Closer Look:

If there’s one lesson obviously learned from their years in the business, it’s that a good product will speak for itself. Rather than rely on cheesy, two dimensional pictures on some forgotten flap of packaging, Thermaltake has taken the liberty of giving us a pre-mod case for the watercooling kit. As you’ll see here, everything of importance – that’s the radiator, pump, flow meter, and waterblock, are there, almost tempting you to touch them, and they’ll definitely be an eye catcher once faced to a shelf.  Now, despite all the pretty graphics, and rather impressive claims across the initially unseen faces, I can understand that a true enthusiast is interested in only one thing. No, not that.  I meant what was in the box, surrounded by the nice, soft packing foam, the sort that doesn't collapse the second it leaves the box, in a flurry of snow that toddlers and pets rather love the taste of.

Installation & Testing:

Alright, so now we’re on to the meat and the potatoes of this kit – getting everything set up.  The first thing that needs to be done… unfortunately is the removal of the motherboard; after all, the backplate needs to be installed, and the four mounting screws need to be affixed – with washers, to the motherboard. Once you have those four posts installed, it’s just a matter of sliding the waterblock down them, and tightening the four oversized, knurled nuts. 

These nuts have improved in terms of miles over the tiny little nuts Thermaltake seemed to so love supplying in past. Next up, the radiator needs to be installed – Here I’ve screwed it to the rear of my chassis via the included, and tiny mounting screws supplied. For other cases, or even more compact ones, the bracket on the rear of the radiator may need futzing with. Take note, however, that this placement isn’t set in stone, so if there’s a source of fresh air, or a nice open area, the radiator can occupy it without a fight. After that, it’s just a matter of finding the pump-reservoir combo a cozy new home; here I’ve screwed it through a honeycomb grille on the chassis’ bottom. Now, while other sites had reported the pump causing case-wide vibration, I can happily say I didn’t fall victim to this little problem… like I usually do. One note of caution when seperating the reservoir and pump, however - if you do it too quickly, the water tends to like flying in all directions... which tends to be heart stopping when working inside a live chassis.

After that, It’s just a matter of tubing up – here I’ve used much less than the recommended amount of tube, for the simple reason of aesthetics – I hate crossing tubes, and unnecessarily long runs in liquid cooled cases. One thing you might notice with the second picture, is the fact that the flow meter's gone and vanished - with a very good reason. The initial flowmeter I recieved with the kit had a slight, aggravating habit of clicking on every third or so rotation. When I contacted Thermaltake about this, I was informed that no, this mild torture wasn't a design feature, it was a defect. At the time of writing, a replacement flowmeter was still enroute, though I'm sure it'll soon arrive - Thermaltake has excellent customer service. As to the degree of service... they sent me a full replacement set of harddrive screws for my Tsunami Dream - free of charge. Color me impressed, a second time.

With that, let’s test her out!

System Spec:

• Intel E8400 Tested @ Stock (3.00, 1.2V) and OCed (4.01, 1.45V)

• Asus P5K-E  Wi-Fi, Stock Cooling

• CoolerMaster RC690 Chassis, with Yate Loon low speed fans ( 1 intake, 3 exhaust), operating at full speed)

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