Phanteks Announces the PowerCombo - Power Your Rig with 2 PSUs

[btarunr]

Phanteks today announces the release of their patented Power Combo. The Power Combo is design to maximize your power output by allowing you to connect two power supplies. The Power Combo will be a true plug and play that requires no splicing and cutting of the wires. The Power Combo is design to be safe and secure. The Power Combo features a redundant power supply architecture concept, this prevents the system from shutting down when one power supply fails. This ensures that all your vital information and data will not be interrupted or lost.

The Power Combo can run high end systems that requires more power output by combining 2x top tier PSUs. The Power Combo is fully compatible to Mini ITX, mATX, ATX, and E-ATX motherboards. The Power Combo features a unique soft start circuit that limits the inrush current to help improve stability and reduce transient voltage drops. The Power Combo will help share the load current of the two power supply and improve the power efficiency. The Power Combo is cost efficient and provides maximum power and efficiency.



Available from April 2016, The Power Combo will be priced at €39.90.

View at TechPowerUp Main Site

 

[P4-630]

The only problem is: cases to fit 2 PSU's?

 

[silentbogo]

The only problem is: cases to fit 2 PSU's?

Chaotic desk setup for LN2 benching?

I guess there is a demand for devices like that, otherwise it wouldn't have appeared at all...
Wondering if this board is just an electrical junction for a pair of PSUs, or if it actually provides some kind of level of redundancy in case of PSU failure?

Phantek has also recently released a Power Splitter, which probably has a much better market value:
http://www.phanteks.com/assets/manuals/PH-PWSPR_EN.pdf

 

[Brusfantomet]

Chaotic desk setup for LN2 benching?

I guess there is a demand for devices like that, otherwise it wouldn't have appeared at all...
Wondering if this board is just an electrical junction for a pair of PSUs, or if it actually provides some kind of level of redundancy in case of PSU failure?

Phantek has also recently released a Power Splitter, which probably has a much better market value:
http://www.phanteks.com/assets/manuals/PH-PWSPR_EN.pdf

Lots of big cases can handle two PSUs, but they are usually of the fulltower size.
Even if the board gives redundancy it will only be redundancy for the MB power, not for the processor, not for the disks, not for the GPU, so it would be rather useless without a simular setup for ALL the devices not getting power from the motherboard.

That beeing said, i think this is MUCH better than the reverse solution (one PSU, two systems).

 

[silentbogo]

Lots of big cases can handle two PSUs, but they are usually of the fulltower size.
Even if the board gives redundancy it will only be redundancy for the MB power, not for the processor, not for the disks, not for the GPU, so it would be rather useless without a simular setup for ALL the devices not getting power from the motherboard.

That beeing said, i think this is MUCH better than the reverse solution (one PSU, two systems).

By better value I meant that there is more use out of PSU splitter for running 2 systems in the dual-board wide case, than from a combiner with no redundancy... Otherwise it will be more beneficial (in terms of cost and space accomodation) to simply buy a larger PSU.

The only problem is: cases to fit 2 PSU's?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811147226

 

[EarthDog]

Cool... for a TINY market that ever needs it.

 

[Frick]

2 x AX1500i here I come!

 

[Brusfantomet]

By better value I meant that there is more use out of PSU splitter for running 2 systems in the dual-board wide case, than from a combiner with no redundancy... Otherwise it will be more beneficial (in terms of cost and space accomodation) to simply buy a larger PSU.

I must admit to not knowing much about the American market, but in Norway you can get 3 quality 650 W PSUs for the price of one 1000 W PSU and 4 1000W PSUs for the price of the AX1500i, add to that the inconvenience of always waving to run both systems with the 1PSU/2system version and the ONLY advantage it has over 2PSU/2system is space (unless you are using SFX PSUs, then the space advantage is also lost). Therefore the PowerCombo is, in my mind at least, a better product.

You then have the ultimate uselessness, 2 PSUs fed to the PowerCombo and then fed to the PowerSplitter to feed to systems, inconvenience in every step.

The PowerCombo can be useful in situations were you need more than 1500 watt, A dual socket workstation with 7 FuryX (or equivalent) cards for compute power will eat up over 2000 W.

