The DeepCool Captain 240 EX RGB AIO Cooler Review: Pump it Up, Without the Noise
by E. Fylladitakis on December 14, 2017 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- AIO
- Deepcool
- Cooler
Thermal Resistance VS Sound Pressure Level
During our thermal resistance vs. sound pressure level test, we maintain a steady 100W thermal load and assess the overall performance of the coolers by taking multiple temperature and sound pressure level readings within the operating range of the stock cooling fans. The result is a graph that depicts the absolute thermal resistance of the cooler in comparison to the noise generated. For both the sound pressure level and absolute thermal resistance readings, lower figures are better.
It can be seen from the above graph that the overall performance of the DEEPCOOL Captain EX 240 RGB is very similar to that of the Fractal Design Celsius S24. The former has a small advantage when the fans rotate at their minimum speed, delivering slightly better thermal performance at the same noise level. As the speed of the fans increases, the roles rotate and the Fractal Design Celsius S24 ultimately delivers the same thermal performance with a slightly lower noise output. Other similarly sized coolers do give better thermal performance figures but also are much louder. The only other product that roughly compares in terms of noise output with these two coolers is the EKWB EK-XLC Predator 240, a product with availability problems and roughly twice as expensive.
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croc - Friday, December 15, 2017 - link
I have an NHD-15 heat sink and I also have a corsair h80i v2. (my case, a silverstone FT1 does not easily support radiators larget than 120mm) My CPU is an older 3930K six core that warms up nicely... Of course I do not have all the nice test bench stuff that Anandtech has, so my results are quite a bit more touchy-feely. By just a whisker the NHD-15 is both a tad quieter and a tad cooler.... I also like the fact that I know that outside of the fans there are no moving parts to fail.I am sure that my limitations are the 120 mm radiator, and I am also pretty well convinced that within a given sized radiator, there will be a very narrow range of test results across the range of AIO kits. But I keep looking...
LordanSS - Friday, December 15, 2017 - link
Thank you, Mr. Fylladitakis for your review.Since the advent of AIO liquid cooling kits my personal builds have changed a good bit. Have a H100i on my main build for a few years now, and my old and trusty second machine has a Hyper 212 EVO on it.
I've had bad experiences with heavy air coolers in the past, so I tend to stay away from them these days. My cases have positive pressure and the H100i works well as an exhaust mounted at the top.
To each their own. I know several people that frequent this website are still fond of air cooling, and in many situations it's still a very good and efficient option but in the end I'd say it depends on what kind of build you have in mind.
snarfbot - Sunday, December 17, 2017 - link
how long are these coolers being run at load?deadlockedworld - Wednesday, April 11, 2018 - link
For all the commentary about the bench -- this deepcool is not in the Anandtech bench section. ...