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Black Ice Extreme II vs. Heater Core

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Pyrotechnic

Member
Joined
May 27, 2002
Location
Austin, TX
When the Black Ice radiators first hit the market, they were twice as expensive as a brand new heater core. Now they are only a few dollars more, are painted already, have threaded fittings already, and already have fan mounting brackets. Buying a Black Ice radiator now seems like a much more attractive option than it did in the past.

I'm looking to use a radiator that will take two 120mm fans. How does the BIX II perform compared to the typical dual 120mm fan heater core ?
 
Well id say that the BIXII requires more CFM to reach its full cooling potental. Like some 80cfm sanyo's on a controller would do ya. I really like my BIXII it has 3x 110cfm 120mm x 25mm Silverstone's on a controller.. When i want it cool i crank it up. It dropps load temps around 2-4C.
 
A BIX II is a lot better than a heatercore for not only the reasons you stated, but they're made to fit in computers, and performance should be a lot better vs an un-shrouded heatercore of similar size; with a shroud, performance should be closer, but the BIX will still come out on top. For a few bucks, the BIX is definitely worth it. (plus, you'll need to throw in another ~$5-$10 for a shroud if you use a heatercore)
 
Do you guys think the BIX II would be adequate with a high end CPU and GPU in the loop together ?

I'm looking for something thats going to be able to cool well without me having to use loud fans to push tons of air through it, since the goal of the game here is quiet.
 
if you want quiet, the black ice extreme is built for quiet. get an mcr220 thats built for quiet, and isn't too pricey.
 
Well like i said get some sanyo denki's and a controller and you can decide how quiet you want it.. Id say that the BIXII could handle an OC'd C2D and a oc'ed vid card nothing too extreme though.
 
A BIP will outperform a BIX with the same speed fans, and a GTS will outperform both of them at any speed.
 
Meh. For the price of a BIXII+shipping I can buy a pair of heatercores. Who needs barbs when you can just cut off the ends for insta highflo's?

Shrouds don't cost 5-10 dollars. Use some cardboard and colored duct tape. My external rad box costs $50 at most and utilizes a single 120mm fan to cool an overvolted 165 and 1900xt.

If you want aesthetics go for the BIXII. They are a pretty decent buy for the price now if you're not too keen on modding.
 
Well in my current system I'm running a heater core and i've been very satisfied with it's performance. The core area is about 160mm X 160mm. I painted it and it looks good, and for the $20 I paid for it at auto zone, it's a great.

That was about 4-5 years ago though. Heater cores were the best price/performance buy back then hands down. I remember the original Black Ice radiators costing around $70-$80 back then if my memory serves me right. The original ones didn't even cool as good as a heater core did either.

Still looking for test data if it exists on how a BIX II stacks up against a dual 120mm heater core.

Just found the Black Ice GT Stealth 240, both the 2 pass and crossflow models. I'm guessing these are even better ?

EDIT: Also seeing info that the Black Ice Pro II would be better for a low air flow situation ?
 
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