9-Way 850W Power Supply Roundup

Antec Signature 850W

The name Antec has long been synonymous with quality power supplies which cater to everyone from budget-minded first time buyers to enthusiasts who demand the best of the best. Their new Signature series caters to the latter crowd and are actually considered a cut above as evidenced by the 850W unit’s price of around $225 CDN. Granted, with the release of the new Quattro 1200W there is a new king of the hill in Antec’s stable but the Signature series still has its place in the market.


Antec’s packaging is a study in understated design with a predominantly black color scheme accented by yellow highlights. The interior layout within the box is quite unique as well with the power supply, cables and accessories laid out in a sandwich-style affair with the PSU on the top and the accessories below.


Accessories are pretty much MIA with this unit as Antec sticks to the bare necessities with a thick, oversized power cord, a quick install guide and black mounting screws. What is interesting is the addition of a complete testing report for the power supply which shows the stringent process every unit has to go through before it goes into the retail channel.


The Signature 850W strikes a unique figure when compared to the other units in this roundup since it is the only one to use a single, rear-mounted 80mm exhaust fan. This leaves the top for the strategically-placed gold Antec logo and a vast expanse of black-painted metal.

Meanwhile, the modular interface is quite small when compared to some other power supplies since most of the cables on the Signature are non-modular. The extra PCI-E cables are plugged into the red connectors while the peripheral and drive cables use the other outputs.


As we already mentioned, the majority of cables on the Signature are non-modular. Basically, the ATX cable and connectors for the CPU, two PCI-E 6+2 pin and single strings of Molex and SATA connectors are attached to the unit while additional cables are modular.

Unfortunately, we’re not huge fan of the sleeving used on the cables since it feels slightly cheap and the main cables aren’t sleeved all the way into the PSU housing. This leaves flashes of multi-colored ugliness all over your case which is unfortunate considering how wonderfully neutral the Signature’s design is.


Antec bills this unit as using the best possible components and their OEM Delta Electronics (one of the least known yet among most respected OEMs around) seems to have taken that mantra to heart. The overall layout is positioned to take advantage of the single 80mm fan’s limited air movement which means there are two PCB that face each other. From the soldering to the layout to the pure copper heatsinks, everything within the Signature 850W points to it being one hell of a power supply.


The upper PCB holds the primary filtering section along with a pair of titanic Rubycon capacitors and high-end rectifiers hooked up to a dedicated heatsink. Meanwhile, the lower PCB holds the input and secondary filtering sections the latter of which is a forest of high quality NCC caps.