Thursday, January 23rd 2020
Pure 12V PSU Standard, Named ATX12VO, Debuts Later This Year
Back at CES, at the FSP booth, we spied an inconspicuous-looking PSU with a curious 10-pin connector in place of the 24-pin ATX. The FSP500-30AKB turned out to be the first public exhibit of a the pure 12-Volt PC power supply standard being pushed by Intel, which is called "ATX12VO," which abbreviates Advanced Technology eXtended 12-Volt Only. According to the specification, the PSU only puts out +12 V and 12 Vsb voltage domains, and does away with the 5 V, 5 Vsb, and 3.3 V domains. This greatly simplifies the design of PSUs, as PCs of today don't use too many power-hungry 5 V or 3.3 V devices (such as half-a-dozen mechanical hard drives). The PC will still need 5 V for interfaces such as USB, but VRM on the motherboard will be responsible for DC-to-DC switching of 12 V to those lower-voltage domains. It's also likely that the motherboard will now put out a handful SATA power connectors.
Intel could debut ATX12VO within 2020 via its next-generation desktop platform, which features a 10-pin connector instead of 24-pin. It remains to be seen if the company could help the transition from current PSUs to the new standard by having its motherboard partners include a 24-pin to 10-pin adapter of some sort. In addition to the 10-pin connector, ATX12VO PSUs will put out two other purely-12 V connector types: 8-pin/4+4 pin EPS and 6+2 pin PCIe power. The EPS connector powers the CPU VRM, while the PCIe connector powers add-on cards, such as graphics cards. 4-pin Molex connectors could also be put out, but those will only feature 12 V pins (the 5 V pins will be absent).
Source:
CustomPC
Intel could debut ATX12VO within 2020 via its next-generation desktop platform, which features a 10-pin connector instead of 24-pin. It remains to be seen if the company could help the transition from current PSUs to the new standard by having its motherboard partners include a 24-pin to 10-pin adapter of some sort. In addition to the 10-pin connector, ATX12VO PSUs will put out two other purely-12 V connector types: 8-pin/4+4 pin EPS and 6+2 pin PCIe power. The EPS connector powers the CPU VRM, while the PCIe connector powers add-on cards, such as graphics cards. 4-pin Molex connectors could also be put out, but those will only feature 12 V pins (the 5 V pins will be absent).
102 Comments on Pure 12V PSU Standard, Named ATX12VO, Debuts Later This Year
There's far less standing in the way of this than BTX thankfully, so this becoming the dominant standard in 5+ years wouldn't surprise me.
12V only PSU is actually going to be cheaper. Manufacturers cannot really charge the same prices or premium for it as this setup for PSU is much simpler and it should be easier to compete at every level.
Also, do you know how cheap and easily available small, efficient DC-DC transformer circuits are? Powering six SATA devices off a decent entry-level motherboard would be easy - though what we'll likely see is power conversion circuitry tailored to match the number of ports on board. In other words any AIC controller would either need to convert its own power or you would need a small converter box - which would also become available cheaply, as they would be extremely easy to make.
As for the standard having "no real reason to change" - half the pins on the 24-pin are unnecessary legacy pins at this point. Isn't that enough reason to change? Ten or fifteen years ago PCs used the 3.3V and 5V rails for a lot of components. These days it's pretty much all 12V. For what few components need these low power rails, there is such easy access to cheap and efficient DC-DC conversion that most AICs these days use bespoke power conversion anyhow. Of course the power delivery standard should evolve to match this. Or did you also oppose the change when PSUs started including PCIe power connectors, and would you have preferred to keep adapting them from 4-pin Molex? Or when they stopped including heaps of Molex connectors? Or when SATA power replaced Molex? All of those were "working standards" after all.
Intel is doing this only so they can license the standard somehow. The move from at to ATX made sense because we had standby power enabling sleep modes and a better connector that didn't fry boards because it's impossible to put it on wrong. The psu manufactures are not going to lower prices either, we are used to paying the current prices, they will just pocket the rest.
As for adaptors don't get me started, me you and everyone else knows they will be built cheaply and poorly in China causing their own slew of problems. This standard is pointless.
AFAIK Intel doesn't charge for licensing the ATX spec, so why would they charge for this? Specifications like this are required to guarantee interoperability, so making adherence to the spec something you have to pay for too is extremely counterintuitive. They made this spec because, again, the current 24-pin cable is full of obsolete connectors that are no longer needed. Servers use 8-pin 12V connectors, most OEM PCs have moved to smaller non-standard connectors. This standard serves to unify these non-standard solutions under one standard - solely a good thing.
eSATA failed due to USB 3.0 being a far superior port, btw. The first standard didn't have power delivery, requiring either a separate USB cable for power or a wall plug, which made a mess of attempts to implement powered eSATA afterwards - no devices showed up, as they could not guarantee compatibility even with all eSATA-equipped devices. This was doomed from the start, and then USB 3.0 came in and made it entirely obsolete. (I still have a couple of eSATA devices, but run them off small and cheap USB-to-eSATA adapters).
