RCHN..$0.33..Swiftech® H220 AIO Water Cooling Kit Review

RCHN..$0.33..Swiftech® H220 AIO Water Cooling Kit Review at Martin's Liquid Lab

http://martinsliquidlab.org/2013/01/27/swifte...ing-kit/4/




LIVING CONCLUSION

While I am not finished with testing, I’ll add bits and pieces here as I go. I will just randomly bullet thoughts I have as I update the review:

KIT GENERAL COMMENTS

The $139.95 price point is an amazing value for the quality parts you get.
The prefilled plug and play installation should satisfy every level of users. Even having several years of experience building custom loops, it was a pleasure to have such a short and easy installation without any of the usual cutting tubes to length, mounting fans, and fill up routine normally associated with DIY kits.
I really like the little 8 way PWM splitter, they need to sell these things separately for the DIY guys, it’s nice!

RADIATOR COMMENTS

Well known and high Slow Speed fan optimized MCR220QP core
Copper fins, brass tubes
Custom compact brass end tanks designed for the H220
Top End tank serves dual purpose collection and reservoir
Bottom splitter (2 pass design) end tanks incorporate custom swivel fittings

PUMP COMMENTS

PWM speed control works very well 12ooRPM – 3000RPM (5%-90%) near linear response, excellent for automatic thermal throttling.
Extreme duty 60,000 hour MTBF (6.8 years 24/7)
Same quality spiral shaped volute with centering feet and clean radius exit port design as the MCP35X
High quality ceramic shaft
High quality dual ceramic washer restraint (Impeller can not slide or move)
High quality large magnetic shaft balanced impeller

INSTALLATION COMMENTS

The mounting mechanism is a joy to use, all mounting systems should be this easy.
Now that I’ve done it once, I could probably have a kit installed and ready to go in just a few minutes.
I like the swivel fittings and 5/8? OD black tubing, it all feels very hearty and solid. The swivel fittings really take the stress off of trying to bend tubing around as the pump and radiator seem to move very freely even with the more DIY sized and beefy tubing.
Visually I really like the looks of the pump/block, while there are not any LEDs, it has a nice hex finish that matches the hex grills on the H2 case.
2011 screws do take a little work to swap out due to the plastic washer/clips, but there is a trick to it that makes it fairly easy.

OPERATIONS & PERFORMANCE

PWM controls seem to work very well and very linear for both fans and pump from 0-100%
Works best if all your case fans are also PWM, you have 5 more PWM channels to use. Or you could use one channel to operate something like a Sunbeam rheosmart to control non PWM fans.
Works best with good PWM software such as Speedfan.
Handling the very hot hexacore 3930K (180W under Prime 95 Small FTT) overclocked to 4.5Ghz fine in open air bench testing, working on a good case test scenario before proceeding further on case testing.
Mixing the Helix fans in pull with GT AP-15s in Push produces a very nice tone and subjectively better than just the helix in pull. Better noise and about a 1C performance boost, suggest push+pull if space allows.