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Now at the top of the range of what power supplies have to offer, we review the Corsair HX1000i. Looking to bring the most power to your system, efficiently and up to the latest standard. Considering its price and the support behind it, it should be one for the years, and you’d like to think so. With a robust portfolio, we don’t expect too much disappointment from Corsair so we see if it lives up to it and becomes the best PSU for you.

Corsair HX1000i

4.5 /5

Editor’s Rating

How We Review

Specifications

Wattage: 1000W
Form Factor: ATX (180mm length)
Rating: 80+ Platinum, Cybenetics Platinum
Design: Fully modular + iCUE link

What We Think

The Corsair HX1000i is an overall impressive power supply, with the power behind it and a long 10-year warranty making it a desirable long-term solution. Especially with the Platinum ratings it has ensured your system running costs are limited as well. Along with the inclusion of ATX 3.0 makes it a modern choice for new graphics cards. Furthermore, the iCUE link makes it a top choice for those interested in the ins and outs and data nerds alike.

But all that comes at an extra cost. It rises above other 1000W and Platinum selections, so it does come at a premium, but for those that can afford it, it’s a top choice out there especially as it is likely to last you many builds yet to come. This means the cost over many years should be a lot more cost-effective.

Reasons to Buy

Eco-friendly packaging limits plastic use but still provides protection with foam and film
Latest gen spec with a 12VHPWR native power connector
Top-tier efficiency for great long-term costs especially with 10 year warranty
USB connector allows for tracking in iCUE for good insight
Limits standard PCIe to just two cables, and leaves extra SATA ports
Top quality build and FDB fan that is virtually silent

Reasons to Avoid

Very expensive compared to base choices of 1000W Platinum PSUs
A longer ATX PSU than standard choices
Rapid flashing LED on back but will be hidden away so seems unnecessary

Design

Corsair’s HX1000i is a well-built and beefy power supply. It comes well-packed into the box it comes with which also keeps the packaging more eco-friendly for the newer model choice. Reducing the plastic packaging, especially for the cables that come in a box instead. Along with changing the wrap on the PSU which helps with recycling and keeping rubbish down. Although the foam protectors are a bit harder to deal with but kind of a necessity if you want your PSU to survive transport.

Corsair HX1000i is an overall impressive power supply, with the power behind it and a long 10-year warranty making it a desirable long-term solution

With the pack you get a good count of zip ties as well, allowing for some great cable management. That also comes naturally with the fact that the model is fully modular and you only need to install the ones you actually need. Plus there is a lot of range and options to choose from considering it is an ATX 3.0 unit and so you do get native a 12VHPWR cable, giving you the choice of the best graphics cards out there and for many years with the power rating and support on it.

Although it is a 1000W power supply and comes with the latest connector only two standard PCIe cables, although they do double up to two connectors on each which should provide enough for any GPU, along with coming with two EPS connectors for your CPU, you can get a good overclock and power to your entire system effectively. Even though there are some extra ports you can’t use up all the SATA and PATA ports with the given cables

For the cooling of the PSU, it features a full 140mm fluid dynamic bearing fan. Along with a zero RPM mode, it does provide a strong cooling selection and performance when it comes to it. It also comes with a USB connection to plug into your motherboard and with an LED to the side showing activity. That connects up to iCUE and you can easily see how your PSU is performing and set profiles to it which makes it easier to see what it’s doing and set limits to it for peace of mind and longevity.

Size

The Corsair HX1000i comes in at a standard ATX sizing, but it is a longer choice as well. Since it is extended to 180mm it does take up a bit more space in the bottom, so it’s best to make sure you have everything you need for installation and not have to plug it in after. It also means you have to be careful with your PC case choice so you can fit it in so that you don’t have any issues, but it certainly is not an SFX pick for smaller builds.

Performance

Plugging the power supply into our test bench we got to see how it does, with the combination of iCUE and HWinfo accessing those sensors we got a bit more information on what the power supply was doing. Alongside that keeping an eye on our power meter to see how much power is needed for it. Our test bench consists of the following components:

Ryzen 9 7950X CPU
ROG X670E Hero motherboard
Phanteks 1000W PSU
Corsair Dominator Titanium 64GB 6600
ROG Ryujin II 360 AIO CPU cooler
MSI Gaming X Trio RTX 3090

The CPU and GPU are the main contributors to the power requirement of your PC. For our combination, the CPU and GPU combine to a minimum of 520W. Along with a recommendation of at least 750W, which the HX1000i can easily cover but also provide with good efficiency. We put that to the test by running Furmark 2 CPU and GPU stress tests and recorded the PSU performance.

for a component that might not be at the forefront of your build it brings about so much more than the rest

In that full load situation, the power draw from the wall was around 706W, showing why the recommendation is for that 750W mark. But during that, the efficiency according the the PSU’s own sensors through HWinfo peaked around 93.93% as it rose higher during those intense workloads but wavered around 90% at idle. While the power draw did fluctuate as the graph also shows the fluctuation also dropping to 600W at times. The fan at this time also spun up to 556 RPM, but being a 140mm fan it wasn’t at all too noisy and was a strong cooling capacity.

You can also check out Cybenetics testing, for an in-depth look at what earned the Platinum rating for the PSU. As there you also get a split between 115V and 230V, we are on the latter being in the UK. However, their testing shows its average efficiency at 115V getting 89.9% and 5VSB around 78.5% with the average noise output coming to 24.64dB(A). Whilst at 230V it averages 91.4% with the 5VSB coming to 78.4% and the sound staying around 24.63dB(A) for a noise rating of an A, showing just how quiet it is.

GPUs to pair with the HX1000i

At this power rating, there’s not much you can’t run with the Corsair HX1000i. Even the top-rated graphics card in the RTX 4090 is a top contender for pairing with the PSU as its 450W total graphics power suggests an 850W unit and running it on a high efficiency makes sure your electricity bill is going towards running it effectively. The top AMD GPU can also be a top choice for it with the RX 7900 XTX offering plenty with it for less. So that and the 4090 are both, although the Nvidia card is a bit tougher to find so the RTX 4080 Super is a good alternative as well.

Hands-on Review
ASUS ROG Strix RTX 4090 OC
- GPU: AD102
- CUDA cores: 16,384
- VRAM: 24GB GDDR6X
- Memory bus: 384-bit
- Bandwidth: 1,008 GB/sec
- Base clock: 2235 MHz
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ASUS TUF Gaming Radeon RX 7900 XTX OC
- GPU: Navi 31
- Stream Processors: 6,144
- VRAM: 24GB GDDR6
- Memory bus width: 384-bit
- Bandwidth: 960 GB/s
- Base clock speed: 1,929 MHz
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Gigabyte RTX 4080 Super Windforce V2
- GPU: AD103
- CUDA Cores: 10,240
- VRAM: 16GB GDDR6X
- Bandwidth: 736.3 GB/s
- Memory bus width: 256-bit
- Base clock speed: 2295 MHz
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Conclusion

Overall, the Corsair HX1000i is an outstanding power supply, for a component that might not be at the forefront of your build it brings about so much more than the rest. With such a high efficiency and warranty it’s a PSU built to last, for 10 years minimum of no worry, but with the build quality, we expect even more from it. Along with providing insight into its workings via iCUE, it’s a true enthusiast choice, which is where the drawback is. As the amazing choice sets you back around $260 at full price, although it might save you in bills over the years it might be worth it for those looking to use it for many builds to come, and we would consider it.