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Usually, the Signature 1300 Platinum has a ten-dollar lower price tag than its 1000 Titanium sibling, and its MSRP is notably below the $300 mark. Nonetheless, because of the Covid-19 outbreak, the prices in all IT products have increased, so if you manage to find a Signature 1300, you will pay way more now. There are not many high-capacity PSUs offering this kind of wattage nowadays, mostly because there is no need for more than 1kW power in the majority of PC systems. Only if you want to build a special purpose workstation, might you need so much power.
As we expected, the Signature 1000 Titanium performs better than the Signature 1300 Platinum, thanks to the notably lower max power. The lower the power levels, the easier it is to keep ripple low and achieve tight load regulation. Moreover, the thermal loads are lower, so you don't have to push the fan speed profile. Still, 300W more are a lot, especially if you plan to install several energy-hungry GPUs into your system and the 1803W that the SP1300 delivered before the triggering of the over power protection look impressive.
In terms of pure performance, the Seasonic Prime Platinum 1200 scores notably better, and the same goes for the Corsair HX1200. The SP1300's performance is on par with the Thermaltake Toughpower PF1 ARGB 1200W and the Asus ROG Thor 1200, and has the advantage of the OC Link technology, which allows two SP1300 units to operate in tandem, for systems requiring crazy amounts of power. The primary issue with the SP1300 is the high noise under increased loads and ambient temperatures. If you care about noise output besides wattage and you need more than 1.2kW of power, you should take a look at the Cooler Master V1300 Platinum, which is also a solid choice.
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Disclaimer: Aris Mpitziopoulos is Tom's Hardware's PSU reviewer. He is also the Chief Testing Engineer of Cybenetics and developed the Cybenetics certification methodologies apart from his role on Tom's Hardware. Neither Tom's Hardware nor its parent company, Future PLC, are financially involved with Cybenetics. Aris does not perform the actual certifications for Cybenetics.
Aris Mpitziopoulos is a contributing editor at Tom's Hardware, covering PSUs.
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