Be Quiet! Straight Power 12 1500W PSU - ATX 3.0 PSU review
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xrodney
Very disapointed in connector Layout. I would not like this for 800W and definetly not accept it for 1500W.
Only Two EPS and two PCI-e.
In comparison Seasonic Prime TX-850 or TX-1300 provide 8 and 11 PCIE/EPS connector.
I dont like using pigytail or splitter cables and realy hate when vendors pretty much vendorlocking PSU to Nvidia.
It would be acceptable for lower end computers, but then you dont need 1500W.
Its nice that it can Run dual 4090 setup, but hardly can accomodate single AMD GPU setup.
@Hilbert Hagedoorn , nice review, but disapointed by product.
BTW, 4 PCI-e Cables for two connectors, two of them being as spare?
SamuelL421
The guts of this PSU appear to be great though I have to concede that opting for only 2x 12+4 (PCIe 5.0) connectors is a disappointment. Not only pseudo- vendor locking, but who is this really geared at, besides someone haphazardly "future proofing" their build?
This PSU seems to cater to a very specific (workstation?) user that has 2x 4090's or 2x Ada RTX 5000's (or similar) - nevermind that someone (business) with the budget for multiple RTX Ada workstation cards is more likely to be going through a 3rd party than building themselves (and will end up with white label parts from the enterprise brand they go with, rather than something like a PSU from BeQuiet). Power users are going to want some 6/8pin connector options. That leaves the odd non-business/enterprise, non-power user who also happens to need a 2x 4090 build (for rendering/local LLM?),... I would think that pool of customers is not huge.
TLD LARS
It has 4 PCI 8 pin cables with the option of buying more if needed.
It looks like 1 of the P8 CPU power can be converted to 2 more PCI 8 pins for a total of 6.
The 2 PCI 5.0 connecter could en theory be converted to more PCI 8 pins, if you really want to run more then 3x reference 7900XTX or more then 2x overclocked 7900XTX.
The Dark power pro 13 1300 and 1600 has 6 PCI 8 pins out of the box if you really need it.
xrodney
No sure how sensing pins works on PSU side for 12VHPWR but I would prefer awod that connector all together its still have issues even on PSU side.
Just for idea, I have Asus x670 Hero motherpoard that use 2 EPS+ 6pin PCI-e for USB PD, Saphire 7900xtx Nitro+ which use another 3x PCI-e which makes this PSU insufficient even before throwing in any addin card. for anything else you need to use splitter, daisy chaning etc.
Only reason to buy this PSU is to run dual 4090, for anything else its overkill with power or insufficient connector wise.
And even The Dark power pro 13 only have 2 EPS and 3 PCI-e connectors. Yes you can theoreticaly use 6 with daisycain, but that still wont allow me to use even single add in card as you will use two cables for GPU and 3rd one for USB PD.
Not something I would like to pay 450 eur for.
TLD LARS
What makes you think there is daisy chaining going on with the straight and dark power PSU?
Also dual 8 pin on a Ryzen board? the CPU is going to be uncoolable long before hitting the 8 pin limit and Ryzen scales like crap anyway at those power levels.
My 10 year old PSU did not have 2x 8 pin so I did not bother connecting both up, but I only have a 7800X3D, it is not even capable of maxing out a PCI 8 pin power connector, let alone a 8 pin CPU power connector.
The front USB-C connector on the Asus board still delivers 27W without installing the 6 pin power connector, not the biggest loss.
xrodney
You might meed dual EPS on intel board as well as Threadripper or EPYC, I usualy have 4-5 different builds using same PSU and I simply dont like to buy new PSU every time I decide to change my build. Like with case, it have to be handle anything especialy when PSU appart from GPU can be most expensive and also most critical component in your system.
Pigtailing is when you split cable (run another cable from connector to nex one) and you can have 3-4 pigtails on 2x 6+2 cable.
Each split adds another point of possible failure, increase resistancy, increase load on wires which can then cause multiple different issues. I had that happen in past multiple times, never happened with straigh cable.
And PD on front USB is important to me as I am using it to power some devices like notebook for example.
TLD LARS
What makes you think there is Pigtailing going on with the straight and dark power PSU?
The straight power has 4 PCI power, each with their own individual cables connected from the PSU end to the connector end (according to pictures on the Be Quiet homepage)
You would have 3 for the GPU and 1 for the front USB.
It has 2X 8 pins CPU power also individually cabled from PSU to connector, so you can connect both of them if you ever change to Intel or a workstation that needs it in the future.
All that without even touching the PCI 5.0 power connectors yet.
If you really need the "Future proofing" the Dark power 13 1300Watts and up, has 6 PCI power connectors instead, so you would have 2 extra PCI power connectors you do not need yet.
Powering a laptop/notebook with a front USB-C is the weirdest thing I have heard in a long time, but apart from that the PC would need to be ON to turn on the 12 volt in the PSU PCI connector to power the front USB output.
It is fine if the PC is ON anyway, but very wasteful to use 50-100 Watts power running idle at the desktop to charge a laptop with 60 Watts via the front USB.
You should buy a 40€ wall plug with 65W USB-C output for laptop/notebook charging, but you still have enough connectors to do it if you want, with the straight power 12 1500W from this review.
xrodney
You are wrong, look at that Dark power 13 1300 again, it only have 2x 12VHPWR, 3x PCI-e and 2x EPS connectors, Rest is just for Sata and main 24pin MB coonector.
I got new PSU this year and yes I was looking into multiple brands including Be Quiet and none of their PSU was sufficient/acceptable for me. In end I went with Seasonic Prime 850W because unlike many others it had 8 EPS/PCI-e and 6 Sata which is double of what Be Quiet Dark Power offers.
And yes I have PC running most of the time, I use it for everything incliding watching TV listening music, managing my home network, network sharing for my wife computer etc.
And I as well have 60/100W chargers, actually more of them used in all rooms and they all eat few wats so why to use more when I already have computer running.
I have 5+ devices that use USB-C charging and that does not count another ones that my wife own and it happen often that i need to charge more than one at same time and usually quickly. I already have used like 16 sockets for computer, audio, network and other tech stuff, dont want to add another cable with socket expansion just to add another USB charger.
TLD LARS
No
The PCIe connector on the PSU side has 12 pins to feed the 2 PCI connectors.
A PCI 8 pin only has 6 pins delivering power, the rest is sense pins and only the 6 power delivering cables go down to the PSU.
if the connector in the PSU is 12 pins to feed 2x 6 pins of power in the 2 PCI connectors then every single power delivery pin has a dedicated wire going to the PSU.
The sensing is handled in the cable end connected to the GPU and is only needed by the GPU, the PSU does not care about the sense pins at all.
