The Cougar Helor 240-360 CPU Liquid Cooler Review: A Top Tier Start In CPU Cooling
by E. Fylladitakis on December 9, 2019 3:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Cougar
- AIO
- Liquid Cooling
- Cooler
Testing Results, Maximum Fan Speed
Our maximum speed testing is performed with both the fans and the pump of the kit powered via a 12V DC source. This input voltage should have the pump and fans matching the speed ratings of the manufacturer. As per Cougar’s specifications, the Vortex Omega fans have a rotational speed of 1800±200 RPM. According to our tachometer, the fans were all rotating at 1850 RPM, a figure well within the manufacturer’s specifications. Furthermore, the speed difference between the five fans we tested was negligible, indicating great manufacturing quality and minimal variation.
| Core Temperature, Constant Thermal Load (Max Fan Speed) |
A quick look at the average thermal performance charts reveals that the Helor 240 is a competitive product, proving a strong adversary for most similarly sized products with an average thermal resistance of 0.0773 °C/W with a relatively low sound pressure level of 41.8 dB(A). Other similarly-sized offerings, such as the EKWB EK-XLC Predator 240 and the Corsair H100i GTX, do outperform the Helor 240 in terms of thermal performance but their acoustic performance is inferior. Only Alphacool's liquid cooling kit retains its massive performance gap compared to standard AIO coolers, with an average thermal resistance of 0.0532 °C/W.
Thermally, the Helor 360 clearly performs better than the Helor 240, with an average thermal resistance of 0.0722 °C/W. It also slightly outperforms the similarly sized Corsair H150i Pro RGB that has an average thermal resistance of 0.0731 °C/W, managing better performance when the thermal load is very high. In terms of acoustics, the Helor 360 is expectedly louder than the Helor 240 due to the extra fan, which brings the sound pressure level up to 43.2 dB(A). The figure is not too high but is higher than what the primary competition of the Helor 360 currently offers.
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Pro-competition - Monday, December 9, 2019 - link
Why dont you throw in a few high end air coolers like thermalright, noctua, be quiet!?E.Fyll - Monday, December 9, 2019 - link
You can easily check their performance figures in several of our air cooler reviews. The average thermal resistance figures are directly comparable, the test setup is exactly the same.Pro-competition - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
Great! What TIM do you use? Do you standardise the thermal paste used (e.g. only use Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut) or the TIM that comes with the cooler?JanW1 - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
Very conveniently for the Cougar Helor, many of the tested coolers were not included in the Thermal Resistance vs Sound Pressure chart, as it would be much more obvious that this cooler is rather middling in performance.Among the selection tested here, the Alphacool NexXxos completely dominates the competition in cooling performance per noise but that reference point was omitted. Why? It wouldn't crowd the graph since it's apart from all others. Maybe not the same market, but the cooler was part of this test and would have been an informative reference.
nathanddrews - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
Yeah, that Alphacool NexXxos looks like da real MVP.nathanddrews - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
Ah, it's also double the price and a self-assembled open loop system.bwanaaa - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
i guess the kraken x62 is slightly better if not only its performance but the ability to mount on ryzen/TR.Foeketijn - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
We've seen with swiftech and Alphacool, the most important part is a copper radiator. But yeah copper costs a couple of cents more, So yeah, lets just add RGB and hope the blinking light distract the potential buyer from the cheap design choices.nathanddrews - Tuesday, December 10, 2019 - link
I read your comment because it had RGB in it.Foeketijn - Wednesday, December 11, 2019 - link
nice one