Conclusions
The FSP Dagger 600W is one of a select few “high” powered SFX units on the market. It is, also, the first SFX power supply that we have seen from FSP at TheFPSReview as well as the first FSP unit overall. However, FSP is not new to the PSU market as they are one of the largest PSU OEMs and they have been competing in the enthusiast space more and more aggressively over the years. Today though, FSP is moving a bit outside of where we have typically seen them competing in the enthusiast space as they have not, typically, been known for SFX units. Let alone 600W SFX units. Which means we have to ask; will this prove to be just too much capacity in an SFX unit to match the expectations enthusiasts have? Or will this be the little power supply that could? Let’s see.
Build Quality
Today’s FSP Dagger 600W starts things off with a build quality that seems very good given the limitations we are going to see with an SFX unit. Externally, the finish that this unit has is very much like what we typically find these days being black and slightly textured. The one downside to the branding is that we see stickers instead of some form or printing on the unit directly. Back on the high side, we see that the unit is equipped with flat FlexForce style cables. When we move to the interior of the unit, we see a cramped, but new and modern, power supply. The topology is very modern and the component selection is generally very high quality. Among these components, we find Nippon Chemi-con and Rubycon standard capacitors coupled with CapXon solid capacitors. The actual integration is very good, though cramped, and there are a few places where things could be cleaned up a bit. Moving on to the support side of things, we know that this unit is covered by a 5 year warranty and not great documentation.
Load Testing
Today’s FSP Dagger 600W provides us with some outstanding results when we consider that we are looking at a 600W SFX units. If we ignore that, we see results that are somewhere between very good and excellent with them leaning towards excellent. Indeed, we saw voltage regulation of up to 0.07v on the 12v rail, 0.04v on the 5v rail, and 0.06v on the 3.3v rail. This voltage regulation is certainly excellent in absolute terms and is easily competitive with other products on the market.
With that for a start to the day, our performance metrics are looking excellent. Moving on to the unit’s efficiency, we see that it ranged from 86.93% to 90.70% at 120v and of 85.94% to 89.88%at 100v. When we look at the 80 Plus tests, we see that the Dagger 600W posted efficiency values of 86.54%-91.02%-88.41% using 80 Plus’s load testing parameters. This put the unit just under the 80 Plus Gold standards. This area is part of what helps moderate the initial comment of leaning towards excellent from being just excellent. Lastly, this unit passed our Torture Test in fine shape which is good to see from an SFX unit given the extra constraints placed on it.
When we look at the Transient Load Tests results for the FSP Dagger 600W today, we see results that look a lot like what we saw above or better! This may be the highlight of the day! When directly loaded, the 12v rail showed a peak change of ~240mV and the 5v rail had a peak change of ~50mV. During the 12v load, the unloaded 5v rail saw a peak change of ~45mV. In absolute terms, those are excellent. Full stop. Not just for a 600w unit, but any unit. On top that, this is an SFX unit. That, of course, makes those results even more impressive. As such, these results would easily be right up there at the very forefront of comparable products.
DC Output Quality
The DC Output Quality results for the FSP Dagger 600W were passing but this unit did not do much better than that. Indeed, we saw peak values of just ~30mV of ripple/noise on the 12v and 5v rails while the 3.3v rail hit ~40mV of ripple/noise. When it comes to absolute values, these values are not great for the minor rails (the 12v rail is doing fine). This is an SFX unit so there is some leeway there, but this is not the high point of this unit today.
Noise
Today’s FSP Dagger 600W is an SFX unit which means space for a large fan will be limited. On top of that, this unit is a 600W unit. That may not seem large for an ATX12v unit these days but it is for a SFX unit. So, what was the noise like? In our testing, this unit was very well behaved. It was not until the Torture Test and the full load tests that we could discern the fan adding noise to our load testing environment. Given the circumstances that we used to reach that noise output, this unit seems to be very nicely behaved and should work out well for most users more normal usage cases.
Final Points & Summary
The FSP Dagger 600W is right up there with the best SFX power supplies in this capacity in most regards. This ends up being the case because of the excellent build quality, excellent voltage regulation, and outstanding Transient Load Test results. The noise output from this unit was also good to very good and the efficiency was not far behind that. The one big area that this unit suffered was the DC Output Quality. However, it must be noted that it was in specification in this aspect. This means this unit has just about all the performance capabilities one could want, but given the slight catches does it have the right price? Well, today, we find the Dagger 600W coming in at ~$109.99. That price does make it competitive with other high powered SFX units. However, it does not quite undercut them enough for this unit to separate itself completely from the pack with or without its one stumbling block. There is nothing wrong with this unit in users pick it up, but if this unit takes a $10 to $15 price drop, though, prepare to “wowed”.
(FSP Dagger 600W SFX Power Supply)