Yeah, they put the review up this morning.
Too bad it sucks so much. I was looking at buying one of those down the road.
Oh well, someone else will come out with a good one eventually.
BTW, is it possible that the bad cooling was because of the transformer Tom had to use?
------------------------------
My Athlon can beat your Ferrari off the line.
Too bad it sucks so much. I was looking at buying one of those down the road.
Oh well, someone else will come out with a good one eventually.
BTW, is it possible that the bad cooling was because of the transformer Tom had to use?
------------------------------
My Athlon can beat your Ferrari off the line.
While it is apparent that the Koolance Case needs to actually do a thermal design for it's cooling fins, Tom's hardware makes a couple of suggestions that may or may not be of value. It may not be wise to confuse Koolance on these issues, as they don't seem to have the resources to do a professional design.
"More cooling fins closer together enlarge the radiation surface and create the conditions required for better cooling efficiency."
When using forced convection cooling (as opposed to radiation) there is always a trade off between fin density, thickness and fin length vs. air flow. Fewer thicker fins may actually perform better than more thin fins, depending on air flow rate and the amount of heat dissapated.
"A further flaw is the positioning of the heat exchanger beneath the PC case, as this causes the entire PC tower to heat up. Finally, the heat sink constitutes a very large radiation surface that quickly heats up the components inside computer."
With a decent thermal design, the heat exchanger should not heat up the case much. A simple layer of insulation at the bottom of the case would be enough to thermaly isolate the heat exchanger from the case.
David
"More cooling fins closer together enlarge the radiation surface and create the conditions required for better cooling efficiency."
When using forced convection cooling (as opposed to radiation) there is always a trade off between fin density, thickness and fin length vs. air flow. Fewer thicker fins may actually perform better than more thin fins, depending on air flow rate and the amount of heat dissapated.
"A further flaw is the positioning of the heat exchanger beneath the PC case, as this causes the entire PC tower to heat up. Finally, the heat sink constitutes a very large radiation surface that quickly heats up the components inside computer."
With a decent thermal design, the heat exchanger should not heat up the case much. A simple layer of insulation at the bottom of the case would be enough to thermaly isolate the heat exchanger from the case.
David
My main objection to the rather harsh attack on this case is that this model is <i>not</i> intended for high performance systems, which Koolance has been very clear about, yet Tom's makes no mention of that fact. Koolance plans to release a different case for "high performance" systems in the future. They specifically recommend NOT using the water-cooled PSU with fast CPUs...
Where is the in and out watertemp-measurement of the heat exchanger, and the flow? If they are blaming the heat exchanger, show it, don't guess! I've got a homebuilt watersystem with a "puny" pump, which just move the water around. You don't have to race the water, if you do, you race it across the cooler too, and not leaving the heat off to the air. Example: take a circuit, with just a waterloop, a pump and two peltiers, one in and one out. Will the loop transport more heat if you speed up the flow? I think not.
You are correct in that the processor should not have been an issue in the review, the standard Koolance Power Supply, CPU, and Video cooling case is rated to cover up to an Athlon 1100MHz processor. It is NOT however rated for DDR - Koolance recommends the Air-Cooled power supply case for DDR based mainboards. Now down to the nitty gritty - why did the Koolance case perform so poorly for Tom's but not for many other people. The secret is in the power.
Note they had an American 110V/60Hz power supply case. European power is 220V/50Hz. When they used the transformer to go from 110V to 220V, they very likely did not change the power's cycle frequency from 50Hz to 60Hz. This would cause the pump to run ~20% slower. Slower pump=case not running at spec. There are a few other things in the review I could debate as well, but this is the big one.
Note they had an American 110V/60Hz power supply case. European power is 220V/50Hz. When they used the transformer to go from 110V to 220V, they very likely did not change the power's cycle frequency from 50Hz to 60Hz. This would cause the pump to run ~20% slower. Slower pump=case not running at spec. There are a few other things in the review I could debate as well, but this is the big one.
I don't know about you but nothing lead me to think the pump was AC driven - especially if it was small. I had assumed it was running off the psu - and therefore DC driven and therefore not a factor.
