A Closer Look

The Zalman ZM600-HP power supply enclosure is painted matte black and uses a single 120mm fan on the bottom-side for cooling.  Several Blue LEDs mounted inside provide a subtle lighting affect.  The power supply has hard-wired cables for the main power leads and modular cables for powering peripheral devices and an additional CPU or PCI-e connector.

 

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The 120mm cooling fan is made by Adda (AD1212MB-A71GL).  It incorporates dual ball bearings and is rated for up to 83.2 CFM and 38 dBA at 2,050 rpm.  To help keep things quiet, the fan speed is automatically controlled by the internal component temperature (speeds up as the combined load and temperature increases). As you will see later, the ZM600-HP cooling system and fan proved to be very effective and quiet, especially at mid to lower power levels.  

 

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The open honey comb grill on the back allows the exhaust air to exit the power supply with minimal resistance.  The The Zalman ZM600-HP incorporates universal input (automatically adjusts the AC line voltage) and active PFC that adds to the units environmental friendliness.

 

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The ZM600-HP power supply supports ATX12V v2.2/EPS12V and is rated for a combined, maximum output power of 600 watts at up to 50°C ambient air temperature (internal case air temperature).  This is an important feature and one many generic power supplies don’t have.  Many less expensive power supplies rate their output capacity based on 25°C, which is not realistic.    

 

Specifications (from the Zalman-USA website)

 

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Notice that the majority of the rated output capacity is supplied by the +12V section.

This is typical of most newer power supplies and a result of changes in the PC industry that more and more rely on +12V instead of +5V and +3.3V.  With over 500W of power available on the +12V rails, the ZM600-HP should be capable of powering most any new system unless you plan to use dual CPU’s with a pair of next generation video cards.

 

Quad +12V outputs

 

The Zalman ZM600-HP PSU incorporates four 12V outputs (+12V1, +12V2, +12V3, and +12V4).  As is the case in most PC power supplies, the four +12V outputs are all derived from a common +12V source and differentiated with individual current limiting circuits.  The following table shows the maximum rated current and what connectors are supplied by each output.

 

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Note 1: The maximum combined load for all four +12V outputs is 42A (504 watts).

Note 2: Zalman doesn’t actually specify which +12V outputs supply the individual connectors.  I’m going by the color-coded wires that supply each connector (Yel-Blk, Yellow, Yel-Blu, Yel-Grn).

 

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