Packaging

The package is quite large and features a simple but overall nice design. On the front there is an angled photo of the unit along with the fan controller and the Silent Pro Hybrid series is highlighted in white fonts, while the capacity description uses purple fonts. In the top right corner we find two badges, one for the Gold efficiency and one for the five year warranty that accompanies the unit. On the rear side there is a brief feature description in several languages and two graphs showing the fan and efficiency curves. The most interest information is shown on one of the two sides where the unit's specifications along with the rail descriptions are listed.

Contents

The internals of the box are well protected by lots of packaging foam. On top of that the PSU, along with the fan controller, are wrapped in plastic. Also all modular wires are stored in a nylon pouch so you won't have to worry where to put the wires that you finally didn't use. The rest of the bundle includes an AC power cord, a user's manual, a fan controller, two set of fixing bolts (one for the PSU and one for the fan controller) and a warranty card.


Now let's take a better look at the fan controller that ships along with the unit. First of all it can be installed in a free 5.25" drive bay and it is connected to the PSU via a four pin wire, which also feeds it with power, so it doesn't need any extra power source. It has two knobs with the left one controlling the unit's fan speed, if you have set the main switch to manual operation and with the right one you can simultaneously control up to three case fans, which are handled by three LM317T regulators. If you set to manual operation then even in very high loads/ambient you can keep the unit's fan to very low speeds, meaning much less noise but also you stress the internals of the unit really hard. Thankfully the PSU is equipped with Over Temperature Protection which protects it from burning/blowing up but in general it is better to leave the fan in auto operation, if the internals of your case are quite hot and you draw significant power from the PSU. Here we should note that the two fans that can be connected directly to the 7V ports on the PSU cannot be controlled through this controller, since the voltage they get is fixed at 7V.

Exterior

As you can see the unit is fully modular and features a clean and nice design. The finish is of high quality and thanks to its matte texture it's fairly scratch resistant. On the front, the classic honeycomb grill helps the ventilation of the unit and the On/Off switch resides below the AC receptacle. On the sides we don't meet any fancy decals, just the series description along with the capacity. On the back, the modular panel has quite a few sockets and a diagram in the top left corner explains where you connect each modular cable. The specifications label is installed on the bottom of the unit while on the opposite side the fan uses a honeycomb vent with the Cooler Master logo in its center. Overall the external of the unit screams of quality, something that the future buyer will definitely appreciate since its price is quite stiff.