As for your games requiring 2.7TB - again, welcome to a tiny minority. Most PC users use laptops with a single drive, and the majority of those in current models are SSDs around 256-512GB. Most desktop PC users use prebuilts, whether they be office PCs or for gaming etc. Office PCs have moved to SSDs (and largely m.2) outside of the very cheapest ones, while gaming PCs usually come with an m.2 SSD and a 3.5" HDD and are never added to - a setup easily accommodated by a single, short power wire running off the motherboard. Heck, you could even route it alongside the SATA cable for some actually sensible cable management.
I kind of get where you are coming from - this standard would be a poor fit for my DIY NAS, which currently has 4 3.5" HDDs and a 2.5" SSD, and will expand over time to at least six HDDs. For something like this I'd likely need a breakout box of some sort. I really don't see this as a problem.
The point: a standard made for constrained use like in a PC should provide the basics automatically and have provisions for expansion into more advanced or esoteric uses - bundling all the advanced and esoteric uses in for everyone is a silly idea, causing overproduction of unnecessary components, driving up prices, lowering efficiency, and making things more complicated than they need to be for the vast majority. A simple standard for everyone with provisions for expansion built in is an obvious development as computer technology matures.
eSATA could easily be added with a passive adapter to any motherboard, such as this. If anything, eSATAp failed, which as the much better standard that had power as well. That said, by the time that came around, USB 3.0 had already won and if you want to blame anyone here, blame the SATA-IO for not pushing/promoting their standards better.
M.2 is NOT expensive. The drives cost the SAME as SATA SSDs now, unless you're comparing apples and oranges and compare the price of SATA vs NVMe drives. Of course NVMe drives are going to cost more, as they have more pricey controllers and higher-end flash to be able to operate at higher speeds. However, they're not all that much expensive now.
Hard drives are simply not suitable for modern computers as they've become a major bottle neck. I don't want to spend a minute or more waiting for my PC to boot from a mechanical drive when it can boot in 15 seconds from an SSD.
I have 4TB of SSD storage in my PC and I have another 16TB of spinning rust in my NAS, where it belongs.
This has NOTHING to do with licensing. There's no fee to use any of the motherboard or PSU standards in use today and there likely never will be. Intel is in general smart enough to make sure their standards have a wide adoption rate to become standards, rather than some niche products.
By the way, a current ATX PSU is not going to be compatible with some of your antiques, as guess what, the ATX standard has evolved!
The -5V pin was dropped, which means some older boards won't work with new PSUs. We went from 20 to 24-pins and this requires either a split connector or an adapter for current PSUs to work with old boards.
And FYI, this isn't a new thing, 12V only PSUs started in 2011, it's just that Intel is trying to make it a proper standard.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_supply_unit_(computer)#12_V%E2%80%93only_supplies
As for pricing, that's obviously an unknown factor, but if the cost is significantly lower, it's likely we'll pay less, as that's normally how the market works. Initially these new PSUs might not be cheaper, due to lower volumes, but over time they would become the norm and prices will go down.
Yeah, not everything is made in China and not everything made in China is shit. I mean, Apple makes their products in China too... It's all about who your manufacturing partner is and there are plenty of Taiwanese companies that have some of their manufacturing in China. Afaik, most Asus boards are made in China after their split with ASRock (as that was their motherboard production arm). Also, plenty of stuff is still made in Taiwan, so if you're so concerned, support Taiwanese companies instead.
You clearly don't know much about the industry or how these things work, so making silly comments like this, serves ZERO purpose, expect maybe justifying your claims to yourself so you can feel good about them. You don't have a backplane in your NAS? I have four hot-swapable caddies and a backplane that takes one power connector. Still requires four SATA cables though...
As for eSata no boards with an eSata port where like boards with WiFi, they where only on high end boards, and USB 3 is garbage compared to eSata period, USB even 3.1 can't sustain the transfer speeds.
Your opinions don't apply to everyone else.
Who makes you the only person with the sole right to decide what is necessary or not?
I have 16TB in my NAS, that's for "cold" storage and my SSDs in my PC are for software and games that I use on a "daily" basis.
Spinning rust is not the future, sorry dude, it's not my fault you're stuck in the past.
Ever heard the saying "you get what you pay for"? Stop buying cheap crap.
Why do you have the right to decide when the time to transition to a new standard is? Are you working in senior management for a large hardware OEM? I doubt it, based on your comments here.