Anyone have any idea? To be AC I assume they would have to run an AC spur from the PSU input to the pump, or have two power leads - neither of which seems likely - but I could be wrong - it has been known.
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now I look at the pictures again it sure looks like a mains AC lead going into the exchanger/pump area - you may be onto something there. 17% reduction in pump rate wouldn't help - assuming it scales linearly.
Difficult to see how it accounts for everything though. I'd have to say if I were buying a setup like this - that really has some potential - I'd want it to be first rate for cutting edge cpus.
Me - I'd pay $500, right now, for a professionally built and well finished case that was well watercooled (like delta 5C room temperature on an +80W load, quiet with a monster psu, 4 5.25" bays, 2 external 3.5" bays and 4 internal 3.5" bays. The clamp needs to be good and able to take a TEC at a later date too.
Anyone got any ideas?
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Difficult to see how it accounts for everything though. I'd have to say if I were buying a setup like this - that really has some potential - I'd want it to be first rate for cutting edge cpus.
Me - I'd pay $500, right now, for a professionally built and well finished case that was well watercooled (like delta 5C room temperature on an +80W load, quiet with a monster psu, 4 5.25" bays, 2 external 3.5" bays and 4 internal 3.5" bays. The clamp needs to be good and able to take a TEC at a later date too.
Anyone got any ideas?
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So did anyone else here look at the pictures close enough to notice that the water coming off of the proccessor is going onto the graphics card? Maybe I'm wrong but it seems to me that taking hot water and running it over the graphics chip might not be the most effective way to take the heat off of the chip. Considering the fact that the heat capacity of water is fairly high and the distance the water traveled from the processor to the graphics chip was pretty short, the water had no time to cool back down to room temperature before attempting to absorb more heat. The suggestions made in the article will help keep the processor cooler in that setup but will not do enough for the graphics chip. Seems to me more time was put into the craftsmanship of the case and less into the thinking of the design. Just wondering if anyone noticed that also.
yep - saw that - again faster pump rates will help, but basically the whole thing is IMHO sub-standard. As you say, a neat finished product but fundamentally flawed by under-specified components and design.
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Big Case, radiator, intercooler, pump, pipes, pcb controler, 6 fans, 300 power suply, 7 5 1/4 bay.
I think that it is cheap
I think that it is cheap
The Koolance should have been named the Quietance. It may be great for a quiet system but how many of us want that? As for the heat, if you just reach around to the back of your case and put the back of you hand in the air coming off your power supply you'll see where the majority of the heat is coming from. It was stupid to spend the money to water cool the power supply when any decent power supply can cool itself. Take a look at the case they used, it has an 80mm blow hole right in the back that is unused. They could have put an 80mm radiator right there with a top notch 80mm fan behind it blowing out and had plenty of cooling for everything except the power supply. If 80mm wasn't big enough they could have made the blow hole bigger much more easily than modifying the bottom of the case to accommodate that large tank and three tiny fans. I'm just estimating here but I suspect they added about $75 to the cost of the cooling system for features performance users just don't care about. If you want a quiet, low performance system the Koolance might be for you. How many readers of Tom's Hardware Guide want a quite, low performance system.
Chess
Chess
Well pete, get the dremel/jigsaw/elecric drill out and start modifying!!, its the only way to get EXACTLY what you need. I'd also like a vapochill in a full tower size, but I cant afford one anyway!!.
With reghards to the case being reviewed, I also think the pump is MAJOR underpowered, I'm in the middle of going watercooled- still waiting for parts to arrive- and from the information that I gathered, it seems that 1000ltr/min or so is needed, I opted for a 1250.
Next time you wave - use all your fingers
With reghards to the case being reviewed, I also think the pump is MAJOR underpowered, I'm in the middle of going watercooled- still waiting for parts to arrive- and from the information that I gathered, it seems that 1000ltr/min or so is needed, I opted for a 1250.
Next time you wave - use all your fingers
Yeah, the transformer had a lot to do with it. The pump is AC, and there is a lead directly from the power supply to the pump for it. Read my previous post for the why of it.
