Thermaltake Water 3.0 Closed Loop Cooler Roundup
by Dustin Sklavos on May 31, 2013 12:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Thermaltake
- Water Cooling
Conclusions: Narrowing Down the Competition
Going through testing, it became increasingly clear to me what the Thermaltake Water 3.0 kits were, how to evaluate them, and ultimately which ones to recommend. We're dealing with fairly bone stock Asetek coolers, and that's not necessarily a bad thing. I've had a decent enough amount of experience with Asetek's closed loop coolers in the past that I'm not unhappy to see them, and the Arctic Cooling Accelero Hybrid even uses the thinner 120mm cooler to cool the GPU. It works admirably.
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The entry-level Thermaltake Water 3.0 Performer and its thicker sibling the Water 3.0 Pro both force me to come to one unfortunately inescapable conclusion: the fans Thermaltake is using aren't very good. Put two of them in a row and suddenly there are vibration issues, harmonic issues, and even a little bit of buzzing. These fans desperately need the control the Water 3.0 Extreme offers. That the MSRP Thermaltake is asking for these two is higher than the competition and it's pretty clear to me most users would benefit from skipping them.
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The Water 3.0 Extreme turns out to be the good egg in this bunch. While I remain unimpressed by the fans included, it's able to offer a more balanced performance and I can more easily conceive of a situation in which I would recommend it. If you can't afford the Swiftech H220, and you don't have space for the NZXT Kraken X60, the Water 3.0 Extreme will be the next best thing. The fan control software will give you fine-grained control of both thermals and acoustics and perhaps most importantly keeps the questionable 120mm fans from going off the rails.
While I still remain fairly bullish on closed loop coolers, there are increasingly only isolated cases in which I would recommend going with a 140mm or smaller radiator. If that's the scale you're operating at, you'll do just as well with Noctua's NH-U14S air cooler. If you do decide to go big, the Water 3.0 Extreme offers a decent enough performance profile but long term I'd probably consider replacing the fans, which could bring it within striking distance of the superior Swiftech H220. The NZXT Kraken X60 (or alternatively the Corsair H110) may prove to be the most ideal, but if you're on a budget and have the space to mount it, the Water 3.0 Extreme is the way to go.
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Wetworkz - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
I do not remember where I saw this but some guy hooked his water cooler to his toilet. No, I am not kidding. He ran plumbing to the tank on the back of the toilet and every time his temperature began to climb he would flush the toilet and get a new surge of cool water. I am pretty sure you could find the article if you wanted to look it up, it was pretty entertaining to be honest.EJ257 - Saturday, June 1, 2013 - link
That's actually pretty brilliant. Was it this guy?http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/124677-how-to-c...
jkresh - Sunday, June 2, 2013 - link
that could work depending on your usage, if you are always running at load (folding at home or something along those lines) it wouldnt help because eventually all the water would get warm (and without a radiator it would continue to heat up), but if you only run for relatively short periods of time (lets say an hour or two for gaming) then that might work. The most impressive system I saw, was someone ran a a server farm in his basement, with water running outside to copper pipes which ran deep under his yard, so he basically used geothermal cooling for his computers, kind of a crazy setup, but using the Earth as your heatsink has its advantages.Adamantine - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
You didn't setup the radiator like people who do full PC liquid cooling setups do, which is going to perform better than how you did it. Fans need to be setup as intakes on the radiator, not exhaust. It almost guarantees the radiator will get the coolest air possible which isn't possible when setup as exhaust.dwade123 - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
They should start making those compatible with CPU & GPU. Now that is truly a All-in-One design.Galcobar - Friday, May 31, 2013 - link
Copyediting error in the second paragraph of the first page."The variety of coolers is pretty simple: you're dealing with a traditional 120mm radiator in the Water 3.0 Pro, you get a double-thick 120mm radiator with the Water 3.0 Pro, and then you go back to standard thickness and double-length with the 240mm radiator in the Water 3.0 Extreme."
That first "Pro" should be "Performer."
vishwa108 - Saturday, June 1, 2013 - link
Whilst being prejudical is an unwelcome trait, being prejudicial on behalf of Truth is an asset all men strive for. Truth be told, "Thermaltake" might sound both Tojo-ish and English, but as all know, this beastie is but a mere pretender to "watercooling", mediocrity being its forte when it comes to watercooling. Not when "Asetek" is supporting one's watercooled butt, that is. After some Bavarian ariy-fairyness having levelled Ten on the religiosity crapola. That is what you'll get for mixing Taiwanese panda greeny-loony cutieness with sophisticated Western gender-bending taste.Even so, DNA being thicker than water, the same nonsense prevailed. LOUD and LOUDER. What is "entry-level" watercooling if it is not about lowering loudness? What? Eets about pandering to fairies and their pirouettes? This has to be some Choseness Frivolity & Nonsense masquerading as Sense & Sensibility. It looks like fashion has finally caught up with PC, Performance and Overclocking. Either that or the fairies have accidentally beached themselves on the PC Cloud Cuckooland. C'mon chuck, give us the other one will ya.
xaml - Sunday, June 2, 2013 - link
What is this, if not an attempt at pooetry? Is it that your head case is the one thing in urgent need of water cooling? Thermal it. Take!