Thermaltake ToughPower GF3 1200W, ATX 3.0

Da nach dem Launch von NVIDIAs ADA-Spitzenmodellen und dem leidigen Gezerre um den 12VHPWR-Anschluss viele Enthusiasten nach potenten Stromversorgern nach dem neuen ATX-3.0-Standard suchen, bietet Thermaltake mit Toughpower GF3 1200W ein echtes ATX v3.0 Netzteil an, das mit aktuell rund 250 Euro Straßenpreis durchaus eine ernstzunehmende Alternative für viele Besitzter einer GeForce RTX 4090 oder RTX 4080 sein könnte. Denn Ihr kennt das ja mit dem Adapter: Steckst Du nicht richtig drin, dann b4ist du hin…

Thermaltake has a really nice power supply with the Toughpower GF3 Snow 1200 Watt. It’s obviously very powerful, and at 1200 watts, it’s got more than enough grunt for any of today’s flagship CPUs such as the Intel Core i9 series, the top-end Ryzen, or even a Threadripper, and still has enough juice left over for a flagship graphics card such as the RTX 4090 or RX 7900 XTX, as well as all your storage and other devices too. The build quality is excellent too, and really the only two small details I can pick are not a big deal. The AC Line-in soldering looked a bit scruffy, but certainly not unsafe, but this is quite a common site in many PSUs. The flat cables look great, but they were packed in a bit tight and that left some of them with folds and twists in the package that take time to work out and get looking neat again. It’s nicely overbuilt too, and being part of the Toughpower series it means that it’s designed to cope with continuous loads over a long period of time. If you want to draw 1000W+ 24/7 it’ll do it without breaking a sweat. If you have a system that tends to power spike and exceeds that 1200W rating, again, not a problem, it’ll pull up to 1700W for a short period before the OPP kicks in and shuts your system down. I like that Thermaltake made the PSU outer casing bigger too, seemingly just to put a larger 140mm fan inside, and this means it’s a lower RPM that moves more airflow with a lower noise output compared to a 120mm fan that has to spin faster to move the same amount of air. The slightly larger size of the PSU also means there is more room for passive airflow throughout, and there’s additional ventilation on the sides of the PSU to help this even further.

The Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 1200 uses a solid platform by Channel Well Technology, which offers high performance in almost all areas. While in load regulation, the PSU cannot follow the tough competitors, in every other section it scores high. The unit's transient response, among the critical performance factors, is top and the same goes for ripple suppression. If only the fan speed profile were less aggressive, but the lack of heat sinks on the 12V board, and the extended warranty probably pushed CWT to tune the fan speed profile.

Thermaltake’s PSU people try hard to offer quality and high-performance products, and their cooperation with manufacturers like CWT plays a key role in this. The ToughPower GF3 1200 uses the proven CSZ platform, equipped with quality parts. The performance of this unit topped my charts with 115V input, and the PSU scored second with 230V input. Most of the PSUs I used for comparison purposes are Platinum, and one of them is Titanium (be quiet! Dark Power Pro 12), showing that I chose extra tough competitors for the GF3 1200. There aren’t many Gold 1200W units, so I had only two options, select lower capacity Gold units or go with Platinum ones with similar capacity, and I chose the latter.