Thermaltake TOUGHPOWER PT 1200W Power Supply Review – Smaller and Mightier
PC Components are becoming more power-hungry, which makes choosing the right power supply for your build tricky. You need to find the right wattage to power your rig, with a little overhead, and also make sure that it will physically fit in your case, or wherever you need it. However, Thermaltake is looking to overcome such issues with its new PT range of power supplies. The PT range comes in 850W, 1000W, and 1200W, offering something for most standard users. Today, we will be taking a look at the 1200W offering.
The PT 1200W PSU is an 80 PLUS platinum certified PSU with support for dual PCIe Gen 5.1 16-pin (12+4) connectors. It features 100% Japanese capacitors and a single +12V rail. It comes with a 135mm fan to keep things cool, and the low-profile modular cables step things up a bit from the standard flat black modular cables we see on most power supplies.
Where to Buy?
SCAN UK – £169.99 At the time of review
Amazon.com – $199.99 At the time of review
Specifications
Packaging, Accessories, and Cables
The front of the box features a nice minty green color and lists the main specifications of the PT 1200W. You will also see some of the main specifications of the PSU across the bottom. These are likely to be the main points that will help grab people’s attention and persuade them to purchase this PSU.
Opening up the box, we can see everything is nicely packed. There is a plastic back with documentation, screws, and cable ties. Under this is the PT 1200W power supply, which is encased in styrofoam to help protect it. Lastly, we have a bag full of all the cables, so users can make the most of their new PSU.
As we see with most power supplies these days, there is a region-specific power cable, standard cable ties, and even some premium labelled Thermaltake velcro cable ties.
There are plenty of cables to power up your system, and while the PT series may feature a smaller PSU unit than its competitors, the cables are still of standard length, so you shouldn’t run into any issues with cable management.
Each cable has the same braiding, and what is even better is that they also feature movable cable combs. This is going to give you as much control of your cables, meaning you can tuck and bend them as you please and route them where you like.
External
Covering the PT 1200W’s 135mm fan is a mesh-like panel. Normally, these holes are much smaller, so as to avoid anything falling in, but Thermaltake wants this to get plenty of airflow to keep things cool. This will be fine, as you should be careful around your PC components anyway.
The sides of the PSU have the Thermaltake logo, the TOUGHPOWER PT 1200W branding, an 80 PLUS Platinum logo, and the wording ATX 3.1 Platinum. This is a bit overkill and would have looked much better with just the Thermaltake logo; the rest is unnecessary.
The rear of the PSU features the main input connector and a power button. The PT series does not feature any RGB or have a Smart/0% fan feature, so there are no extra buttons needed.
The modular cable ports are all nicely labelled, so you won’t have any problem plugging your cables in. The cables will only fit in the ports they belong to anyway, but this does make things much easier when it comes to connecting them all.
The top of the power supply, likely not to be seen in most builds, is where all the input is on the power input/output and all of the other technical data that no one really looks at on a PSU.
Internals
When I said no one looks at the power input/output, I just meant the sticker on the PSU. Those looking for the data will normally check the box or the Product Page on the website for this information.
This is a CWT Design with a full-bridge topology on the primary side and also features an LLC resonant converter to help reduce energy loss. The PCB is absolutely tiny, especially when considering this is a 1200W unit we are looking at.
While the PT series is smaller in size than typical PSUs, it still features a 135mm fluid-dynamic bearing fan, as we have seen. This is a brushless 12V fan that does a good job of keeping the PT series of PSUs at a good operating temperature.
To help aid the 135mm fan in keeping things cool, CWT has added some rather large heatsinks to the mix on the primary side.
To help keep pricing low, especially in the current market, CWT has used its own fan and has used Chinese FETs instead of properly branded ones.
Size Comparison
One of the big selling points of the PT series is its size. When comparing it to another 1200 PSU from Thermaltake, the TOUGHPOWER GF3 1200W, we can see that it is significantly smaller, though they are the same wattage.
