Swiftech H2O-120

David Murphy — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 19:45:29 -0600

A lot of the enclosed “for newbs” water-cooling kits we see at Maximum PC are pretty lame. You get a pump/heatsink combination that’s mildly irritating to install, connected by tubing that’s slightly wider than the veins in your arm. The tubing goes to a radiator that’s often unable to handle the heat output of the processor—even with a noisy 12cm fan pushing more air through it than a jet engine. You spend half an hour installing the device for a whopping cooling difference of three degrees versus what you get from a stock air cooler.

Assembling and installing Swiftech’s new H20-120 water-cooling setup will leave many on the brink of frustration, but if you’re willing to trade an hour of your life for additional cooling relief, this device delivers. It cooled our test rig by an average of 6.5 degrees more than our stock cooler in both our idle and punishment CPU tests, outperforming most of the water-cooling kits we’ve tested.

Setting up the H20-120 is similar to building a DIY water-cooling kit. The pieces don’t come assembled; you must do the grunt work. If you’re running an AMD rig, you need to take apart the Intel-specific waterblock that’s attached to the pumping mechanism by default. Instructions are provided, but the process could be confusing for a liquid-cooling newbie.

In a perfect world, Swiftech would have taken a note from its competitors and preassembled the entire kit. The company could close-loop the system and free everyone from having to double, double toil and trouble up a liter of coolant—of which the cooling kit uses very little. Small details, but absolutely crucial for inexperienced users that want a no-fuss setup.

The H20-120 functions great, but it straddles the line between the newbie and enthusiast markets. It’s mildly complex for the former, and its lack of included water cooling for graphics cards will surely make the latter froth at the mouth. Consider this a practice run for your first piecemeal setup.

Swiftech H20-80 Micro

Josh Norem — Wed, 08 Nov 2006 02:04:46 -0600

Swiftech’s dual-radiator Apex Ultra water-cooling kit is the current cooling record-holder (in our Lab, at least), so when the company told us it had a Micro kit that was designed to fit in tight, cramped cases, we were intrigued. Like most hardcore PC users, we assumed a small radiator couldn’t get the job done—at least without making a ton of noise. Boy, were we ever wrong.

The kit uses Swiftech’s best components, including the eerily quiet MCP350 12-volt pump, which pushes the water around like a schoolyard bully. It uses vinyl tubing with a 3/8-inch internal diameter and a tiny transparent reservoir. The cooler’s secret weapon is an 8cm radiator—an all-new “quiet performance” model optimized for low-flow fans.

The kit includes a 12V-to-7V fan adapter to quiet the fan a smidge more. Swiftech includes a small bottle of its Hydrx UV reactive anti-algae additive that you must combine with distilled water (water is not included). Every component in this kit is top-of-the-line, and they work extremely well together.

During testing, the teeny radiator/fan setup provided surprisingly good performance for such a small package. Some reservoirs make loud sloshing noises, but not this one—it is the quietest unit we’ve ever tested. Sure, 50 C might seem a bit hot under load, but it’s just a few degrees hotter than what we’re used to seeing on our FX-60. One very cool feature of the Micro is that, unlike other Swiftech kits, this one fits entirely within your case. Awesome!

Sure, the instructions are as dense as pound cake, but that’s par for the course with Swiftech. We don’t have any other gripes at all. If you’re looking for an all-internal kit, be sure to put the Micro on your shopping list.

Month Reviewed: November 2006

Verdict: 9
kickass=yes

URL: www.swiftnets.com

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Swiftech H2O-120

Swiftech H20-80 Micro