the 1,200W Gold, and finally $319 for the 1,200W Platinum.
Silverstone Hela
Next we have the Hela 850R from Silverstone, a comparably smaller PSU with ‘only’ 850W maximum power output, yet also featuring a 16-pin VHPWR connector capable of delivering 600W to a graphics card. That’s 70 per cent of total power delivered via a single cable. It also has three 6+2-pin GPU power connectors plus two 8-pin for the CPU.
While 850W may sound small, its Cybernetics Platinum certification is surely not, indicating that it has passed (among others) Cybernetics’ transient power tests. The Hela 850R is also rated at 89 to 91 per cent efficiency at 230V. For cooling, you can choose to activate a 0dB mode which keeps the 135mm fan off until reaching 50 per cent load.
Asus ROG Loki
Available in 1,200W, 1,000W, 850W, and 750W variants the ROG Loki series should provide a lot of power in a smaller SFX-L format – for SFF builds. All models are fully modular and include a single 16-pin VHPWR connector alongside three CPU/GPU 8-pin. Efficiency-wise, the 1,200W model is rated at 80 Plus Titanium whereas the rest achieves a lower, but still good, 80 Plus Platinum.
Backed by a 10-year warranty, Loki PSUs are priced at 11,930 PHP (£180), 13,420 PHP (£202), and 15,650 PHP (£236) for the 750W, 850W, and 1,000W variants, respectively, in the Philippines.
Thermaltake Toughpower GF3
First announced during Thermaltake’s Expo, Toughpower GF3 PSU will be offered in 750W, 850W, 1,000W, 1,200W, 1,350W, and a massive 1,650W capacity, all certified 80 Plus Gold. The latter carries two 16-pin VHPWR connectors, whereas the rest are limited to only one. These PSUs use a single 12V rail and are cooled by a 135mm or 140mm semi-passive fan, backed by a 10-year warranty.
Finally, inside we find Japanese capacitors as well as an LLC design with a DC-to-DC converter. The brand also talks about a strict voltage regulation of around three per cent, with less than 30mV of ripple noise.
For a detailed look at the connectors’ layout see the table below:
| 750W | 850W | 1,000W | 1,200W | 1,300W | 1,650W | |
| ATX 20+4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| EPS 4+4 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 2 |
| PCIe 6+2 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 9 |
| PCIe 16-pin (VHPWR) | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| SATA | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 12 | 16 |
| Molex | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 8 |
| Floppy | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
