Today it seems we need bigger and bigger power supplies, with the coming of the 8800 series from Nvidia that is very much true. Just how much is enough though? How do you know exactly how much you need? There are many PSU calculators out there, and they all seem to be different, everyone has a different opinion as to just how much power you need. Today for review I have the Iceberg from Apevia, it is a 680Watt beast of a power supply, it has some really cool features, like the ability to change between three different colors and a plexi glass top and sides to show it off to the world. Well read on to see what I learned about the Iceberg…
APEVIA 680Watt Iceberg Power Supply-Red
Reviewed by: Kristofer Brozio AkA Dracos
Sponsor: Apevia
Tech Specs,Features or the Basic Info:
APEVIA 680W Iceberg Power -Red
ATX-IB680W-RD
PRODUCT FEATURES:
-Aluminum casting for best cooling
-High quality colorful components and materials ensure superior performance and appearance
-Fire resistant see-through acrylic cover
-LED color switch for blue, red or green light
-Excellent ventilation:2 x 80mm crystal LED fans for excellent cooling
-Super silent:1 x fan speed controller optimizing cooling while reducing noise
-Wire management:fully sleeved cables to avoid clutter and improve airflow
-UV reactive connectors, switch and wire sleeves
-Protection:Short circuit/ Under voltage/ Over voltage/ Over current/ Over power/ Electric-shock free
protection
-Safety approval:UL, CSA, FCC, CE, CB, TUV
-Supports ATX Intel and AMD systems
-Low noise and ripple
-100% Burn-in test/ Hi-pot test/ Vibration test/ Leak Current test
Apevia Iceberg 680W SLI-ready aluminum power supply is a high end version of the combination of Apevia 500W See-Thru power supply and Apevia Chameleon 550W power supply. This power supply unit is designed to handle power hungry systems efficiently and also to be physically appealing. Only high quality materials and components are used to assure superior performance, reliability and stability. We believe that a good power supply is not only served what it is claimed to be, but also can it be a piece of art to delight our heart. Stylish design with neat colorful uv reactive cable sleeves, plus a fire resistant see-through cover for all the multi-color coated components and PC board, along with its LED fans, it is a powerful yet sophisticated beauty. Constructed by high quality aluminum material which is known by its great cooling, plus 2 built-in fans, this unit has the maximum cooling that you can find in the power supply market. The built-in fan speed adjuster is to reduce the noise level while maximizing its cooling capacity. The best feature is also the gamer's dream comes true, that is this power supply can change its color tone to be red or green or blue by switching the LED light from the built-in fans. Accommodated both Intel and AMD, this beauty has vigorous power and lots of connectors for the today's ever demanding computing environment of PC enthusiasts, gamers, overclockers and extreme users. Indulge yourself in this luxury high end power supply and you will find the world is a lot easier and much prettier.
Note:
1.To show its beauty through the side window, this power supply should be installed upside down.
2.Due to CE regulation, this model is only available in 600W for European market.
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SPECIFICATION:
Model No. ATX-IB680W-RD
Max. Power 680W
Material Aluminum
Color Black aluminum with see-through cover and red sleeves
Switches:
ATX Logic on-off
additional power rocker switch 115/230 Volt selector switch
Tech Specs,Features or the Basic Info Continued:
Input:
Voltage ranges:103-132VAC or 206-264VAC RMS switch selectable
Input frequency:50-60Hz
Input current:10A for 115VAC, 5A for 230VAC
Inrush current:<60A @115VAC, <120A @230VAC
Connectors:
1 x 20/24pin Main Power
2 x PCI Express (6P)
1 x 12V (P4/P8)
8 x 4pin Peripheral
4 x Serial ATA
2 x Floppy
Electrical:
Efficiency:>70% under max range load
Rise time: <20ms
Hold up time: >10ms at full load
Overshoot: >10%
Leakage current:<3.5mA @240VAC
P.G. Signal:100-500ms
Protection:
Short-circuit/ Over current/ Over voltage/ Over power/ Under voltage/ Electric shock free
Environment Operation temperature:0°C to 40°C
Operation humidity:20% to 90% RH
Operation altitude:up to 10,000 ft
EMI/RFI:
FCC class B, CISPR22 class, BSMI
Safety CB IEC 950/ TUV EN 60950/ UL 1950/ CSA 950
PFC N/A
Cooling: Forced air ventilation by 2 x 80mm crystal LED fan
Fan speed controller: yes
MTBF: 100,000 hours at full load/25°C
Dimension: 150mm x 170mm x 86mm (W x L x H)
Weight: 5.0 lbs
A Better Look at Things
:
This Iceberg comes in a nice sturdy box with its own carrying handle. On the front of the box you can see a picture of the PSU itself along with the colors it can change to.
The back of the box shows you the different color choices it is available in, and there is a side window to see the actual power supply.
The Iceberg is packed very well, nestled in a plastic bag and then in styrofoam padding.
The Apevia Iceberg comes with a user manual, installation screws which are thumbscrews (nice!) and of course a standard power cable.
After unwrapping the Iceberg we find that it also has a piece of protective plastic stuck to the plexi glass cover to prevent damage to it during transit, the Iceberg is packaged very well. The housing is part black aluminum and clear plexi-glass.
A Better Look at Things
Continued:
The Apevia Iceberg is very colorful, from its red UV reactive cable sleeving to the colorful components and heatsinks inside and then the rocker switch and the power connection are orange as well. This is a power supply best suited in a clear plexi-glass case.
