The initial PCIe Gen5 ROG Thor power supplies by ASUS will not be completely compliant with the new standard
There is a caveat with the designs of both the PCIe 5.0 12-pin and 12+4-pin variants. The second mentioned version is an entire specifications power supply cable that presents twelve pins parallel to four data signal paths. The four additional pins are essential for full compliance with PCI-SIG standards, “12VHPWR High Power Connector (H+),” which is considered the new premium power connector to supply future graphics cards. For the cable to supply above 450W of power, at least one of the four signals must be grounded. When ASUS presented the Thor power supply, the company described that it would have a 12-pin cable and assured that it would offer 600W of power, which means that one of the four signals would be internally grounded. However, VideoCardz discovered ASUS advertising changes for the Thor power supply site. The website described as offering up to 600W of power through their single 12-pin PCIe 5.0 cable has changed to 450W. There is speculation that ASUS could not produce the total 600W for their new product using the 12-pin connector due to missing internal grounding for one of the four additional pins. Since it does not meet the standard set by PCI-SIG, they must change the wording and show the actual power produced. There is anticipation that the new ASUS Loki power supply will offer a 12+4-pin cable, making more power and with the assumed internal grounding. NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti is rumoring to offer a TDP of 450W and be the first of NVIDIA’s graphics card line to showcase a 12+4-pin cable connection. This new information raises whether the Thor II power supply series will be adequate for the next-gen NVIDIA card. ASUS Thor is the company’s premium power supply, offering power ranges between 850W to 1600W for systems. On the company’s Facebook company page, ASUS revealed that the 1000W variant would ship this month with an MSRP of $360. By the end of this first quarter of the year, the company anticipates sending the 1200W and 1600W power supplies and delaying the 850W variant for the second quarter.
