View Poll Results: What Premium is fair for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular

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  • Over £15

    8 15.69%
  • About £10

    21 41.18%
  • Around £5

    10 19.61%
  • Nothing, I either don't see the need or dont feel I should pay

    12 23.53%
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Thread: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

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    How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Lo people

    The ability to unplug some of the power leads that you dont need from a PSU is often quite as good thing

    So.. what price premium do you put upon this feature?

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Nothing.

    I just cable-tie unused leads out of the way.

    Besides, I'm a believer in not putting unnecessary connectors into leads. It introduces an extra point of failure, leaves you entirely dependent on the quality of the connectors and is certainly an extra source of possible poor contact.

    Personally, I'd be more inclined to pay extra for a non-modular if they cost more (though I'd be furious if they did) than to pay extra for a "feature" that, to me, is a disadvantage.

    I think they're a con, and a gimmick, and you'll find me buying one shortly after you'll see me buying aftermarket fans with LED lights ..... which will be an eon or two after hell freezes over. I'm more likely to buy aftermarket fans without LED lights to get rid of the stupid blue things in my current case, and about the only thing stopping me is that I can't be bothered to strip it down to do it, daft though it makes it look.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    I custom built my case with a compartment to hide unused cables:

    http://www.cpcff.co.uk/phpBB2/viewto...p?f=62&t=20051

    Excuse the LED fans Saracen I'd definately have it as a feature on the next PSU I buy, the only reason I wouldn't go modular is if I was buying a cheapo PSU, which is daft anyways. It is a purely asthetic thing though unless you're short of space, for airflow reasons.

    e.g. an HTPC case where you want a full size power supply, or an mATX case same reason. Seeing as you can buy a good 500w modular PSU these days for £50 it's worth a look.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Depends really, if it was a cheap PSU (sub £50) then £5, but it if was an expensive PSU (£100+) then I'd pay £15+

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Usually prices hit me at absolute terms instead of relative so I'd usually pay around £10 more. To me, modular cables are a godsend as PSUs nowadays have so many unnecessary connectors; e.g. I don't need 10 molex connectors and 8 SATA connectors nor do I need 4x PCI-E connectors.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Depends on what you're using it for. I've found it quite useful for my HTPC just to keep the cable clutter down but my main PC doesn't really benefit from it as there's room to stash the cables above the PSU and top 5.25" bay. I don't think it's worth more than £5-10 extra and in my case (no pun intended) it was no more than £5.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Not more than a tenner.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Im with Saracen here, most cases have plenty of space to tuck away unnecessary cables. The modular connectors are just another possible failure point. Also it is really easy to lose the modular cables, you can't lose them if they're attached to the psu

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    I'd pay somewhere in the region of 25-30% more.
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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    I don't agree with Saracen here, I do agree with malfunction though.
    It depends.

    It depends on the case you are using and the psu you are using.
    Some cases don't have much room to hide cables away and a modular psu is of far more benefit.
    Some psu's have far longer and far more cables than others and a modular psu can be far easier to manage.
    Modular connections do add an additional join which can be bad depending on the connection, this will be less of an issue on a higher build quality psu than a lower build quality psu.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Agreed with Saracen. PSUs have gone beyond stupid in design. I also prefer PSUs with 2 80mm fans in a push/pull arrangement to provide some additional redundancy and direct airflow. Modular connectors in particular are silly, they only serve to increase resistance and dirty the power supply.

    I also highly dislike the tendency of chassis manufacturers to place the power supply at the bottom of the case which has forced PSU manufacturers to lengthen the CPU's 12v cables, again, increasing resistance and only serving to disrupt power.

    All of this is creating bizarre airflow patterns in the case.
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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Quote Originally Posted by aidanjt View Post
    Agreed with Saracen. PSUs have gone beyond stupid in design. I also prefer PSUs with 2 80mm fans in a push/pull arrangement to provide some additional redundancy. Modular connectors in particular are silly, they only serve to increase resistance and dirty the power supply.

    I also highly dislike the tendency of chassis manufacturers to place the power supply at the bottom of the case which has forced PSU manufacturers to lengthen the CPU's 12v cables, again, increasing resistance and only serving to disrupt power.
    But the additional few inches of cable or additional connector adds a tiny amount of resistance, hardly noticable in the grand scheme of things. Just seems like a poor excuse not to like modular power supplies.

    80mm fans aren't as efficent as a 120mm fan, and also louder, so why bother with that?

    Whoever said they lose modular cables, clearly doesn't look after their belongings...

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Personally I wonder how many people have had PCs built for them using modular PSUs and them never being given the spares

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Quote Originally Posted by PeterStoba View Post
    But the additional few inches of cable or additional connector adds a tiny amount of resistance, hardly noticable in the grand scheme of things. Just seems like a poor excuse not to like modular power supplies.
    Actually, energy loss and noise induction of direct current is rather high, it's even worse when there's a additional and unnecessary connectors getting in the way.

    Quote Originally Posted by PeterStoba View Post
    80mm fans aren't as efficent as a 120mm fan, and also louder, so why bother with that?
    Because it only takes 1 dead 120 fan for the PSU to go *bang*. Also, with thermal monitoring and control functions which have been built into every non-crappy PSU for almost a decade, you'd be hard pressed to even hear the two 80mm fans running by themselves, much less over the sound of the rest of the sytem.
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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    There is a nother factor modular psu's have going for them, ease of modding.
    Granted not many people mod their power cables, however it is much simpler to change separate modular cables than cables with a psu on the other end, also to make replacement modular cables is far easier than trying to replace cables that are soldered in to the psu.

    Personally I love the lower mounted psu cases, they allow the top to be used for additional extraction fans around one of the hottest areas of a case (the cpu area) and as the psu tends to be one of the single heaviest parts in a case moving it to the bottom helps lower the center of gravity of the case, thus increasing the stability of a case.

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    Re: How much would you pay for a Modular PSU over a Non Modular?

    Quote Originally Posted by aidanjt View Post
    Because it only takes 1 dead 120 fan for the PSU to go *bang*. Also, with thermal monitoring and control functions which have been built into every non-crappy PSU for almost a decade, you'd be hard pressed to even hear the two 80mm fans running by themselves, much less over the sound of the rest of the sytem.
    Yes it only take one fan to die for it to fail, but two fans are doubling the chance of a fan failing.

    As too 80mm fan's being just as quiet, that depends on both the psu and the load it's under.
    If it's a decent quality psu and it's not under much load, then yes it'll be quiet.
    But push the load up and the fans will have to speed up to cope and the noise level will increase.
    There's also the issue of sound pitch, if your case is full of 120mm fans then the aaddition of a low noise 80mm fan is going to be more noticeable as it sounds different.

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