PSU Inside

This sticker covers one of the screws that needs to be removed to open the PSU. If you break it you lose your warranty.


A second sticker covers another screw - it took me quite a while to find this one.


I must say that the GIGABYTE Odin GT is by far the most difficult PSU to disassemble. First two screws are hidden and then you have to figure out that the PSU opens by sliding both sides apart from each other. For a short time I was worried that this would be a W1zzard-proof PSU.


When taking a look at the inside you quickly realize that this is not a cheap rebranded OEM power supply. Everything seems to be well organized, the heatsinks have even been copper colored for a nice look.

Test Equipment

• The PSU is connected to an APC SmartUPS which supplies clean 220V input.
• AC current is measured using a Peaktech 4010 desktop RS232 multimeter with 0.02A accuracy.
• To measure DC output voltages of the PSU we use a Keithley 2700 6.5 digit data acquisition system. All three input voltages are measured at the same time using a solid state switching system.
• Power Factor is measured using a generic Power Efficiency Meter.
• Measurements for Ripple Voltage were obtained using a 100 MHz Tektronix TDS224 Digital Storage Oscilloscope.

Fan noise measurements are performed with an IEC Type 2 Sound level meter and this setup.
It consists of three high-power resistors and a Socket A motherboard. The motherboard creates a small load which makes sure the PSU turns on (some PSUs require a minimum load). Since there is no hardware installed in the motherboard, its power draw is negligible. The three resistors create a static load of 320W (120W @ 12V + 50W @ 5V + 150W @ 12V) - a typical high-performance system. This setup is also used to determine the power conversion efficiency of the PSU.