Vantec ION 400 PSu review by Pimprig

mdaniel · Post by **mdaniel** » Fri Jun 20, 2003 6:25 am

Sounds interesting. I might have to buy one and let ya'll know about the noise level as I am looking to replace the stock Antec Smartpower 350 that came in my Antec 3700 AMB.

http://www.pimprig.com/modules.php?s=&n ... &artid=136

mdaniel · Post by **mdaniel** » Fri Jun 20, 2003 7:04 am

Ok...my curiosity got the best of me. I just ordered one from Newegg for $64 shipped. I'll let ya'll know my thoughts on it compared to my modded Antec SL350...which only has an exhaust fan that is attached w/ fan isolators.

marc999 · Post by **marc999** » Fri Jun 20, 2003 8:21 am

Just read the review. It looks promising. I like how it uses some copper. I wish they would make PSUs with copper heatsinks, or at least some copper. Seems like an easy way to make it more quiet. Guess it could get expensive though. However, I bet even low grade copper cools better than premium aluminum. Anyway, let us know how it goes .....

mdaniel · Post by **mdaniel** » Wed Jun 25, 2003 2:17 pm

OK...well I just installed this new PSU and it is quite a bit quieter than my old Antec SL350 (w/ one fan removed). There are two negatives thus far. One, it doesn't have a fan monitor to plug into the motherboard. The second is that the 5v rail seems low. Under prime95...it is only 4.703...where my old psu low was about 4.76. The 3.3v has yet to drop below 3.36. The 12v is at 12.352. The Vcore fluctuated between 1.74 and 1.76.

With it running at idle, the 5v only climbs to 4.784. The 3.3v is still at 3.312 and the 12v is at 12.16. The Vcore has been a SOLID 1.76

I'll have to game on NWN and BF1942 to see if the low 5v rail has any effect or if it is just a low reading by Asus Probe.

Like the Pimprig review, I notice no audible difference at all between the fan settings...so I have it set at auto. With its two fans...it is still quiter than my old modded Antec 350 that had the intake fan removed.

The air coming out of the back is slightly warm and is coming out at a lower rate than the old Antec.

I'll keep ya'll up to date on how it performs over the next week. Who knows, maybe I'll remove the intake fan and see if it makes any difference. Noise wise I am happy.

mdaniel · Post by **mdaniel** » Mon Jul 07, 2003 6:53 am

Well, I've played around with this puppy for some time now. The first day after installing the PSU, I did have a randon reboot, which I was none to pleased with. I upped my CPU voltage .025 and have not had ANY stability problems since. I've played Neverwinter Nights for hours on end. As for noise, this PSU does not seem to increase in noise at all. If I turn down my CPU fan and undervolt the exhaust...I can't even hear the PSU. So far, I would recommend it...although I have not had the pleasure of experiencing a Silentx, a Nexus or the Foltron. But for $64 shipped, its a nice PSU in my opinion. The rails on the 5v are a little low...but are very solid.

I'd like to hear from anyone else who has installed one. I must agree with the present reviews available for this product.

chinnei · Post by **chinnei** » Tue Jul 15, 2003 6:15 am

I also have vantec ion which I just installed it couple days ago.
It's true that it is very quiet, as quiet as my seasonic 350W that's in another system, especially considering the fact that ion uses 2 fans.
I also like the fact that it comes with 2 SATA power cable adapter which would be very useful since I will upgrade my harddrive to SATA later on.

However, I did ran into some trouble at first. When I powered on, everything ran fine except I didn't get any video signals. At first I thought it was problem with the radeon card, but with different power supply everything ran fine.
So I put my ion back in and ran seperate power supply only to video card and that fixed the problem which only could meant that there was not enough power.
Isn't 400W supposedly enough to power on such configurations as mine?
I do have 4 panaflo fan running at 12v each and I tried unplugging it couple of'em and that also fixed the problem too.
I like my ion very much and really don't want to return it for other brand for higher outage because Ion only comes in 400W.
Does anybody know if the problem I am having is sorely due to lack of power?
If it is, any suggestions on how I can go around this without getting a different psu?
thanks in advance.

mdaniel · Post by **mdaniel** » Tue Jul 15, 2003 8:13 am

Intersting, I didn't have that problem with my ATI 9700np...running w/ a pro BIOS. I do run my video card at 1.6v instead of 1.5v by choice...maybe that is why I have not had that problem. Ever since I had ATI problems on my VIA KT400, I got my ASUS board and have kept the voltage .1v higher as recommended by many users. Maybe that random reboot I had on day #2 was the result of not enough power to the VGA card and not the cpu. I may have to lower my cpu voltage back down and raise the VGA to 1.7v and see if that cures the one time problem just out of curiosity. Maybe this psu doesn't have a naturally strong 1.5v rail. But by upping the cpu voltacge .025...I have not had ANY power related problems. I am curious about what your voltage readings are. Asus Probe shows my 5v rail at approx 4.703v...but my (non-digital) mulitmeter shows it at 5v or 4.9v at the worst. My multimeter shows the 12v rail right on also. As I stated earlier...Interesting.

POLIST8 · Post by **POLIST8** » Tue Jul 15, 2003 8:41 am

I'll have to try boosting my VGA voltage, as I get probs with faults...

chinnei · Post by **chinnei** » Tue Jul 15, 2003 10:13 am

mdaniel,
I am not too familiar with how voltages are related with
different component but here are the readings I got from
intel utitlity.
+12v, it cycles between 11.875~11.978
+5v, 5.0
+3.3v, 3.369
+1.52v, 1.494
and +1.5v, 1.523.
again, I really don't know what I can conclude from
these numbers.
You think I should increase the voltage for radeon?
Do I do that from the bios? and what kind of benefits
would I get from that?
I was thinking of maybe reducing the load by switching
all the fans from 12v to 5v. Would that make any difference?
Again, thanks for any kind of help.

POLIST8 · Post by **POLIST8** » Tue Jul 15, 2003 11:16 am

I want one.

Though my Enermax ain't too bad...just a little noisy.

Very stable though, considering I make it my only exhaust.

mdaniel · Post by **mdaniel** » Thu Jul 17, 2003 11:50 am

Changing the AGP voltage is done in the BIOS, if your board will support that function...my old VIA did not. I'm running an AMD too. I'm not realy sure why you are having video problems. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but unplugging the fans wont change much along the lines of the voltage rails supporting the 1.5v agp port. It is a separate rail from the 12v fans. Might just be a bad psu. Your voltages look good, so you might try calling Vantec...it sure can't hurt.

Good luck

chinnei · Post by **chinnei** » Fri Jul 18, 2003 2:18 pm

Well, after messing around with the ion and having no luck, I took the easy way out by just swapping out the psu.
Now the ion's in my old computer and seasonic is paired up with the radeon and everything is running smoothly.
Seasonic is only 350w, but it's having no trouble providing necessary juice with everything connected. And Ion's also running very quiet with my other system with geforce 2, pentium 1.8. Matter of fact I think it's running even quieter than seasonic.
I guess you are right about voltage rail being the problem as it probably wasn't stable enough for the radeon.
Btw, the intel bios is as generic as it can get, so there was no option for me to tweak the voltages. I wish I could tweak it because I think that might've fixed the problem.
Anyways, thanks for your help, I am very happy with the setup as of right now as both are running very quiet and smooth. Crossing my finger that it will stay that way.