PurePower TWV500 Series - ATX 12V 2.0 Version

Testing and Performance

Testing the PurePower TWV 500Watt PSU with our trusty voltage tester, we see that switching from modes reveals lower than expected spikes, which is a good thing, this will ensure that when your PSU throttles down the rails, with the resulting spikes kept to a minimum. Also appealing to the PSU is the fact that we have less ripple then we have seen with another 500Watt PSU we tested late last year. The fluctuation was less than 2/10ths of a volt throughout its switching modes and operations. 

Let's take again a look at our rig under steam. The blueish glow gets spread throughout the PSU. But at daytime there is not much spread that will get noticed, or at least not enough. But what happens during nighttime, when the darkness falls? Just look below and the pictures tell all.

When the lights are all gone and you are enjoying you nightly shift of playing online games, the blue glow takes control. The back of the TWV500 power supply spreads blue lightings and sets the mood.

Here we can see the Thermaltake PurePower putting out some night time effects with its blue LEDs. When all the lights are off and under our configuration we get a really nice blue effect that really brightens the case considerably.

The back of the PSU is equally as stunning with the honeycomb ventilation system. You can see the blue LED through the backside as well. In fact it is bright enough to put a rather significant reflection on the wall behind us. Overall this a really nice stable power supply. The performance is awesome with low ripple and relatively clean power, the 12volt rails didn't budge enough for our meter to tell the difference, so we can safely say the PSU is operating very efficiently.

Well this is the final shot of the PSU tucked away in the Thermaltake Armor series case. The fact the blue color LED matched our case LED, just sweetened the deal. Again while our PSU orientation is side ways do in part by the design of the Armor case, the LED effects will differ from rig to rig.

Conclusion

The Thermaltake PurePower ATX 12V 2.0 TWV 500W is a dynamite power supply unit. The power is steady, clean with minimal spikes and ripple. The fluctuation is kept to a minimum thanks to Thermaltake's customer switching buffers that allow a smooth transition from varying degrees of amperage needed to allocate clean efficient energy to your peripherals. The Thermaltake PurePower has a single 120 mm fan stuffed inside the PSU. This design puts the fan on the bottom of the PSU giving enough airflow to properly cool the MOFETS via the honeycomb ventilation system. The fan diameter is almost equal to the outer dimensions of the PSU metal case. This fan is also rpm speed adjustable when connected to the Total Watts Viewer display module with built in 2-channel fan support.

The PurePower TWV 500 Watt PSU can handle our rig with ease, with a maximum of 120 Watts needed to push the rig as we played Battlefield 2 with flying colors. One thing we noticed was the fact our pitch of our rig fans never changed. What I mean by this is the fact some PSU's don't handle current as well as others and with some PSU you can here the drain and current draw actually change the pitch of your fans based on power usage. This is not the case with the PurePower TWV 500 Watt PSU, this PSU didn't even flinch in our system. I recommend this PSU to any enthusiasts who want a really kick ass PSU that shows you real time power usage, complete with a 2-channel fan controller.

Thermaltake has been known for the excellent product support system, taking on a lead by example approach, thermaltake offers great products, great support and innovative designs. Thermaltake's commitment to product users ranging from entry level to enthusiast has allowed the company to tap into the mainstream segment with kick ass products and excellent service. If your in the market for a new Thermaltake product I highly recommend this and other products made by them.

Andrew at Xoxide.com sponsored the Thermaltake Armor series case for us a while back and we would like to thank Xoxide for their continued support and excellent prompt service.  We give special thanks to e-tailers like Xoxide and FrozenCPU. MVKTECH proudly supports these LLC's for there products and service. If you ever need some cool hardware, check those guys out.

On an ending note, this is a really nice PSU and should be on anyone's short list of computer upgrades. The stable power will keep a testy system at bay by providing clean and reduced noise current that will energize your hardware with stable power. If you're having graphic card glitches, reboots, power sentinal problems with your hardware, try a Thermaltake PurePower TWV500 Series and put some of those gremlins to rest.

Pros:

• Real time power read-out via display module
• Stable, Clean and low ripple current
• Honeycomb Ventilation facilitates the use of only one 120 mm fan
• Over all package and design is top notch
• Low noise operations
• Excellent performance under our configuration
• Universal 20/24-pin main power single cable design

Cons:

• N/A

(Aug., 05-2005) Edit: Thermaltake Technical Support informed us the power cable is in deed 24-pin compatible (the split power connector is design so that it work with both 20 and 24-pin motherboards) so we re-wrote the review and decided to give this our Editors Choice award. We made a mistake with our presentation and we apologize for any inconvenience.