As for eSATA, did you not see the picture I posted? Those brackets came with plenty of boards. Again, go talk to the SATA-IO, they're the ones in charge of promoting the SATA standards. They clearly failed compared to the USB Promoter Group, for better or worse. The eSATA cable was poop, there was no power, so you needed some kind of wonky adapter or an external housing, regardless, hence the standard failed to take off as it wasn't consumer friendly. You need to start thinking like a person that doesn't understand computers and this is in general how standards win, they get a majority of users due to ease of use/affordability, not because they're technically the best. Just look at VHS vs. Betamax as a great example. Firewire was technically superior to USB as well, it also failed due to higher costs, even though it was much faster, offered better reliability and delivered more power.
USB 4 might be the solution that solves all of this, but the USB-C port has become too splintered in terms of what it's being designed for vs. what is being implemented. I just got a new phone, USB-C, but only 2.0 for data and beyond charging, it supports no other standards, which imho is crap. You might not agree though, which you have the right to. Maybe you'd rather we go back to serial interfaces and custom charger ports on phones? That's the way your reasoning here is going anyhow. Or maybe we should go back to AT PSU?
As for a nas this is something I would never recommend for an average home user, the average person doesn't want a second box taking up space. This standard is bad for the average user. Your willingness to drop over a grand on ssd's does not represent the average user. They are quite content with a small SSD and a large hard drive and are not willing to spend the money for a large SSD or a nas. Your attitude and opinions do not reflect the average user or their needs, they reflect the worst part of the computer enthusiast the elitism that you must spend this much or your buying junk.
An average new build I just put together for a guy is a great example, it replaces his 2nd gen i3 system.
Ryzen 3 2200g
Asrocks a320 board
8gb stick of ddr4
256gb says SSD
2tb hdd (his tax documents, family pictures, home movies, and music library) transfer from old system
450w psu
$30 matx case
Their is an average non gamer system.
With a simple 12V only standard it would become easier to build higher efficiency low output PSUs (there are a lot of affordable 92-96% efficiency 12V AC-DC PSUs used by the SFF crowd from companies like MeanWell) meaning you'd be able to build that PC with a more suitable (450W for that is massive overkill even when factoring in aging and the possibility of adding a GPU - that system will likely max out around 100W from the wall), more efficient and likely cheaper PSU than you currently do. There would be no need for any additional power delivery components as even the most basic motherboard would be able to handle two drives. Cabling would be simpler, it would run cooler, likely last longer, be easier to build (no more 24-pin to wrangle!), and at zero added cost. How is that not a win-win?
Then my user goes on Amazon and buys splitters or a DC to DC converter but not the quality ones, nope they buy the 2nd cheapest. Then now suddenly his drives are dead and ive got to support this mess.
Btw, if 10% of your 256GB SATA SSD's price is $10, you should really be buying different drives. Looking at an affordable but good drive like the MX500 on Newegg the price difference between 2.5" and m.2 is $0.75. There are more low end options in the 2.5" form factor, sure, but there are still good cheap m.2 ones like the MyDigitalSSD SB2 within a few dollars of the cheapest name brand 2.5" ones.
Then again, this also shows that you're not all about value in these builds. Might be time to consider moving to m.2 for the sake of convenience?
It's also that long time table is why I don't support the 12v psu. Take athlon XP guy, back in 2010 we added a sata raid controller on his pci slots as his ide drive died and new ide drives where already hard to find and expensive. I also added a USB 3 card to the core 2 system for their external drive. I add cards to these systems to give them functionality, but like the USB 3 card sometimes add-on cards need more power than the slot provides, and I don't want to be in a situation where I'm forced to go well time to build a new rig we're out of power leads.
Thing is, the chances of this happening again are... pretty much nonexistent. Modern systems integrate a massive amount of I/O - a huge change from a decade ago - and the chances of a basic/non-advanced user like you describe needing/wanting, say, USB4 when it arrives is pretty much zero. There will be zero appreciable difference for such users as most of them don't have any devices that will even saturate USB 3.0 so there will be no incentive to upgrade (and if they want/need USB-C, well, it's your job as the builder of the system to be forward thinking enough to make sure to buy a motherboard with USB-C). They're also highly unlikely to need more SATA or m.2 ports than a modern entry level board provides, and there are no new storage or I/O standards incoming. Thus this entire point is moot.
Besides that, there's still nothing saying you'd ever need to scrap a build due to running out of power cables. Splitters are fine as long as you don't need heaps of power - even cheap ones. As I said, motherboards are likely to provide at least two SATA power plugs and the cables needed, which following modern psu standards would likely have 3 plugs each. And if you need more power than that is able to provide, chances are the device in question will run off a 12V plug like PCIe anyhow.
www.techpowerup.com/256065/seasonic-connect-a-godsend-for-cable-management-novices