SilverStone NightJar NJ520 Power Supply Review

Hot Test Results

From the tables below, it can be seen that the output power quality of the Silverstone Nightjar NJ520 is exceptional. The maximum voltage ripple that our instrumentation recorded was 34 mV under maximum load. Even with the unit heavily cross-loaded, the ripple on the 12V line only went up to 46 mV, which is much lower than the 120 mV design limit. Voltage regulation is less than 1% for the 12V line and just over 1.2% for the minor lines, performance figures that are excellent and comparable only to those of top-tier products.

Although this unit is rated for operation with an ambient temperature of up to 40 °C, it performed just fine even with an ambient temperature of 50 °C. The energy conversion efficiency is reduced by about 0.4%, a fantastic result for increasing ambient temperature by 25 °C.

As the Nightjar NJ520 has no fan, the increase in ambient temperature essentially increases the operating temperature of the unit almost proportionally. The temperature of the primary and secondary side heatsinks is now reaching up to 81.9 °C and 84.1 °C respectively, figures that would make us feel uncomfortable but are not high enough to trigger a thermal shutdown by the protective circuit of the unit. The Nightjar NJ520 will simply shut down if overheated, as it has no active cooling and thus it cannot take any action to change its thermal performance. Obviously it's not really intended to be run in such extreme conditions, so plan accordingly.