What is even more impressive is that while the PT series is physically smaller than the GF3 series, they both use a 135mm fan to cool internal components. This means Thermaltake has reduced the size but not lost out on the quality of cooling being offered.
The PT series 1200W is 20mm smaller than an average 1200W power supply. While this may not seem like much, this is going to make a load of difference when installing into PC cases. This 20mm is going to allow the PT series to fit in more cases and also allow for more storage of those extra lengths of cable that we all know and love. .
Testing System and Methodology
While we don’t currently have a load test for power supplies, we have done what we can to push the PSU as far as we can so we can best test things and share our results.
Methodology
Ambient temperatures were taken after the PC had been powered off for at least 30 minutes. Idle temperatures were taken after the PC was powered on and sitting on the Windows 11 desktop for 30 minutes. Load thermals were taken after both Prime 95 and FurMark V2 were running simultaneously for 30 minutes.
Noise testing, measured in dB, was also taken at each of the above 3 stages at the 30minute intervals using an S8607 Sound Level Meter.
Programs Used
- Prime 95 – CPU Stress Test
- FurMark V2 – Intensive GPU Stress Test
Test System
- Case – Open Benchtable BC1
- Motherboard – AORUS X870 Elite WIFI7 ICE
- CPU – AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D
- Thermal Paste – Thermal Grizzly Duronaut
- Cooler – MSI MAG CoreLiquid E360 AIO
- Memory – Corsair Vengeance 32GB (2x16GB) DDR5 6000 MT/s @ 1.40V
- Graphics Card – EVGA NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 FTW 10GB
- Power Supply – Thermaltake PT 1200W
Testing Results
Thermal
For the thermal testing, I used the Thermal Master P2 Thermal USB-C Camera. The highest temperature I recorded during all my testing was, of course, after 30 minutes of the system being used at full load. During this test, we saw highs of 35.8 °C.
Noise Levels
Again, the noise levels were tested at the same intervals as the power and thermals. However, my dB meter did not pick up anything, even when lying directly on the PSU. This meter is designed to test in the range of 30-130dB, which means the PT 1200w power supply noise levels were under 30dB.
30dB is audible, but it is normally not considered disruptive and is generally used as the point at which environments are no longer quiet. This means that the PT series, during our testing, would barely be audible and, once installed into a case with other components, would not cause any noise pollution within the system. We all know that when it comes to building PCs, the less noise the better!
Power
While I could not max out the 1200W power supply, I gave it my best! Using my AM5 Test system, I was able to push a maximum of 791W through the PT 1200W PSU continuously when running the full load tests. Users putting more power through the PT series may see a slight increase in internal temperatures, but these will likely be very minimal, if at all.
Final Words
It is safe to say, I have put the Thermaltake PT 1200W Power Supply through its paces as best I could. One of the main selling points here is going to be its smaller size when compared to typical power supplies of a similar wattage. Let’s just say, Thermaltake has knocked this one out of the park.
Not only does it perform well while remaining cool and quiet, but it also comes with a 10-year warranty and, believe it or not, is affordable! When comparing to competitors, the PT 1200W comes in quite a bit cheaper than a lot of other 1200W models out there. Thermaltake has really gone with an aggressive pricing on this model,l and it is more than welcome, especially given the current state of the industry as a whole. As mentioned, this can currently be purchased from SCAN UK for £169.99 at the time of writing this review.
It is also packed with plenty of features to make it well worth your money. It has 2x 16-pin 12V-2×6 connectors, 100% Japanese capacitors, a 135mm fan, all in a compact casing that is going make this more versatile than most standard power supplies of the same wattage.
If you are in the market for a new power supply, the PT series from Thermaltake is a good option. While we took a look at the 1200W model in this review, it does also come in 850W and 1000W models for those who don’t need quite as much power. Size, performance, and a crazy 10-year warranty make the PT series Power supplies more than worth your hard-earned money!