On the Iceberg the technical specs label is located on the top of the PSU, out of site.
The Specs are:
+3.3v = 38A
+5v = 40A
+12v1 = 22A
+12v2 = 24A
-5v = 0.3A
-12v = 0.8A
+5Vsb = 2.0A
The rear of the Iceberg is where you find the power connector, a nice large I/O rocker switch, an 80mm cooling fan with a speed adjustment knob, and a small button that cycles the colors between red, green, blue and off.
The front of the Iceberg has another 80mm fan and the power cables coming from it.
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A Better Look at Things
Continued:
Well this is one PSU that I don't have to take apart to show you the insides of it, the nice plexi top lets us look right through into it.
The Iceberg has some nice large industrial sized components in there.
The green heatsinks are nice and large and are positioned so that the air flows right across them for maximum cooling efficiency. It does look a bit crowded in there though doesn't it? For a PSU with a plexi top I would have tried for a little bit better wire management.
The actual power cables are basically fully sleeved in a red sleeving that is UV reactive, the sleeving job is very well done and looks very professional.
The Connectors are:
1 x 20/24pin Main Power
2 x PCI Express (6P)
1 x 12V (P4/P8)
8 x 4pin Peripheral
4 x Serial ATA
2 x Floppy
Well it does look really cool, but how does it perform, let check it out…
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Installation and Testing:
Installation was very easy with the included thumbscrews, all companies should include them wherever they can, it just makes life so much easier.
Well here it is installed in my system in the various colors:
And here's a few close up shots of the Iceberg all lit up and off.
Yep, it look pretty cool doesn't it, but let's see how well it handles under load. The first thing I have to say is that with the fans on low it is silent, but if you turn the fans to max it is annoyingly loud, keeping them in middle is about the sweet spot, you can hear them but not overly so.
Well Ok, my test system is:
Asus P5wd2-e Premium motherboard
Intel P4 Cedar Mill (3.0Ghz) @4Ghz
Coolermaster Hyper TX CPU Cooler
1 gig of Corsair XMS2Pro PC-8500
Power Color X1300
Memorex dvd/r/dl
Maxtor 40gig HDD
2 120mm fans
The Apevia Iceberg has been in my system for a little over two weeks now and it has given me no problems, I'm happy to report.
Now for testing, since this is a CPU with HyperThreading I can run 2 instances of Prime95 torture test, one on each core to really stress it out. I let it run for about 30 minutes, and recorded the voltages of the 12v and 5v lines at 5 minutes intervals with my trusty multimeter. Remember this is an overclocked and overvoltaged CPU as well here.
First up we have idle voltages:
12v = 12.21v
5v = 5.12v
Load with Prime95 x2:
12v = 12.09v – 12.10v
5v = 5.12v
Installation and Testing Continued:
I decided to also run 3dmark06 to further stress the system, and did the same thing, recorded the voltages of the 12v and 5v lines.
Load under 3dMark06:
12v = 12.06v – 12.08v
5v = 5.13v
Not bad stayed well above 12 volts, and just a little bit of fluctuations going on. I have to say that the 12v line never did stop fluctuating during testing, but it was very little as you can see from the results. This could be due to several things, and it might be atypical of these power supplies, but I tested what I got for review and those are the results I got. Even with the little fluctuations, I will be keeping this PSU in my system as it does seem more than capable of handling the loads, and the 12v lines were well above the 12v mark.
The idea of a self controlled fan system is not my thing, how do you really now when to turn the fan up, or down? I like the idea of the PSU itself controlling the fan speeds. What if you forget to turn it up before you start an intense gaming session? Will the PSU die from overheating? Or you could do what I did and leave it at the middle setting. Then again I think most people are not as sensitive to sound as me and they really couldn't care less about the noise level, so it might not matter much in the end.
As I said personally I would rather let the PSU control the fans, it takes the human error factor out of the equation.
I did some more overclocking on my CPU/Ram and the Apevia did fine during all of it.
I'd like to also note that originally I had my x1800GTO video card in there, but had to swap it out as my new 7900GT OC needed to be RMA'd. So for most of the time the Iceberg was in my system the higher, more power consuming video card was in the system. This was all though other tests and overclocking as well.
Summary:
Ok well, besides the fact that the fans are manually controlled the Apevia Iceberg is, in my opinion a pretty good PSU. The 12v rails faired very well in all tests and even handled the overclocked system just fine, everything seemed stable with no problems at all. Coming in at 680Watts the Iceberg will be able to handle the demands of the majority of the power hungry system out there today, that I say for sure. Now for the score, due to the fact that the 12v lines never stabilized, there were constant fluctuation at load, and the use of manual controlled fans I can only give the Apevia Iceberg a 4 out of 5 score. Which still is very good overall, I will be keeping the Iceberg in that system for some time to come, it did handle everything I threw at it with no problems. If you are in the market for a nice looking, high powered PSU then the Iceberg might be for you.
DragonSteelMods gives the APEVIA 680W Iceberg Power Supply a 4 out of 5 score.
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Pros:
-Cool looking
-Colorful
-Stable
-Powerful at 680watts
Cons:
-Self controlled fans
-Lots of fluctuations on the 12v rails
I would like to thank Apevia for the chance to review the Icebereg and for their continued support of DSM.