 

[GhostRyder]

This sounds kinda cool if you built yourself a home server that you need up 24/7 and want redundancy on not just the HDD's/SSD's (With like Raid 5) but also on the PSU's.

 

[JATownes]

The only problem is: cases to fit 2 PSU's?

My Phanteks Enthoo Primo is ready for dual PSU's by default.



JAT

 

[cdawall]

So is the like 8 year old HAF932. Dual PSU support is nothing new.

 

[EarthDog]

Its not new, that was never the point, its not COMMON was the point there. The VAST majority of cases cannot hold 2 PSUs.

This sounds kinda cool if you built yourself a home server that you need up 24/7 and want redundancy on not just the HDD's/SSD's (With like Raid 5) but also on the PSU's.

Good thinking, but what happens more, PSU go bad or power goes out? It will handle the more rare item of a PSU failure, that is about it though.

 

[cdawall]

If you are that worried about data loss get a good raid card with a BBU on it

 

[EarthDog]

RAID is not a backup. It really only protects against one kind of failure...It does not cover...

• File corruption
• Human error (deleting files by mistake)
• Catastrophic damage (someone dumps water onto the server)
• Viruses and other malware
• Software bugs that wipe out data
• Hardware problems that wipe out data or cause hardware damage (controller malfunctions, firmware bugs, voltage spikes, ...)

I would have it on a different local drive and offsite/cloud, etc.

 

[cdawall]

RAID is not a backup. It really only protects against one kind of failure...It does not cover...

• File corruption
• Human error (deleting files by mistake)
• Catastrophic damage (someone dumps water onto the server)
• Viruses and other malware
• Software bugs that wipe out data
• Hardware problems that wipe out data or cause hardware damage (controller malfunctions, firmware bugs, voltage spikes, ...)

I would have it on a different local drive and offsite/cloud, etc.

All the BBU allows is to finish the write before power is lost to the array.

 

[EarthDog]

Well aware. Just saying that RAID is not a back up.

 

[silentbogo]

I must admit to not knowing much about the American market, but in Norway you can get 3 quality 650 W PSUs for the price of one 1000 W PSU and 4 1000W PSUs for the price of the AX1500i, add to that the inconvenience of always waving to run both systems with the 1PSU/2system version and the ONLY advantage it has over 2PSU/2system is space (unless you are using SFX PSUs, then the space advantage is also lost). Therefore the PowerCombo is, in my mind at least, a better product.

You then have the ultimate uselessness, 2 PSUs fed to the PowerCombo and then fed to the PowerSplitter to feed to systems, inconvenience in every step.

The PowerCombo can be useful in situations were you need more than 1500 watt, A dual socket workstation with 7 FuryX (or equivalent) cards for compute power will eat up over 2000 W.

I am way far from US too, but relative pricing is pretty much the same everywhere.
In case if you can find a dual-psu case you can either get, let's say, a pair of 80+ Gold certified 600W PSUs for $80-$100/ea plus another $35 (assuming price is the same as splitter), or simply invest $200-$250 into a decent 80+Gold 1200W PSU.
Something like Aerocool Imperator (1150W, 80+Gold, modular) goes for less than $150 where I'm from (all estimates are current prices converted from UAH to USD).

The argument about dual-PSU for a huge server with centi-core dual CPU and gazzilion Fury X cards is ridiculous. The only board that can actually accommodate all of that is EVGA Classified SR2, which is about as rare as a pink tasmanian badger.

In regards of usefullness: power splitter can actually have a lot of practical applications.
For example:
- running 2 POS systems from one case (150W TFX PSU + pair of Celeron N3150 rigs or something alike).
This is the most important use, because I got couple of those rigs and each runs from a separate 230W PSU while actually consuming less than 30W from the outlet.
- Cubicle setups in offices are always paired. 2 PCs in one case + Wake-on-KB is excellent space/energy conservation strategy. I actually had a similar setup at work for the administrative desk. 2 mITX boards with 2 SFX PSUs were fitted in one tower.
One PC was used for security camera monitoring, another one for booking administrative paperwork, both used from the same workspace by a single person.
- Many of you are crunching for WCG, and some of you have several dedicated crunching machines. I think it will be very useful to run pair of rigs from the same PSU assuming that there are no videocards involved and you have the means of ghetto-mounting this stuff in some kind of box/case.

