80 Plus Hikes its Testing and Licensing Fees, Could Affect Prices of Low-Volume PSU Models

erek

erek

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"Plug Load Solutions has reportedly increased its per-SKU certification price by 3x. For a new model launched after 2021, this would mean an increase in flat licensing fees by tens of thousands of Dollars. If a manufacturer launched a PSU in 450 W, 550 W, 650 W, 750 W, 850 W, and 1000 W, they pay a flat $21,000. Interestingly, Igor's Lab reports that a manufacturer has to pay the licensing fees even for an OEM/whitebox PSU model that has already been certified by 80 Plus. The "OEM" here refers to the likes of CWT, Seasonic, HEC, Fortron, etc., who contract-manufacture PSUs for others. If a generic 650 W certified model is re-branded by a manufacturer, it incurs re-brand licensing fees. Find more interesting insights in the source link below."

https://www.techpowerup.com/275155/...-could-affect-prices-of-low-volume-psu-models
 
Tsumi said:
3rd party certificate as far as I know. It's all a sham because they have no integrity control. Companies have been known to send the 80+ groups PSUs that are not representative of what they sell on the market.
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Yea I heard it was nothing but a sham. I hope they drop them like a sack of bricks.
 
Guess they saw the rising prices on PSUs and decided they wanted to get them some of that money. Seems pretty shady to raise prices by 3X out of nowhere. Most PSU makers will prob drop their branding like a sack of lead bricks.
 
Ouch.
My Seasonic Prime TX1000 should last me for the next several builds.
 
clockdogg said:
The PSU makers can switch over to my Efficient Certification Platform: 90 Minus. Everything Certified! Only $10k a year. Sign up now!
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They may switch to the Cybernetics Labs ETA certification. Some, like Seasonic, already do it as well as 80Plus. If consumers get to the point where they recognize and shop for it, we could see companies stop doing 80Plus certifications.

For now though they have brand recognition and that matters, so they can probably get away with it in the near term.
 
80+ ratings are something I trust as much as the individual brand but I only use it for initial sorting when look at available power supplies anyway. I don't buy one unless I've read a good review on it anyway and any good review will cover a lot more about efficiency than 80+ ratings do as a small part of the review.
 
alxlwson said:
Ouch.
My Seasonic Prime TX1000 should last me for the next several builds.
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Seasonic is a meme of ancient times, they can't handle power surges from RTX 3000 cards.

Plus they configure their fans wrong so they are noisy.
 
Lepardi said:
Seasonic is a meme of ancient times, they can't handle power surges from RTX 3000 cards.

Plus they configure their fans wrong so they are noisy.
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I would like proof of this. Especially since SS builds just about all of the high end PSU's for Corsair, XFX, etc...

I'd love to see proof that my 1kW titanium rated power supply can't handle a rtx3000 and that instead of mine being silient, that the fan must be dead.
 
alxlwson said:
I would like proof of this. Especially since SS builds just about all of the high end PSU's for Corsair, XFX, etc...

I'd love to see proof that my 1kW titanium rated power supply can't handle a rtx3000 and that instead of mine being silient, that the fan must be dead.
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If his only reference is to the older Focus / Focus Plus lines of PSU's, then he's beating a dead horse that was already known about (when AMD Vega 54/64 launched) and only affected a couple of lines of Seasonic PSU..

Not all their PSU lines had that problem.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/j9edtm/beware_of_the_750w_minimum_for_rtx_3080_cards/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/9zd1os/seasonic_updated_statement_after_the/

https://www.guru3d.com/news-story/s...-plus-psu-has-gpu-compatibility-issues,2.html


Of course the simple solution back then was, switch to a different PSU line or get a higher wattage model than you needed.
 
Tsumi said:
3rd party certificate as far as I know. It's all a sham because they have no integrity control. Companies have been known to send the 80+ groups PSUs that are not representative of what they sell on the market.
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Beyond the fact that basically everyone games the system and PLS didn't give a flying toss as long as those sweet multi thousand dollar checks kept coming in, their testing methodology is completely unrealistic and worthless.

They test the power supplies in open air at room temperature, which is basically an edge case in PC building. Nobody has their power supply flopping around on their desk for anything but testing.

Jonny Guru's testing methodology is really the only test I'd consider valid for PSUs.
 
I can understand why they did this - there are more PSU models out there than there are Motherboard base models. And each comes with enough design variations to complicate testing (some even change their OEM with different capacities under the same base brand!)

Compared to mobos/video cards, it's way too easy to get into the PSU rebranding market. And many of those poor vendors are goinng to flub on support (bad for the brand)
 
warmon6 said:
If his only reference is to the older Focus / Focus Plus lines of PSU's, then he's beating a dead horse that was already known about (when AMD Vega 54/64 launched) and only affected a couple of lines of Seasonic PSU..

Not all their PSU lines had that problem.

https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/j9edtm/beware_of_the_750w_minimum_for_rtx_3080_cards/

https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/9zd1os/seasonic_updated_statement_after_the/

https://www.guru3d.com/news-story/s...-plus-psu-has-gpu-compatibility-issues,2.html


Of course the simple solution back then was, switch to a different PSU line or get a higher wattage model than you needed.
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There is no guarantee that newer prime psu's can handle power surges better. Reviewers don't test it, there is no data available.
alxlwson said:
I would like proof of this. Especially since SS builds just about all of the high end PSU's for Corsair, XFX, etc...

I'd love to see proof that my 1kW titanium rated power supply can't handle a rtx3000 and that instead of mine being silient, that the fan must be dead.
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1kW is handling pretty sizable loads in passive mode, so that's why.

Seasonic uses Hong Huan fans, and insists on driving them below their minimum rated RPM, so they produce this noise on the video while running in low RPM mode.

