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.
Performance, Performance Per Dollar, Noise, And Efficiency Ratings
Performance Rating
The following graph shows the TPG-0850D-R's total performance rating, comparing it to other units we have tested. To be more specific, Thermaltake's PSU is shown as 100 percent, and every other unit's performance is shown relative to it.
The +12V rail's bad performance in the turn-on transient tests, the low power-good hold-up time, loose load regulation on the minor rails, and >50mV of ripple at +12V during the full-load test combine to put the TPG-0850D-R into last place compared the competition we charted.
Performance Per Dollar
The following chart may be the most interesting to many of you because it depicts the TPG-0850D-R's performance-per-dollar score. We looked up the current price of each PSU on popular online shops and used those prices and all relative performance numbers to calculate the index. If the specific unit wasn't available in the United States, we searched for it in popular European Union shops, converting the listed price to USD (without VAT). Note that all of the numbers in the following graph are normalized by the rated power of each PSU.
The combination of mediocre performance and a high price leads to a terrible result for Thermaltake.
Noise Rating
The graph below depicts the cooling fan's average noise over the PSU's operating range, with an ambient temperature between 28°C and 30°C (82°F to 86°F).
Thermaltake's offering performs pretty well when it comes to noise, since its fan remains quiet through most scenarios.
Efficiency Rating
The following graph shows the PSU's average efficiency throughout its operating range with an ambient temperature between 28°C and 30°C.
The overall efficiency we measured is lower than the TPG-0850D-R's direct competitors. The difference reaches up to 1% compared to the Gold-rated XFX offering, which uses a solid Seasonic platform.