 

[nickbaldwin86]

Going to get me this and two AX1500s to run my H170 board and a GTX 980!!! woot I love GIGAWATTS!!!

 

[EarthDog]

Going to get me this and two AX1500s to run my H170 board and a GTX 980!!! woot I love GIGAWATTS!!!

Im going to pray that is sarcasm....

 

[Brusfantomet]

I am way far from US too, but relative pricing is pretty much the same everywhere.
In case if you can find a dual-psu case you can either get, let's say, a pair of 80+ Gold certified 600W PSUs for $80-$100/ea plus another $35 (assuming price is the same as splitter), or simply invest $200-$250 into a decent 80+Gold 1200W PSU.
Something like Aerocool Imperator (1150W, 80+Gold, modular) goes for less than $150 where I'm from (all estimates are current prices converted from UAH to USD).

The argument about dual-PSU for a huge server with centi-core dual CPU and gazzilion Fury X cards is ridiculous. The only board that can actually accommodate all of that is EVGA Classified SR2, which is about as rare as a pink tasmanian badger.

In regards of usefullness: power splitter can actually have a lot of practical applications.
For example:
- running 2 POS systems from one case (150W TFX PSU + pair of Celeron N3150 rigs or something alike).
This is the most important use, because I got couple of those rigs and each runs from a separate 230W PSU while actually consuming less than 30W from the outlet.
- Cubicle setups in offices are always paired. 2 PCs in one case + Wake-on-KB is excellent space/energy conservation strategy. I actually had a similar setup at work for the administrative desk. 2 mITX boards with 2 SFX PSUs were fitted in one tower.
One PC was used for security camera monitoring, another one for booking administrative paperwork, both used from the same workspace by a single person.
- Many of you are crunching for WCG, and some of you have several dedicated crunching machines. I think it will be very useful to run pair of rigs from the same PSU assuming that there are no videocards involved and you have the means of ghetto-mounting this stuff in some kind of box/case.

Do not get me wrong here, the best is one PSU for one system, but i fail to see how the power splitter is more useful than the powercombo.

The Asus Z10ped16 WS takes 2 2011v3 CPUs and has 6 PCIe 16x slots
The Asus Z10ped8 WS takes 2 2011v3 CPUs and has 7 PCIe 16x slots
The Asus X99E WS taskes 1 2011v3 CPU and has 7 PCIe 16 slots

Al three are more common than the unicorn fart the EVGA board is.

2x E5-2687W v3 is 320W, 7 Fury x is 1750 W, in total 2090W, add the board and some drives and you are looking at 2200 W full load.

- For the POS systems, a small Pico PSU of 45 W would be smaller and allow you to turn one off completely independent of the other.
- Even more importantly here, with separate PSUs you can turn the system completely off, with a singe PSU for two systems the best you can hope for is to hibernate one.
- Pico PSUs would save more space, the only fringe case is if you already have one leftover PSU and two systems for CPU crunching.

 

[silentbogo]

The Asus Z10ped16 WS takes 2 2011v3 CPUs and has 6 PCIe 16x slots
The Asus Z10ped8 WS takes 2 2011v3 CPUs and has 7 PCIe 16x slots
The Asus X99E WS taskes 1 2011v3 CPU and has 7 PCIe 16 slots

Al three are more common than the unicorn fart the EVGA board is.

I see, but there is also a question of accommodation. There are no single slot cards with that high of a TPD, no watercooling solution to reduce that space to single slot per card and probably no need for it. If someone really needs something like that, then they could by a properly designed multi-GPU rack, like this one:
https://www.asus.com/Commercial-Servers-Workstations/ESC8000_G3/overview/

Or wait for an upcoming NVidia DGX-1 with eight P100 cards (I am not sure what's the use for 6-8 GPUs in one system besides compute).

- For the POS systems, a small Pico PSU of 45 W would be smaller and allow you to turn one off completely independent of the other.

