Corsair HX1200 PSU Review

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Performance, Value, Noise & Efficiency

Performance Rating

The following graph shows the HX1200's total performance rating, comparing it to other units we have tested. To be more specific, the tested unit is shown as 100 percent, and every other unit's performance is shown relative to it.

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Very high performance puts our HX1200 sample ahead of the HX1200i we tested. It looks like our equipment recorded better ripple suppression from the new PSU, resulting in its victory.

Performance Per Dollar

The following chart may be the most interesting to many of you because it depicts the HX1200'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.  

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Naturally, the HX1200 achieves a higher value score than the HX1200i since it costs less and just demonstrated slightly higher performance.

Noise Rating

The graph below depicts the cooling fan's average noise over the PSU's operating range, with an ambient temperature between 30°C and 32°C (86°F to 89.6°F).

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The HX1200i clearly wins in this metric, though the HX1200 is still a very quiet power supply with lower-than 25 dB(A) overall noise output.

Efficiency Rating

The following graph shows the PSU's average efficiency throughout its operating range with an ambient temperature close to 30°C.

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The average of multiple thousand load combinations shows that the efficiency difference between Corsair's HX1200i and HX1200 is pretty small.


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Aris Mpitziopoulos
Aris Mpitziopoulos
Contributing Editor

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

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16 Comments Comment from the forums
  • davidgirgis
    In the Conclusion, 'TO' should be 'To'; and 'demands' should be 'depends'; and 'product' should be 'protect'.
    Reply
  • grozzie
    Not another plug/connector change!. I, like many people on this site, build custom PC's, part of which includes sleeved cables. One bug bear is 2 wires into 1, which is a in in the arse. I personally like the HXi series of Corsair PSU's which only have one such connection. I also think the 24 pin ATX supply is outdated and needs revision. I can't see the point of supplying motherboards with 3.3 and 5v rails. If only 12v was supplied with any or all voltage reduction made on board life would be so much simpler and neater. By providing more noise reduction at source (the PSU) gives Motherboard manufacturers an open cart to reduce the quality of voltage regulation i.e capacitor quality, on the motherboard. Is there really a need for another PSU on the market?
    Reply
  • panathas
    On the specifications table it says: "Efficiency: 80 PLUS Gold, ETA-B", which is wrong since this is a Platinum PSU.
    Reply
  • Aris_Mp
    yes we didn't pay much attention to the 80 PLUS efficiency certification :)
    Reply
  • 10tacle
    ^^What are you talking about? Register and get on Corsair's support forums:

    https://sso.corsair.com/idp/AuthnEngine#/authn

    Of course they have a customer support phone number: 888-222-4346 (North America customers).

    Anyway, back on topic, first the $#@! miners have negatively impacted our GPU market, and now they may negatively impact our PSU market. :fou: What makes this really aggravating is that the PSU makers really can't prove a PSU was used 7x24 for heavy mining operation.

    Worse, even if PSU vendors like Corsair offer a mining-specific PSU for less money with just say a 2-3 year warranty, nothing would stop the miners from buying the full 10-year variant. This mining craze is becoming a real pain to we PC enthusiasts.
    Reply
  • 10tacle
    You are making everyone's head hurt. If you want to complain about Corsair, then do so on Corsair's customer support forums and social media. Also, just FYI, Tom's only reviews what is sent to them. They do not go "cherry pick" buy products and review them. For someone who is an alleged "original reader" of Tom's I'd have expected you to understand that.
    Reply
  • jonnyguru
    jellwood... aka: Alex Jones.
    Reply
  • jonnyguru
    20057343 said:
    Not another plug/connector change!. I, like many people on this site, build custom PC's, part of which includes sleeved cables. One bug bear is 2 wires into 1, which is a in in the arse. I personally like the HXi series of Corsair PSU's which only have one such connection. I also think the 24 pin ATX supply is outdated and needs revision. I can't see the point of supplying motherboards with 3.3 and 5v rails. If only 12v was supplied with any or all voltage reduction made on board life would be so much simpler and neater. By providing more noise reduction at source (the PSU) gives Motherboard manufacturers an open cart to reduce the quality of voltage regulation i.e capacitor quality, on the motherboard. Is there really a need for another PSU on the market?

    Bro.. You're all over the place. :D

    So only the 24-pin is pin incompatible with the Type 3 cables. And yes... it's because of the extra sense wires. If you're really going to get all wound up about having to do 2-to-1 wires when doing custom cables, you know what you should do? Don't do 2-to-1 wires. They're only sense wires. The lack of them doesn't prevent the PSU from working. It'll just make your voltage regulation "as bad" as any other PSU that doesn't have the sense wires.

    Yes. The ATX spec is out of date. But Intel wrote it and nobody is going ot implement a new standard without Intel's blessing. They even released a whole new ATX design guide last month that changes almost everything (T1 timing, T3 timing, standby efficiency..) but DID NOT TOUCH the pinout (they made -12V "optional", but that's hardly much of a change).

    Reply
  • beatnutz
    Jellwood: I find it hard to believe that someone who does not know how to write a proper sentence is preparing any students for anything. Let alone the ACT.
    Reply
  • beatnutz
    Jellwood: I find it hard to believe that someone who does not know how to write a proper sentence is preparing any students for anything. Let alone the ACT.
    Reply