PC cooling specialist Noctua has simply revealed a brand new PC energy provide that it’s designed in collaboration with Seasonic. The brand new Seasonic Prime TX-1600 Noctua Version is clad within the distinctive brown, beige, and black tones related to the Noctua model, and the corporate additionally says it specifically designed the grill to scale back noise even additional. You’ll want deep pockets, although, as the value is a large $569, $20 greater than the coveted Steam Deck OLED.
That is about as premium as you may get within the PC PSU world, and the specs are definitely up there with the perfect energy provide fashions we’ve seen. The Seasonic Prime TX-1600 Noctua Version is rated at 1,600W, and likewise sports activities the 80 Plus Titanium badge, which means its effectivity sits at 90% or above at any load, from 10% to 100%. Maybe extra importantly, Seasonic and Noctua have particularly designed this PSU for “silence,” and on this case that doesn’t seem like hyperbole.
In response to the 2 firms, the totally modular PSU’s semi-passive fan management system means the equipped Noctua NF-A12x25 fan received’t even spin up till the PSU goes over 50% load at regular working temperatures (+/-25°C).
Put this PSU in a PC with elements that received’t draw greater than 800W, and also you’ll have a silent PSU for probably the most half, even when gaming. In our assessments, even a power-hungry Core i9 14900K system taking part in video games on an Nvidia RTX 4080 solely attracts 557W at peak load, in order that’s loads of headroom.
There’s nonetheless loads of energy on faucet for individuals who need it, although, with two 16-pin PCIe 5.0 connectors for the newest graphics playing cards, such because the forthcoming Nvidia RTX 5000 sequence. The all-important 12V rail (the one which powers your CPU and GPU) additionally has a large 133.33A present score, which is sufficient to energy a ridiculous degree of PC energy.
So what’s Noctua’s position in all this? Firstly, you get an outstanding 120mm Noctua NF-A12x25 contained in the unit, which is without doubt one of the finest PC followers you should buy proper now.
Nevertheless, Noctua has additionally actually gone to city on the design of the grill that covers the fan, which it claims can “allow it to run ~8-10dB(A) quieter than the already quiet commonplace mannequin” of this Seasonic PSU, and backed up this declare with graphs of its take a look at outcomes. This grill, says Noctua, has been “engineered and optimized to make sure as easy as potential strain gradients when the blades of the NF-A12x25 fan go the struts of the grill.”
The corporate expands on this by saying that “the grill’s radial struts are angled and swept in opposition to the sense of rotation of the fan and the sweep of its blades, which helps to keep away from conditions the place the main edges of the fan blades are parallel or nearly parallel to the grill struts.” This, says Noctua, “would trigger a high-pressure pulse adopted by a sudden drop in strain when the blade strikes out of the overlapping place.”
In the meantime, the entire package deal comes with a full set of individually sleeved cables clad within the basic Noctua black and brown colour scheme. It’s an enormous unit, although, measuring 210 x 150 x 86 mm, so that you’ll have to be sure to have room in your case for it.
Noctua is making some daring claims for a fan grill, but it surely’s additionally demonstrated that it is aware of what it’s doing with cooling and airflow, and we’ve been impressed by the corporate’s cooling merchandise previously. If you wish to see why, take a look at our Noctua NH-D15 overview, the place we had been struck by this cooler’s very good construct high quality, wonderful cooling, and low-noise operation, incomes on the high place on our greatest CPU cooler shopping for information.