Corsair has adjusted this minimum rpm higher in their Seasonic models, which helps tackling the noise.
 
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warmon6 said:
If his only reference is to the older Focus / Focus Plus lines of PSU's, then he's beating a dead horse that was already known about (when AMD Vega 54/64 launched) and only affected a couple of lines of Seasonic PSU..

Not all their PSU lines had that problem.
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I hope mine is one that doesn't have a problem :O. I'd never heard this. I have an old Seasonic Platinum 1000 PSU from... I dunno at least 5 years ago, probably more. Particularly since it looks like it is basically impossible to get a PSU from a non-scalper right now. They are something else that is all sold out everywhere.
 
I'm running a 3070 and a 3080(separate machines) on newer Seasonic Focus Plus Gold power supplies without any issues. Most of their time is spent crunching BOINC tasks(similar to Folding@home or mining, it slams the GPU with 100% utilization and uses a lot of power), but I have also gamed with the 3080 as well with no issues.
 
GiGaBiTe said:
Beyond the fact that basically everyone games the system and PLS didn't give a flying toss as long as those sweet multi thousand dollar checks kept coming in, their testing methodology is completely unrealistic and worthless.

They test the power supplies in open air at room temperature, which is basically an edge case in PC building. Nobody has their power supply flopping around on their desk for anything but testing.

Jonny Guru's testing methodology is really the only test I'd consider valid for PSUs.
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That too.

whateverer said:
I can understand why they did this - there are more PSU models out there than there are Motherboard base models. And each comes with enough design variations to complicate testing (some even change their OEM with different capacities under the same base brand!)

Compared to mobos/video cards, it's way too easy to get into the PSU rebranding market. And many of those poor vendors are goinng to flub on support (bad for the brand)
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No, 80+ has absolutely no good reason to do this. 80+ doesn't go out and buy PSUs, they get them sent to them by the manufacturer. Their test is a simple 4 point load test in an uncontrolled temperature setting at 2 different voltages. No fancy expensive oscilloscopes needed, no elaborate setup needed to eliminate all variables. It probably takes a lab monkey less than half a day to run a PSU through their "tests."
 
Lepardi said:
There is no guarantee that newer prime psu's can handle power surges better. Reviewers don't test it, there is no data available.




1kW is handling pretty sizable loads in passive mode, so that's why.

Seasonic uses Hong Huan fans, and insists on driving them below their minimum rated RPM, so they produce this noise on the video while running in low RPM mode.

Corsair has adjusted this minimum rpm higher in their Seasonic models, which helps tackling the noise.
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....... you know that the problems were with MANY different 3080s and MANY different PSUs right?

Maybe..... the problem is the 3080s and not the PSUs....

I have built 6 computers since the 3000 series came out, all with seasonic. Not a single one has issues. Hell I have an 850w in my wifes computer, shes running a 3080 AND a 1080Ti, not a blip.

and your "reviewers dont test them." I have seen plenty of reviews where they are using seasonics, there are literally hundreds of popular reviewers and sources out there. I feel that if there was an actual problem it would have been addressed by at least one of them.

EDIT: Just for funzies I went and read some of the links you posted, and some more link beyond that. Seasonics official statement doesnt even admit they made bad PSUs.... it literally says that the VEGA series cards were showing "higher than usual peak loads" (meaning the cards were pulling more than they should) and that the "resonating frequency with different PCIe cables had problems" (meaning they used 3rd party cables that caused the problem"

As i said before, the problem isnt the PSUs, its the cards....

Your claims are baseless and you should feel bad.
 
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Sycraft said:
I hope mine is one that doesn't have a problem :O. I'd never heard this. I have an old Seasonic Platinum 1000 PSU from... I dunno at least 5 years ago, probably more. Particularly since it looks like it is basically impossible to get a PSU from a non-scalper right now. They are something else that is all sold out everywhere.
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Even if it does have that "issue" (as i dont know if yours does or not).... I'd be hard press to think your PSU would have a problem with any of the RTX 3000 gpu's (unless your SLI'ing 3090's) since it's a 1kw PSU and not a minimum 750w or below PSU.

I personally haven't heard of any Quality PSU at 850w and above having issues with single RTX 3000 or Vega cards over-current problem. Just 750w and below with that normally being in the 550w - 650w range but that's people ignoring min spec requirement than any fault of the PSU. (if you do have issues with a 1kw psu, then there's either something very wrong with the graphic card or your PSU has majorly degraded over it's life that it cant support it specs anymore).

Now part of seasonic focus (plus) problem was that it's OCP was more sensitive that other PSU's on the market and Vega has high power spikes (Vega 54 has spikes as high as 600w per card). Those two combo's lead to that issue. Newer Focus (Plus) models made Jan. 2018 and after were adjusted to have less sensitive OCP. That allowed Vega cards to run fine but that OCP change caused to have more ripple noise.

The New Focus Line (FOCUS GM, GX, PX and SGX) does not have the same problems as the old ones (or at least that I can find).

(If you know someone trying to figure out when their seasonic psu was made, look at the first 4 digits after the "R" on the serial number. That'll give the year and month. R1707 (what is on my Focus Plus Gold 850w) means mine was built in 2017, July).

Anyways, back on topic...

Price hikes on 80+ certification? Time to create a new certification standard I guess. Looks like clockdogg is ready to get started.
 
captaindiptoad said:
As i said before, the problem isnt the PSUs, its the cards....
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Right, whatever the reason is, the fact is that other brand PSU's don't have this problem reported, so I'll pick the one with no issues.

And while doing so, also avoiding the low rpm grinding noise issue in Seasonic PSU's, because of the fan profile they refuse to fix. Win-win.
 
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