A pair of PicoPSUs with a pair of generic 12V 40W laptop chargers will probably cost same or more than splitter box and 80+ TFX PSU:

2x$25 [Pico] + 2x$15 [Charger] =$80
1x$35[Splitter] + 1x$45 [80+ Gold TFX PSU] = $80

- Even more importantly here, with separate PSUs you can turn the system completely off, with a singe PSU for two systems the best you can hope for is to hibernate one.

That is true.

- Pico PSUs would save more space, the only fringe case is if you already have one leftover PSU and two systems for CPU crunching.

Genuine PicoPSUs are also hard to come by outside US. I have access to chinese clones, but those have tendency to explode and cost approximately the same.
I had to ask my brother to send me a pair from US, but those were stolen while my package was on hold in customs...
I am working on redoing a compact power supply from a Chieftec ITX case: almost as small as PicoPSU, but requires a lot more wiring. Meanwhile TFX is about as small as it gets for me right now (powering Celeron J1800 + 2.5" HDD from a 230W Delta PSU).

 

[newtekie1]

This is just for doubling up the power for the motherboard. Does the power going into the motherboard really require that much power?

 

[Breit]

This is just for doubling up the power for the motherboard. Does the power going into the motherboard really require that much power?

No, not really. It is more like bringing both PSUs together to act like one (and switching on at the same time). All the auxilliary power connectors (PCIe, SATA, 4-pin Molex) can then be directly used from each PSU. For instance four PCIe 8-pin going from the first PSU into the first two GPUs and then another four PCIe 8-pin cables goinig from the second PSU into the other two GPUs in a Quad-SLI setup.

The only problem is: cases to fit 2 PSU's?

How about the CaseLabs TH10A: http://www.caselabs-store.com/magnum-th10a/?

 

[Brusfantomet]

I see, but there is also a question of accommodation. There are no single slot cards with that high of a TPD, no watercooling solution to reduce that space to single slot per card and probably no need for it. If someone really needs something like that, then they could by a properly designed multi-GPU rack, like this one:
https://www.asus.com/Commercial-Servers-Workstations/ESC8000_G3/overview/

Or wait for an upcoming NVidia DGX-1 with eight P100 cards (I am not sure what's the use for 6-8 GPUs in one system besides compute).


A pair of PicoPSUs with a pair of generic 12V 40W laptop chargers will probably cost same or more than splitter box and 80+ TFX PSU:

2x$25 [Pico] + 2x$15 [Charger] =$80
1x$35[Splitter] + 1x$45 [80+ Gold TFX PSU] = $80


That is true.


Genuine PicoPSUs are also hard to come by outside US. I have access to chinese clones, but those have tendency to explode and cost approximately the same.
I had to ask my brother to send me a pair from US, but those were stolen while my package was on hold in customs...
I am working on redoing a compact power supply from a Chieftec ITX case: almost as small as PicoPSU, but requires a lot more wiring. Meanwhile TFX is about as small as it gets for me right now (powering Celeron J1800 + 2.5" HDD from a 230W Delta PSU).

The EKWB block for the fury X makes it a 1 slot card.

As for two pico PSUs costing the same as one TFX PSU with splitter, that just proves my point, you do not gain anything in space, but if the PSU fails you take both POS systems down, while with separate PSUs one failure leaves you with half capacity, not no capacity.

Check out the Antec ISK110 VESA, its as small as a ITX box can be, with a pico PSU capable of running a i7 3770k. It would be a much better option that a combined box with two systems in it.

 

[RCoon]

It will handle the more rare item of a PSU failure, that is about it though.

This ensures that all your vital information and data will not be interrupted or lost.

It doesn't cover PSU failure at all though. It has no SATA redundancy, no Molex redundancy, and no PCI-E power redundancy. If one of your PSUs goes bang, your system will still die a horrible death because your drives and graphics card won't be getting any power. The redundancy it does provide is 100% pointless unless you run your OS from RAM or a USB drive.

To be frank, this is just an overpriced prettied up jumper to enable the simultaneous operation of two PSUs to enable stupid stuff like quad 295x2 by splitting the graphics cards across two 1200Ws and having them both turn on at the same time. They slapped the "redundancy" tag on there because it provides a rather crippled version of it.