Protection Features Evaluation

Every PSU should be equipped with a set of protections that will protect the PSU and the whole system. You can learn more about PSU protections by reading through the corresponding section of our "A Detailed Look Into PSUs" article.

In a snap, the most important protection features for PSUs are the following:

Over Current Protection (OCP)
Over Power Protection (OPP)
Over Temperature Protection (OTP)
Over/Under Voltage Protection (OVP/UVP)
Short Circuit Protection (SCP)
No-load Operation (NLO)
Surge and Inrush Protection (SIP)

We should note here that OCP isn't usually offered in single +12V rail PSUs, especially high capacity ones. In such units, OPP takes over. OTP is very important, and we won't mess with OVP/UVP until we find a way to safely evaluate it.

We found a small problem here: OCP at 5VSB should be set a little lower since 3.9 A on this rail causes very high ripple. Merely lowering OCP by 0.1 A would fix this problem. OCP levels on the other rails are configured properly since load regulation and ripple suppression don't go out of control. The OPP's triggering point might look too high, but the PSU has no problems at all in delivering 1050 W of power under normal ambient temperatures.

OTP is present as we discovered, and you will have to push this PSU very hard to trigger it. This makes sense, though, since the ATX specification recommends that a PSU should be able to deliver its full power continuously at up to 50 °C ambient. All other protection features Seasonic lists are working as they should.