SilverStone ST1200-PTS PSU Review: Compact But Powerful

Why you can trust Tom's Hardware Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.

Transient Response Tests and Ripple Measurements

Advanced Transient Response Tests

For details about our transient response testing, please click here.

In the real world, power supplies are always working with loads that change. It's of immense importance, then, for the PSU to keep its rails within the ATX specification's defined ranges. The smaller the deviations, the more stable your PC will be with less stress applied to its components. 

We should note that the ATX spec requires capacitive loading during the transient rests, but in our methodology we also choose to apply a worst case scenario with no extra capacitance on the rails. 

Advanced Transient Response at 20% – 200ms

Swipe to scroll horizontally
VoltageBeforeAfterChangePass/Fail
12V11.977V11.797V1.50%Pass
5V5.014V4.825V3.77%Pass
3.3V3.316V3.137V5.40%Fail
5VSB5.058V5.009V0.97%Pass

Advanced Transient Response at 20% – 20ms

Swipe to scroll horizontally
VoltageBeforeAfterChangePass/Fail
12V11.973V11.735V1.99%Pass
5V5.011V4.791V4.39%Pass
3.3V3.314V3.123V5.76%Fail
5VSB5.058V5.013V0.89%Pass

Advanced Transient Response at 20 Percent – 1ms

Swipe to scroll horizontally
VoltageBeforeAfterChangePass/Fail
12V11.972V11.746V1.89%Pass
5V5.010V4.809V4.01%Pass
3.3V3.313V3.088V6.79%Fail
5VSB5.057V5.018V0.77%Pass

Advanced Transient Response at 50% – 200ms

Swipe to scroll horizontally
VoltageBeforeAfterChangePass/Fail
12V11.929V11.781V1.24%Pass
5V4.983V4.800V3.67%Pass
3.3V3.282V3.112V5.18%Fail
5VSB5.016V4.967V0.98%Pass

Advanced Transient Response at 50% – 20ms

Swipe to scroll horizontally
VoltageBeforeAfterChangePass/Fail
12V11.927V11.752V1.47%Pass
5V4.982V4.779V4.07%Pass
3.3V3.281V3.086V5.94%Fail
5VSB5.016V4.978V0.76%Pass

Advanced Transient Response at 50% – 1ms

Swipe to scroll horizontally
VoltageBeforeAfterChangePass/Fail
12V11.925V11.761V1.38%Pass
5V4.981V4.778V4.08%Pass
3.3V3.281V3.121V4.88%Fail
5VSB5.016V4.977V0.78%Pass

The transient response is mediocre on the +12V and 5V rails, and quite bad at 3.3V. Apparently the lack of enough electrolytic capacitors in the secondary side, led to those results.

Turn-On Transient Tests

In the next set of tests, we measure the PSU's response in simpler transient load scenarios—during its power-on phase. Ideally, we don't want to see any voltage overshoots or spikes since those put a lot of stress on the DC-DC converters of installed components.

There is a high voltage overshoot on the 5VSB rail, which goes above 5.5V so it is out of the range that the ATX spec sets as safe. Simply put, notably higher, than the nominal, voltage levels cause increased stress to the system's components. In the second test, the slope is smooth while in the last one, there is a small overshoot along with a low ringing (the second wave in the line representing the +12V rail's signal).

Ripple Measurements

Ripple represents the AC fluctuations (periodic) and noise (random) found in the PSU's DC rails. This phenomenon significantly decreases the capacitors' lifespan because it causes them to run hotter. A 10°C increase can cut into a cap's useful life by 50 percent. Ripple also plays an important role in overall system stability, especially when overclocking is involved.

The ripple limits, according to the ATX specification, are 120mV (+12V) and 50mV (5V, 3.3V, and 5VSB).

Swipe to scroll horizontally
Test12V5V3.3V5VSBPass/Fail
10% Load5.8 mV8.4 mV21.6 mV9.6 mVPass
20% Load11.3 mV9.2 mV23.6 mV11.0 mVPass
30% Load15.7 mV10.2 mV28.3 mV12.0 mVPass
40% Load20.7 mV11.8 mV27.2 mV12.7 mVPass
50% Load27.7 mV12.0 mV29.1 mV13.9 mVPass
60% Load32.2 mV14.9 mV33.7 mV14.5 mVPass
70% Load36.4 mV16.3 mV35.4 mV16.0 mVPass
80% Load42.2 mV18.7 mV42.8 mV17.1 mVPass
90% Load50.4 mV17.9 mV55.2 mV19.2 mVFail
100% Load56.4 mV18.8 mV35.0 mV22.8 mVPass
110% Load63.3 mV21.7 mV56.8 mV24.6 mVFail
Crossload 19.3 mV13.4 mV24.0 mV30.0 mVPass
Crossload 256.1 mV15.0 mV29.1 mV21.3 mVPass

The ripple suppression could be better at +12V. Ideally we would like to see less than 40mV ripple in the worst case scenario on this rail. At 5V and 5VSB the ripple readings are low enough, while at 3.3V, there seems to be a problem in some tests.

Ripple At 90% Load

Ripple At Full Load

Ripple At 110% Load

Ripple At Cross-Load 1

Ripple At Cross-Load 2

MORE: Best Power Supplies

MORE: How We Test Power Supplies

MORE: All Power Supply Content

Aris Mpitziopoulos
Contributing Editor

Aris Mpitziopoulos is a contributing editor at Tom's Hardware, covering PSUs.