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Arctic Liquid Freezer 240 thoughts? Update: review! [38mm rad, push/pull AIO]

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Helgaiden

Member
Joined
Jul 14, 2003
Hi all! I read some initial reviews on the arctic liquid freezer kits (the 120mm kit appears to perform as good as other average 240mm units) and was very impressed, so i ordered one up for a Xeon e5-1650 overclocking adventure build im working on. Its a bit stupid that the 240mm kit is only $10 more than the 120mm kit, but it is what it is. At $84 on amazon, its a hell of a deal either way. The coldplate/pump is larger than i expected which is cool, but initial research on the fans showed that they aren't exactly the best fans for pushing through a radiator. Probably one of the reasons it comes with 4 for a push-pull config. Another bonus though too is that the radiator is a 38mm thick unit (and about 20fpi), not your average 28mm or so that is typical with most AIOs (like my Deepcool Captain 240ex for example).
Anyways, i don't really have a way to compare how well it did since i only ran this processor stock with a 212 evo and it never really got above the mid-50s/low-60s C at stock speeds, then OC'd taking almost 1.4v at 4.5ghz on all cores, Prime95 can push this CPU into mid-80s. Under more typical usage it doesn't really go past the mid-70s though (playing battlefield 1 for example).

The E5-1650 is a 130w TDP 6-core Sandy Bridge CPU and CoreTemp reports that its pulling around 175w when im running prime on it. I'm not sure how to gauge the performance of this AIO (though i am weary of my thermal paste job, but i always am). Does anyone have any feedback? I imagine upgrading the fans would probably prove beneficial as well as these Arctic F12 pwm fans on it appear to only be 1.8mm-h2O. Meanwhile the fans on my Deepcool Captain 240ex, which are model TF120, are 3.3mm-h2O.

I plan on finishing up a review video on this unit so it would be cool to maybe read some feedback [hands on or theoretical, whatever] from my OCforums homies!

Looks like the amazon price went up a little bit tho but its still a good deal for its size (so is the 360mm version)
https://www.amazon.com/Liquid-Freez...1492701924&sr=8-1&keywords=liquid+freezer+240
 
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These AIOs are just rebranded just like every other company does. The nice thing here is, is that the price is lower than most competitors and it comes with 4 fans. I would run some benchmarks for about 30 mins to get the loop in a equilibrium state, of course you would have wanted to do tests prior with your other cooling setups to see the difference. On average, I'll see a 20c average on these AIOs but not always the case. Custom cooling costs are way more but can get you a 30c+ average and much quieter operations.
 
Oh yeah, definitely aware of the few OEMs that make most of these rebrands. But its interesting to see what each company does with Asetek or whatever OEM's products, like the Cryorig AIOs for example (or NZXT infinity mirror ones), or more practical customizations like thicker rads. Im not sure what OEM makes the Deepcool unit though.

Yeah i know it takes a while for the temps to settle out when it comes to temp testing. I'll probably just have to compare the temps stock vs OC with this cooler. I've heard that this AIO specifically uses a "5th gen asetek pump" which by the way its said, would make me think that its somehow better or something than previous gens (which i guess should be the case), but i have no idea what the current gen is so its hard to gauge. Definitely happy with the pricing on these units over the others though :)

I applied the thermal paste using a slightly larger pea-size dot method. Any comments on the load temps i mentioned? Im not sure if i should redo the TIM job.
 
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Read our reviews of coing on the front page for pointers?

But, hard to review properly when yoy have incomplete datasets. :(
 
Read our reviews of coing on the front page for pointers?

But, hard to review properly when yoy have incomplete datasets. :(

What kind of datasets would you like? I'll be home this evening to gather info.
 
BIOS voltage set to 1.285
BIOS reports vcore actual voltage is 1.394.

45 minutes of Prime95 peaked at 86 on two cores, 84 on two more cores, and 82 on the other two cores. After the initial peak happened in the first 15 mins, the temps leveled out at around 80c. Ambient in room was 77f/25c.

i suppose this shall do!
 
best cooler at its price point and arguably the best 120mm AIO out there but I've some confusion would i be able to use 2 of the 4 included fans as case fans?
 
best cooler at its price point and arguably the best 120mm AIO out there but I've some confusion would i be able to use 2 of the 4 included fans as case fans?

You sure could. They are just regular Arctic F12 PST fans. Though im not sure how good it would work with just two fans, doesn't hurt to find out. I don't personally feel like they are the best static pressure optimized fans so push-pull with them helps out this setup. I've considered replacing the fans with ones off the deepcool captain 240ex that i have since those are a bit better as rad fans, just to see how it would possibly help performance, but i haven't gotten that far with that idea yet.
 
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