ASUS ROG LOKI 850w SFX

ASUS, which traditionally has been in the market for motherboards and graphics cards, has now entered the market of high-end PSUs. The particular model we are looking at today comes in the ROG or Republic of Gamers brand, dubbed the Loki SFX-L 850w Platinum.

The Loki SFX-L, just like the name implies, is a relatively small SFX PSU with a few "tricks" up its sleeve. The Loki SFX-L is the second time ASUS has used a name from the Marvel Universe, with Thor reserved for the full-size ATX PSU. The Loki SFX-L is designed under the ATX 3.0 design while being 80 Plus Platinum rated. The Loki SFX-L also comes with all the ROG trimmings, like an aRGB fan, premium metal accents, and the axial fan tech found in the Strix series of graphics cards.

Specification-wise, the Loki SFX-L packs 850 watts under almost 71 amps under a single 12-volt rail. An ATX 3.0 design means the Loki SFX-L includes a 12VHPWR 16-pin 600-watt connector for modern-day GPUs such as the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 and RTX 4090. Pricing for the Loki SFX-L 850w has an MSRP of $220 but can be found with a $10 discount. The Loki SFX-L also comes in white, as well as in 750w and 1000w, and it includes a 10-year warranty.

The Loki SFX-L 8502 comes packaged in the standard cardboard box with all kinds of graphics and specifications on the sides. You are first greeted with a bag with some goodies inside.

Inside that bag are zip ties, ROG branded cable straps, a manual, and a coupon for CableMod cables.

Also inside the box, which you wouldn't traditionally find inside, is an SFX to ATX PSU adaptor, which is about a $10 value - a nice touch.

All the cables that come with the Loki SFX-L 850w are bundled together nicely inside another ROG branded bag, except the NEMA 5-15P to IEC-320-C13 16 gauge power cable.

The cabling that ASUS included with the Loki SFX-L is fantastic. Every cable down to the MOLEX cables is individually sleeved. The choice of sleeving has a slightly rubbery feeling but allows it to be thinner for easier and more convenient cable management inside an already cramped mITX enclosure.

And finally, the packaging for the Loki SFX-L 850w itself is packed with two pieces of dense black foam on two sides and wrapped in a soft-touch plastic bag. The only thing that could be improved is encasing the PSU's sides more so that damage during shipping doesn't occur as easily. However, my unit came perfectly fine.

The top of the ROG LOKI SFX-L is just stunning. A brushed aluminum top plate acts as a fan grille for the 120mm aRGB fan, with a digitized ROG logo in the center of the fan hub. ROG branding is also stamped into the upper right corner.

The business side, which has all the cable connections inputs, shows two neatly configured rows. Starting with the top left is the 600w 12VHPWR connection, followed by an 18-pin and 10-pin motherboard connection. The last 6-pin connection is for any peripheral/SATA/Molex. The next row has connections for CPU/PCIe cables and two more connections for peripherals/SATA/Molex. The last two-pin connection is for control of the addressable lighting via AURA aRGB software.

The informational sticker, generally found on the side of a PSU, is located on the bottom of the ROG LOKI SFX-L. You can see on the +12V rail almost 71 amps are possibly drawn. Again, the 80 Plus Platinum rating and a slew of other certifications are present.

The rear of the ROG LOKI SFX-L has the ROG logo, branding, a NEMA 5-15P to IEC-320-C13 connection, and a power switch rocker. Honeycomb mesh also provides an airflow path for the air to escape out the rear of the case. Also, notice there are six mounting holes instead of the usual four you would find on a full-size ATX PSU.

This side of the ROG LOKI SFX-L is what I like to call the "glamor" side. Ohhhh... shiny - with More ROG branding, if you didn't know that already.

The other side is similar to the other, sans the shiny part.

The fan that ASUS has chosen to put in the ROG LOKI SFX-L 850w is a Double Ball Bearing DC 12V .35a 120mm fan from Champion, model number CF1225H12D.

An overhead shot of the internals of the LOKI SFX-L, which the OEM for this particular PSU is from Great Wall, which happens to have a very solid reputation for building small SFX PSUs.

The side daughterboard houses the fan controller, 12V mosfets, DC-DC converters, and various other controllers and capacitors.

The two larger capacitors from Rubycon are rated at 420v, while the larger one is 470 µF, and the smaller one is 330 µF. Also, both Rubycon capacitors are rated to 105C.

The main transformer is located almost in the center of the PSU, while the secondary transformer is under the ROG heatsink.

A view of the LOKI SFX-L's input stage - it's amazing how much can be packed in a small space.

The ROG Loki SFX-L 850w it's quite the visual stunner having the aRGB 120 mm fan inside, let alone with its brushed metallic accents. Controlling the aRGB lighting is easy via ASUS's Aura software.

In testing the ROG LOKI SFX-L 850w, it did quite well, earning its 80 Plus and Cybenetics Platinum ratings. Pulling about 550 watts from the wall measured via a KillaWatt P3, the ROG LOKI SFX-L 850w fed an Intel Core i5 12600K, which pulled about 120 watts under full load, as well as an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Founders Edition with nearly 366 watts maxed out.

Together they total 486 watts. Add around 40 watts for the rest of the system, and we are at 526 watts. A simple math equation tells us that the ROG LOKI SFX-L 850w PSU is running at a 95.6% efficiency, which solidifies its Platinum ratings.

In closing, the ROG LOKI SFX-L 850w ATX 3.0 PSU is a surefire way to get bling and performance into your SFX system. It is impressive how much stuff you can pack into such a small SFX power supply. While there may be a handful of SFX ATX 3.0 PSUs on the market currently, none offer any aRGB other than the ROG LOKI SFX-L 850w.

Performance

95%

Quality

95%

Features

99%

Value

90%

Overall

95%

The LOKI SFX-L 850w ATX 3.0 PSU from ASUS ROG is a visual stunner that introduces aRGB lighting, individually sleeved cables, and the ATX 3.0 standard to the SFX PSU market in a solid way.