Enter our December 2007 Giveaway! We're giving away 14 prizes worth several hundred bucks! Enter HERE.
Statistics
Visitors: 942257
| Antec Phantom 350W Fanless PSU |
|
|
|
| Written by Mikhail Ivanenkov | |
| Monday, 18 June 2007 | |
|
Page 2 of 4
The presence of a voltage switch indicates that the Phantom uses passive, rather than active PFC. Briefly, PFC (power factor correction) is used to clean up mains waveforms. Almost all power supplies have at least passive PFC due to energy regulations. PSUs with no PFC have a PF value of 0.5-0.7. Those with passive PFC have values ranging from 0.6-0.8. Finally, active PFC models range from 0.9-0.99. However, active PFC, advertised as it is, generally does not make your power supply any more efficient or save you any money.
Unless you're working at a large company that's billed for both actual power and power factor, active PFC won't give you any advantage over passive. The difference between VA (voltage x amperes, how much is initially requested by the system) and wattage is this: VA is apparent power. Wattage is actual power. The difference (which makes up the PF ratio) is sent back as current, not power. While this can mess up mains waveforms, technically it doesn't waste any power, as claimed by various marketing. In terms of efficiency, since active PFC uses a secondary circuit it actually makes your power supply less efficient upwards of 10%.
|
|
| Last Updated ( Monday, 18 June 2007 ) |
