Feed: AnandTech
Feed Link: https://www.anandtech.com
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Title: Corsair Transitions to Cybenetics Certification for Power Supplies

Date: Wed, 07 Aug 2024 14:00:00 EDT
Link: https://www.anandtech.com/show/21511/corsair-...

Corsair, a prominent figure in PC components, has announced a strategic shift
in its approach to power supply unit (PSU) certifications. The company is
dropping the widely recognized 80 PLUS certification in favor of the newer
but more comprehensive Cybenetics certification.

According to the press release, the primary reason for Corsair's move to
Cybenetics certifications lies in the program's dual focus on both energy
efficiency and noise levels. While the 80 PLUS certification has been a
standard in the industry for decades, it exclusively measures energy
conversion efficiency at four load levels (10%, 20%, 50%, 100%). Despite its
long-standing presence, the 80 PLUS program has not seen significant updates
in over 15 years, which limits its ability to provide a holistic view of PSU
performance.

On the other hand, Cybenetics offers a more nuanced approach. It evaluates
PSUs across multiple load levels and includes noise level assessments. This
dual certification system rates efficiency on a familiar scale (Bronze to
Titanium, plus a higher certification called Diamond) and noise levels from
Standard (noisy) to A++ (virtually silent). By incorporating noise
measurements, Cybenetics provides a more comprehensive overview of PSU
performance, addressing an important aspect often overlooked by other
certification programs. Cybenetics also enforces Power Factor, 5VSB
efficiency, and Vampire Power thresholds, all important to the overall
efficiency of a PSU.

Even though they're dropping 80 PLUS in favor of Cybernetics, Corsair is
being highly diplomatic with their press release. They even suggest that the
reader should not disregard either in favor of the other.

Our opinion is a bit harsher: the simplicity of the 80 PLUS certification
program has led to two major flaws. First, manufacturers have primarily
focused on maximizing efficiency at three specific load points, neglecting
overall performance. Second, the majority of PSUs have clustered around the
80 PLUS Gold and Platinum certifications, with very few achieving the
stringent Titanium level. This results in hundreds of PSUs with significantly
different technical capabilities sharing the same certification badge,
creating a misleading uniformity that fails to reflect true performance
disparities.

Furthermore, almost every PSU platform that has been released over the past
15 years would achieve 80Plus Gold status or greater, with very few products
falling down to the 80Plus Bronze certification and almost zero meeting the
80Plus White and 80Plus Silver requirements, making the three lowermost
certifications practically defunct. Cybenetics dual certification certainly
does not solve every issue and cannot fully assess everything there is to
assess about a PSU, but it certainly makes much more information available to
the user and allows users to at least factor in acoustics performance when
purchasing a product.

The issue that seems to remain is that, due to the slackest requirements,
manufacturers were almost always certifying their units with an input voltage
of 115 VAC, resulting in myriads of units carrying a certification badge that
would fail the same 80Plus certification requirements with an input voltage
of 230 VAC. Unfortunately, this is also true for the Cybenetics standard, as
the badges do not inform the user about the input voltage that the
certification was attained with. However, as the Cybenetics standard revolves
around average efficiency and not efficiency at specific load points, the
majority of the PSUs should meet both efficiency thresholds and not the other
way around.

Certification processes can be costly for manufacturers. By opting for the
Cybenetics program, Corsair possibly aims to get the most value from its
certification investments. Cybenetics offers more detailed and up-to-date
testing methodologies, ensuring that the data provided is more reflective of
real-world usage scenarios. In any case, Corsair's shift to Cybenetics
certification marks a significant development in the evaluation of PSUs and
has the potential to create waves in the market.

Ultimately, this move has the potential disrupt the status quo. With
Corsair's sheer size and influence in the larger power supply market, this
could very well prompt other manufacturers to follow suit, and possibly even
reshape consumer expectations and benchmarks for PSU quality.

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