NZXT HALE90-750-M Power Supply

The NZXT-750-M is a solidly build power supply. It’s made from quality parts and does what it was designed for–providing a stable source of power at a reasonable price point.

Introduction

NZXT’s history as a business spans from its beginnings in 2004 to today. First entering the computer gaming market with gaming chassis like the Guardian and Lexa series of cases, they now have a wide and varied array of products for the consumer to choose from. These include cases and case accessories, 120/140/200 mm case fans and fan control units, a couple laptop coolers, a gaming mouse, and of course the HALE90 series of power supplies, of which we will be looking at the 750  variant.

The NZXT HALE90-750W-M power supply comes in an almost blinding white, with a black trim.

The retail box and power supply together.

A closer view of input and output specifications panel on the side of the power supply shows a single 62A 12 volt rail and 80 Plus Gold certification.

The 140 mm fan intake for cooling the supply. The PSU is at the least, quieter than the other components in the system.

The two sleeved cables are on the left. Eight modular keyed connectors for the supplied cables are on the right. The eight are identical electrically and interchangeable. 

Features

Specifications 

This table is a re-representation of the chart on the side of the power supply.  

Unboxing

This is a top down view of the package contents. Visible are the AC power cord, the power supply itself, and along the bottom, the case containing the assorted cables.
Packaging is fairly straight forward. Four sides are protected with padding while the remaining two are buffered with the power cord and the cable bag to protect the power supply during shipping.

The working end of the supply. To the right are the eight locations to attach the power cables to. To the left are the pair of non-modular cables. The non-modular cables connect to the motherboard’s EATX 20+4 and EPS+12v connector locations.

This is the user’s manual that is shipped with the supply. Shown are the front cover and the table of contents. Seven different languages are used in the manual at this time. Most of the information is covered in one page per language.

A better view of the case for the cables, handy if not all the cables are needed.

Shown are the adapter cables included with the power supply. From left to right are the following–2x SATA cables, 2x PCI-E 6-pin cables, 2x PCI-E 6+2-pin cables, 1x 4 pin Molex cable and 1x 4 pin Molex cable plus 4 pin floppy connector.

 Pictures & Impressions

The PCI-Express 6+2 pin cables measure 55 cm in length while the PCI-Express 6 pin cables are a few millimeters longer.

The 4 pin Molex Style cable (four connectors) measured 54.5 cm to the first Molex connector and then 15 cm between the additional three connectors. The added grips on either side of the Molex connector were a nice addition and aided in disconnecting them from the back of devices as they helped ease the connector out as you pinched them together. This is definitely important, as male and female pins in Molex connectors are usually loosely secured, and are free to wobble about. Wrenching out a Molex pin from its connector with excessive force can dislodge the pins and potentially render the connector defective.

One issue with the 4 pin Molex connectors used by NZXT were they seemed a bit tight and difficult when attaching them to the chassis fan cables in the HAF X. This issue was not seen with the other power supply. Buyers should use caution.

The SATA power cables measured 55.5 cm to the first SATA connector and 15 cm between the three additional connectors.

The EPS+12V cable measured 72 cm from the back of the power supply to the back of the connectors.

The Motherboard ATX 20+4 cable had a length of 56.5 cm, again from the back of the power supply to the back edge of the connectors. 

These two images show the keyed and modular connectors used, the left ones on the back of the power supply; and the right, one of the modular cables. 

Testing & Methodology 

The above table lists the measurement tools used to gather results for this article. The Fluke meter was used to measure both AC and DC voltage. The Kill-A-Watt was used to make comparisons regarding efficiencies between the two power supplies. OCCT was used to assist in providing more load from the video card.

 This table describes the PC used for testing purposes. Readers should note that CPU was running at stock.

 Above were the items used to add load in addition to the normal running PC.

Results

Before we begin, it is worth mentioning that we at Bjorn3D.com do not have the five thousand dollars worth of testing equipment required to exhaustively test for line noise, exact power draw per individual voltage line, and so forth. The following results are based upon a basic user level testing, and user level experience with these PSUs.

There are several ways one could inexpensively add additional load to a power supply under test.  If one has both the skill and time, they could design and build an active load using power FETS and forced air cooled heat sinks. They could also use power resistors and assemble a passive load.  Rather than using power resistors, we acquired several boxes of 12 Volt 75 Watt halogen lamps. The plan was to have the power supply under normal load from a PC and then add additional lamps to increase the load on the 12 Volt line while taking voltage measurements to track any drop as the power supply worked harder.

The lamps were purchased without ceramic sockets, and instead a jig was made to to hold each lamp and at the same time supply 12 Volts to the lamps pins. Soldering was not an option as it had the potential to melt from the heat of the lamps. The jig was spring loaded to put constant pressure at the contact points rather than soldering.

From the chart, this power supply was hands down more efficient than the BFG PSU. It was stable under load and displayed minimal voltage drop along the way.

The tests were run under four conditions between the two power supplies. The Idle condition was run with Windows 7 running at the desktop. The Load condition was with the PC running OCCT to stress the video card. The +2 Lamps was with an additional 150 Watts of load. The +3 Lamps was with 225 Watts added to the PC running while it ran OCCT to stress the video card.

The Kill-A-Watt provided the information on how much power was drawn from the AC outlet. The DC voltage measurements were taken with the Fluke Meter. Readings were taken at one of the modular connectors on the back of the HALE90-750-M while on the BFG-800, they were taken at the end of one of the unused power connectors. 

Conclusion

This is a solidly build power supply. It’s made from quality parts and does what it was designed for–providing a stable source of power at a reasonable price point. 62A on a single 12 volt rail will provide lots of current for hungry video cards and other power-consuming components.

The supplied cables were plenty long enough for the HAF X case that was used and arranging the flat cables and securing them in place was little effort. One has to be a bit careful when connecting the 4 pin Molex Style connectors as the pins inside can wiggle, and it can a bit frustrating at times.