As for the liquid-cooled power supply being a waste, that is not neceassarily true. It is VERY quiet - and there are environments where that is a huge plus (i.e. a recording studio). The simple truth is that you can buy a Koolance without the liquid-cooled power supply if the 'quiet' aspect is less important to you. The better quality air-cooled power supplies are more than capable of cooling themselves, you get one more "link" for cooling components (Koolance does not recommend more than 3 liquid-cooled components), and you get a potentialy more powerful power supply that can be replaced with a bigger unit as needed as opposed to being stuck with the liquid cooled one.
The 80mm blow hole on the back of the case is a bow to the hardware enthusiast. If you want the extra airflow in the case - you have a spot for the fan. As for the components being tubed in serial - it's really not much of an issue. The video card tends to get better cooling from the water thats "hot" from the CPU then it does from the puny heatsinks and fans that tend to be placed on them. Really, take a look at what comes standard for cooling on these video cards. . . The water moves quickly enough that it does not get so hot as to inefficiently cool most video cards. I HAVE a Koolance case right here (at work), a liquid-cooled power supply, CPU, Video Card unit running on an Abit KT7A RAID mainboard w/Athlon 1GHz/266, 32M GeForce2 MX, 512M PC133 RAM, 2x20GHD (RAID 0 Stripe), 16x Pioneer DVDROM, 12x10x32x Lite-On CDRW, SBLive! Value, 10/100 PCI NIC, Hollywood+ DVD Decoder, and 3.5" floppy - and the liquid temperature remains a fairly constant 93 degrees F (Koolance temperature gauge - Mobo Monitor 5 reports CPU as 98 deg F) and is nearly silent to boot.
As for the liquid-cooled power supply being a waste, that is not neceassarily true. It is VERY quiet - and there are environments where that is a huge plus (i.e. a recording studio). The simple truth is that you can buy a Koolance without the liquid-cooled power supply if the 'quiet' aspect is less important to you. The better quality air-cooled power supplies are more than capable of cooling themselves, you get one more "link" for cooling components (Koolance does not recommend more than 3 liquid-cooled components), and you get a potentialy more powerful power supply that can be replaced with a bigger unit as needed as opposed to being stuck with the liquid cooled one.
The 80mm blow hole on the back of the case is a bow to the hardware enthusiast. If you want the extra airflow in the case - you have a spot for the fan. As for the components being tubed in serial - it's really not much of an issue. The video card tends to get better cooling from the water thats "hot" from the CPU then it does from the puny heatsinks and fans that tend to be placed on them. Really, take a look at what comes standard for cooling on these video cards. . . The water moves quickly enough that it does not get so hot as to inefficiently cool most video cards. I HAVE a Koolance case right here (at work), a liquid-cooled power supply, CPU, Video Card unit running on an Abit KT7A RAID mainboard w/Athlon 1GHz/266, 32M GeForce2 MX, 512M PC133 RAM, 2x20GHD (RAID 0 Stripe), 16x Pioneer DVDROM, 12x10x32x Lite-On CDRW, SBLive! Value, 10/100 PCI NIC, Hollywood+ DVD Decoder, and 3.5" floppy - and the liquid temperature remains a fairly constant 93 degrees F (Koolance temperature gauge - Mobo Monitor 5 reports CPU as 98 deg F) and is nearly silent to boot.
I also have a Koolance case (with fan & watercooled PSU) right here,
1Ghz Athlon 200fsb
Asus A7v133
512mb memory
3x quantum fireball plus drives (2 in Raid 0)
Matrox G450 Duelhead
M-Audio Delta 10/10
Yamaha 16 10 40 CDRW
And have encountered problems, I've decided to give them a chance to rectify the situation before I post my comments as I have various views on the performance/suitability/reliability/quality of aftersale support/cost issues that I have encountered.
But I will definitely post back detailing the level of service that I receive.
1Ghz Athlon 200fsb
Asus A7v133
512mb memory
3x quantum fireball plus drives (2 in Raid 0)
Matrox G450 Duelhead
M-Audio Delta 10/10
Yamaha 16 10 40 CDRW
And have encountered problems, I've decided to give them a chance to rectify the situation before I post my comments as I have various views on the performance/suitability/reliability/quality of aftersale support/cost issues that I have encountered.
But I will definitely post back detailing the level of service that I receive.
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