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So you want watercooling for cheap with no maintenance ? Here's how...

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A few days ago I saw a review for the CoolIT Domino A.L.C. CPU water cooler. I was shocked to see that it was both cheap, and had literally no long-term maintenance required. In fact, I had no idea that anything like this even existed. The Domino is a radiator, pump, cpu heatsink, fan, and lcd display all in one. And it does a decent job of cooling the processor. There is no filling, or bleeding or any of that nonsense, which traditionally kept me away from watercooling, it also is only powered by a single 3 pin connector to the motherboard. Here are some pics and results from the install.

My system:

Asus P5E vanilla

Intel Q9650 @ 3.8Ghz

Asus 4870X2
Sapphire 48701GB

Mushkin 4GB DDR2 800

Zalman 850W HP

Creative X-fi Fatality Gamer Pro

WD Raptor 150
WD Caviar Black 1TB
Super Talent 32GB SSD

Lite-On Blu-ray drive
Cooler Master Cosmos S (8 X 120mm fans)










Here, I mounted an additional, low rpm 120mm fan, so there are now 2 fans cooling the radiator, and it stays very quiet.




The temps I got are not nearly as gaudy as a full fledged water cooling loop, but they are not bad either.

Zalman 9700 (Full speed) Idle: Core 1-4, 40. 37. 39. 38.

CoolIT Domino (Med. Speed) Idle: Core 1-4, 34. 32. 37. 32




Zalman 9700 (Full speed) Full load: Core 1-4, 60. 54. 59. 56

CoolIT Domino (med. Speed) Full load: Core 1-4, 55. 50. 55. 52




So as you can see, it dropped my numbers a bit, which is nice, but to be honest with you, if you already have a really nice air cooler (like the 9700) then I don't suggest upgrading to this particular cooler. It is however much quieter than the Zalman on full fan speed, and let's face it, it looks pretty sweet in there too! By the way, the LCD display can be seen clearly through any case window, and reads coolant temperature, fan speed, and pump speed.

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Yup, there are several of those on the market. Toms just did a review of $4,200 boutique PC's that both used similar things.

They fall somewhere in between air and water cooling in both performance and price. :-/

**shrugs**
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The_Blood_Raven said:
Just going by your findings it is like a TRUE or Xigmatek HST-s1283, the real high end of air-cooling. I don't believe water-cooling should ever be taken as anything other than a hobby.


I agree, I would have never dabbled with water cooling at all, because of the bleeding, and filling, and tube routing, and draining it every time you upgrade, but when I saw how this requires none of that, I said 'why not'. I fully respect anyone who uses a legitimate water cooling setup, espescially if they have it looped to their cpu, and gpus(s), just so much work.

Yeah it seems like a cool toy, but it performs about the same as a high end heatsink which is cheaper. IS it very quiet? That is about the only reason I can see to get it over a high-end heatsink, besides just wanting to for the hell of it.

I own a monstrous loop "just for the hell of it" and I would never recommend it in any serious capacity. Unless you just like tinkering the PCs and want to water cool for the fun of it, then it is a waste.

I wonder how this would compare with the Swiftech H20-220 since that thing performs like a real loop and is the only kit i have considered worth it, but it is loud.

That's pretty much says it all, a toy. And the stuff is addictive, I don't see how anyone can stop at just the CPU. Two weeks after water cooling the CPU I was ready for the video cards. Then you want bigger this, better that, I have so much stuff in there now it's on the edge of ridiculous, but like Blood Raven said it's cool.

Yea, i mean just look at the pics, to somebody that has never seen watercooling that looks pretty F'ing sweet, of course to somebody who has a legit watercooling setup, it is probably comical because of how small the tubes are etc. Like I said, if you already have a nice air cooler, don't bother with this, but if you're running like a stock intel HSF, and want to upgrade, this kit should at least be considered, esp. if your case has a window, or you need quiet operation.

I just wanted to clean up my last response a little. When I said "That's pretty much says it all, a toy" I was referring to water cooling in general and not the Ops WC.

If you want a reliable WC kit, go with Swiftech. CoolIt's watercooling kit is very overpriced, and usually can be outperformed by several air cooling solutions (TRUE for one).

Quote:
I wrote a review for the Domino on newegg 2 weeks ago. Kept my I7 at 30c idle / 50c load.


Even with that crazy overclock and overvolt ??? Or is that at stock ?
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