ocaholic - PSUs > be quiet! Dark Power Pro 11 1200W Review

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Preview

Page 2 - Preview

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Delivery and Specifications

With the be quiet! Dark Power Pro 11 1200Watt you get a partially modular power supply. Only the main ATX cord is not separate in the delivery.

Cables
Cable	Length
1 x ATX 20+4 pin	60 cm
1 x EPS/ATX 12V 8Pin pin	70 cm
1 x EPS/ATX 12V 4+4Pin pin	70 cm
3 x PCI-E 2 x 6+2 pin	60 cm
1 x PCI-E 6 Pin	60 cm
1 x SATA, SATA, HDD, HDD, FDD	60, 75, 90, 105, 120 cm
2 x SATA, SATA, SATA	60, 75, 90 cm
1 x HDD, HDD, HDD	60, 75, 90 cm
1 x HDD, HDD, FDD	60, 75, 90 cm
4 x Fan Cable	60 cm
1 x Overclocking Key	60 cm
1 x Overclocking Key Jumper

In total there are no less than seven PCIe connectors, which is adequate for a 1200Watt power supply. One could argue, that a 1200Watt unit should also be capable of powering up to four graphics cards, but this highly depends on what kind of graphics cards you’re using, since with four cards you could easily pull more than 1200 Watt from the unit. Apart from the many PCIe connectors, eight SATA devices can be attached and there are six more Molex connectors. With this unit be quiet! is also addressing overclockers. Using the bundled Overclocking Key and Overclocking Jumper it is possible to switch from multi rail to single rail. Especially if you’re planning on extreme overclocking graphics cards you will be happy about this feature, since under extreme conditions graphics card do need Amps en masse.

Specifications
Voltage	Current	Power
+ 3.3 V	25 A	150 Watt	1200 Watt (Total)
+ 5.0 V	25 A	150 Watt
+ 12 V1	35 A	1188 Watt
+ 12 V2	35 A
+ 12 V3	45 A
+ 12 V4	45 A
- 12 V	0.5 A	6 Watt
+ 5 Vsb	3.0 A	15 Watt

The P11-1200W has been 80Plus Platinum certified. This means, that the efficiency of this PSU should be above 90% at 20% load, above 92% at 50% load and above 89% at 100% load.

At this point the feature list:

80Plus Platinum
OVP, UVP, OCP, SCP, OPP, OTP
Dimensions (L x W x D): 193 mm x 150 mm x 86 mm
Warranty: 5 Years

Page 3 - Delivery / Specs

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A Look Inside

Compared to the predecessor series – Dark Power Pro 10 – be quiet! visibly increased the quality of an already very high-end power supply. This already implies of what quality this Dark Power Pro 11 unit must be. A closer look at the internals shows that the design appears to come from FSP. Be quiet! is using a platform that features a Full-Bridge LLC SR DC/DC implementation. Perfectly in line with the high standards used in the unit are the all Japanese capacitors. On the primary side there are two huge Nippon Chemi Con caps, which have been rated for 470uF at 420V and 105°C. Apart from that there are plastic caps, which help to further reduce signal noise.

Another thing that quickly caught our attention was the number of daughter boards, which can be found with this unit. In total there are no less than eight. Having a detailed look at those we find one for the cable management, on for all the protections, another one for the fan control, one for LLC conversion, one handling -12V current, one for DC/DC conversion of 3.3V and 5V as well as another one for LLC without conversion.

After having read these paragraphs it’s almost self-evident that also soldering quality had to be done according to highest quality standards, which is apparently the case. Overall the internals of this unit are close to perfection.

Page 4 - A Look Inside

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Result Analysis and Discussion

Efficiency 115V
Load	Pin(W)	Pout(W)	Efficiency
10 %	136.27	119.67	87.82 %
20 %	261.91	239.86	91.58 %
50 %	643.00	599.02	93.16 %
100 %	1302.90	1194.00	91.71 %

The 80Plus Platinum certification requirements (90% - 92% - 89%) are surpassed especially at 20% Load. At 100% load the efficiency scores a remarkable 91.71%.

Output Stability - Crossload
Load	Rail	Loading(A)	Output(V)
10 %	5V	1.60	5.054
	3.3V	1.60	3.385
	12V1	1.91	12.023
	12V2	2.46	12.026
	12V3	1.91	12.027
	12V4	2.46	12.026

20 %	5V	3.19	5.048
	3.3V	3.19	3.135
	12V1	3.82	12.012
	12V2	4.92	12.018
	12V3	3.82	12.018
	12V4	4.92	12.019

50 %	5V	7.98	5.023
	3.3V	7.98	3.355
	12V1	9.56	11.976
	12V2	12.29	11.994
	12V3	9.56	11.992
	12V4	12.29	11.997

100 %	5V	15.96	4.986
	3.3V	15.96	3.317
	12V1	19.12	11.400
	12V2	24.59	11.400
	12V3	19.12	11.400
	12V4	24.59	11.400

Noise
Load
20 %	inaudible
50 %	silent
100 %	audible

Voltage regulation of this PSU is very good. It makes use of a DC-DC approach, which means, that the 12 Volt rail is being used to generate 5 and 3.3V. This is a very modern approach, and since the Load is mainly on 12V it makes a lot of sense. Like most PSU, which use this topology, the voltage regulation and crossload testing does not present a problem.

Noise/Ripple
Voltage	Noise/Ripple Vpp
100%
5V	0.025
12V	0.032
3.3V	0.019

50%
5V	0.018
12V	0.029
3.3V	0.013

20%
5V	0.014
12V	0.038
3.3V	0.015

10%
5V	0.013
12V	0.034
3.3V	0.009

The noise/ripple values you can see here come from a Chroma test report, which was provided by the manufacturer. The noise values are good and apparently they're all within the norms.

Page 5 - Result Analysis and Discussion

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Conclusion

With the Dark Power Pro 11 1200Watt be quiet! has an absolute high-quality power supply in its portfolio, which is being sold at 289 Euro or 279 USD in the States. One thing is clear already, this is no cheap unit, but you do get a lot for your money, since this power supply is built according to today’s state-of-the-art. Checking connectivity we find plenty of cords in the delivery, which actually makes this a versatile unit. A look at the efficiency reveals that the 80Plus Platinum guidelines are surpassed especially at 20 percent load. This implies that build quality as well as the DC-output signal quality are on a very high level. Apart from its internals we also like the casing be quiet! has put together for their new Dark Power Pro 11 series. This unit looks simply gorgeous and we’re quite sure we’re going to find it in a few modding projects in future.
If you’re planning on buying this unit to use it for extreme overclocking you’re very happy to hear that it’s possible to switch between multi rails and single rail. Especially highly overclocked graphics cards will need loads of amps and a multi rail design most likely runs into over current protection way to early.

Overall the be quiet! Dark Power Pro 11 1200Watt is an excellent power supply and we like to thank be quite! for having made such a high-end power supply.

The be quiet! Dark Power Pro 11 1200Watt receives 5 out of 5 stars.