What Is everyones opinion on AIO water coolers? I have been looking at cheaper ones like the Cooler Master Seidon 120xl and the Thermaltake Water 2.0 Preformer and the Coasair H80i. I want to go with a good AIO water cooler on a current build i am working on and i like how it doesn't take much space in the case and doesn't block ram dims. Suggestions? Opinions?
they're good for what they advertise. maybe a little modding but they aren't fantastic. water cooling isn't about higher ocs it's about queiter computing.
Okay. Well I am not brave enough to start messing around with over clocking yet.
I think the larger AIO coolers, like the H100i or the NZXT Kraken x60 are hard to beat on performance. But, the smaller single rad AIO coolers don't deliver, and they are quite expensive.
There are air coolers that offer the best of everything: small footprint, great performance, great price, and look good.
I'd recommend the Phantek PH-TC12DX. It will run quieter than an AIO cooler.
I hate them. They are overpriced, ugly, and underperforming. The only worth-while watercooling is a custom loop; any other kind of "water cooling" isn't going to perform as well, nor look as good. Even the Kraken X60 (the best thermally performing AIO, tied with the Swiftech H220), isn't as good as the cheaper Phanteks PH-TC14PE with triple fans in push-pull. It will be quieter to go for air cooling with "premium" parts, and better for temps.
you took the words right out of my mouth, the only reason id ever get one is if i had limited options or space for an air heatsink, but then again for the price of an x60 you can build a small custom loop from the XSPC kit.
Yeah, I'd have to agree with everyone else. The only ones worth getting are probably the Corsair H100i, Kraken X60, and possibly other 240mm radiators. According to Linus (Linus Tech Tips) the new Thermaltake 240mm AIO water cooler is performing pretty well because it has a thicker radiator, but I'll have to check out performance benchmarks for it before I can confirm.
In other words, the single 120mm radiator AIO water cooling kits aren't really worth the money most of the time. If you have a small case where you need to save space, then they're pretty great, but otherwise...not so much.
The 240mm radiator AIO kits are nice, but you're going to have to shell out a decent amount of money to pick one up. At that point you might be able to get a custom loop kit (which will perform worlds better) for around the same price.
I don't know about that. It really depends on what you're looking for. A lot of people just want to be able to overclock a little further while running much cooler than you would with a normal CPU cooler. You can usually do all of that while running a very quiet computer anyway though.
really? I got my kraken X60 for 129.99, cheapest bare bones kit from XSPC is about $165 on sale. I'm surprised at yours and Brendan's disdain for all AIO liquid coolers. What experience do you guys have with them? I've used a few different ones from Cool-it, Corsair and now NZXT. I've always overclocked with them and never had a problem.
For having so much negative to say, just interested in how much use you have with all the different models out there. :-D
y'all overlooked the advantage of not having a massive heavy tower crowding your ram and stessing your cpu socket and motherboard with tortional stresses. the weight and mass of the loop of an all in one is mostly in the rad , mounted to the case. that said don't buy the coolermaster they ripped off asetek .
http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2013/03/11/asetek-sues-cm/1
It wasn't overlooked. There are plenty of small air coolers that deliver great performance. I only choose coolers that don't block the dimms
I have used both an H100i and Kraken X60s in my rig, and friends' rigs that I've built. They aren't performing at what I want, and are still beaten by my Phanteks PH-TC14PE. I just don't like them - too expensive, ugly, and underperforming.
When mounted properly, the stress is nominal; those boards are strong. The tall heatspreaders on RAM are pointless, anyway; they are unnecessary to begin with, providing cooling to parts that don't really need cooling.
Cool Cool. Well, like I've said, used a few from a few different brands, loved every one, met all my expectations and kept my case aesthetically pleasing and my cpu cool and quiet. Fair enough you don't like, but I find they really do the trick for me!
If your going with water pick up a swifttech h220 so you can expand off of it. Also it is much higher quality then the corsair and nzxt models.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835108183&Tpk=swiftech%20h220%20cpu%20water%20cooler&IsVirtualParent=1
Well I looked around and was suprised that the Phantek PH-TC12DX with dual fans, preforms better then the Corsair h80i and its small enough that it will fist in most every case. I will be getting the Phantek instead now because that a few less failures I have to worry about down the road, and it preforms slightly better then any AIO that I can afford right now.
the reviews of the swiftech h220 gives it a fail, pumps to noisy for one to be an all in one
The pump is allot more powerfull then the other all in one coolers. It is made for future upgrades.
This is the reason I didn't go with the swiftech. I'm hoping that they iron out the bugs, that or I'll just put in a custom loop. I never noticed any pump noise on my H80, even at 'full blast', but the response on the net is that there were a lot of pump problems. The X60 is very quiet, no audible pump noise, got my 8350 OC'd to 4.8 1.48v 100% load @ 55C. I'm quite tempted to try out the Noctua NH-D14 or the 'Dark Knight' on my next build, Logan raves so much about the DK that I just HAVE to try it!
I see that linus took back his first review where he failed it