Does anyone know how the PA120.3 compares to the new Black Ice GTX 360? They are similarly priced.
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Does anyone know how the PA120.3 compares to the new Black Ice GTX 360? They are similarly priced.
id venture to guess the Pa 120.3 performs better
Yeah the PA120.3 outperforms the BIGTX, especially under if low CFM fans are being used! I recenlty replaced my old BIX 120.3 with Thermochils PA120.3 after reading all the reviews and learning about all the work that went into that radiator! The other thing to consider is how many components your trying to cool? If your only running one CPU waterblock in your loop than it might now cool any better than a BIP120.2 because you can only cool down to ambient temps. If on the other hand your cooling many compoents (GPU, CPU, Chipset, HDD, etc...) than the extra capacity of the PA120.3 will cool better. Last but not least the fin design on the PA120.3 is such that fans stay very quite because there is not alot of resistance through the fins. There are many reviews on the PA120.3 as well as many comparisons against other high performance radiators, I would take the time and do as much research as possible before getting any radiator because in your case there might be a better solution out there?
Hi, please I have one quick question
Dual PA120.2 with 8 fans will cool better/much better than PA120.3 with 6 fans?
ocfx
Three single rads cool as good as one tripple rad assuming equal flow. But since three rads are about three times as restrictive as a tripple the flow is lower and they cool slightly worse than a tripple. How much worse depends on how much lower the flow is and hence how strong pump you use.Quote:
Originally Posted by OCFX
So two PA120.2 should cool about 1/4 better than a PA120.3 (minus the performance loss due to lower flow).
Since a PA120.3 can handle quite a lot of heat you'd need a really hot system to notice any difference. If the PA120.3 can cool the water to near ambient two PA120.2 won't be able to lower temps noticeably.
You'd need a huge amount of heat to see an advantage of fans on both sides. Might be worth a try, but "normally" I'd say the difference is too small to be noticed.
About dual PA 120.2, again the heat load thing. If you put something together like a Kentsfield + 8800GTX SLI setup, then the difference might be interesting. But most certainly not below that.
Anyone know where I can grab another 120.2 or .3? They seem to be tough to find lately.
I got my PA120.3 at mountainmods, they were the only place who had them in stock (and I looked for over three weeks, waiting for other retailers to get them back in stock with no luck)! They use Thermochill radiators in their builds so they usually have them in stock! It's worth it, despite costing more than other radiators.
http://img382.imageshack.us/img382/7034/eightyk8.jpg
This picture was taken two days before I upgraded my motherboard, RAM, and CPU. Besides that everything is the same. This radiator is huge, even compared to my old BIP 120.3!
Thanks for the responses guys. They were extremely useful! Especially Roger telling me where I can get a PA120.3. I've been looking for months!
http://www.thermochill.com/retailers.php
I'd have just worked me way down the list emailing each company on there til I found one with stock... *shrug*
That would have been the easy way to do it Marci, lol! Although I know how you feel Muftobration because I also spent alot of time trying to find a retailer who had this radiator in stock! By the way Marci, thanks again for helping me to get my PA120.3 sorted! Since I had never used a double-pass radiator before I didn't realize that it's a bit more difficult to get the air out! At the moment though everything is running strong and I'm very impressed with the PA120.3!
hey, talkin about that, any quick tips right now to get air outta my rad? the water AND BUBBLES are just speeding along past my t-line, so teh rad is gurgle-gurlging alll night long.
If it's lying on the side, just turn it a little so that the outlet is not absolutely parallel to the ground, but points a little further towards the roof. Then all the air should get out easily.
talkin bout the t line? yea it lies kinda on its side, i propped it up with an ankle wrap this mornign before work and lil by lil bubbles trickled out. but im saying, there is always some air in the rad i think, just turn the screw at back of the rad is all i should do?Quote:
Originally Posted by Radical_53
thanks for hte rip R53
No, I meant the rad ;) It's much easier if the rad is lying on the side, with both barbs one above the other. Then, if you slightly tilt the rad, the bubbles all come out very easily.
Your t-line should "stand" upwards so that the bubbles can get somewhere, away from the loop.
You could also lower the flow by squeezing the tubing or undervolting the pump. I always bleed with only one of my two DDCs on and at very low voltage.
oh ok, good words fellas, ima lay the machine on its side over lunch then see what happens!
Undervolting is a good idea if you have something to do that.
The PA120.3 was not available at any of the sites listed there. I guess I'll have to wait.:(Quote:
Originally Posted by Marci
How do the Swiftech rads stack up against the Thermochill ones? Don't just tell me they are better, I already know that. I want to know actual real-world performance differences so I can decide for myself if they are worth spending twice as much on.
Thanks!
Mountain mods seems to always have em in stock.
Mine arrived dented. :rolleyes:
But since its not leaking and the dent isn't bad enough to create flow restriction I'm still very happy with it.
I keep an OCed Conroe and 2 hot x1900 cards at a cool 35C. Granted, if I ran 3 x 70cfm fans on it I could probably stay under 30C and under 35C load. But I'm happy with my dead silent Yates at under 900rpm.
There are obviously many different factors such as flow rate, ambients, air flow that will effect real-world performance. As such you can only go by people who have tested real-world performance like Marci.Quote:
Originally Posted by darcon
The answer if its worth the money depends entirely on what you want to achieve. How many watts are you cooling? Are you concerned with OCing or quiet or a combo of both? What kind of pump / blocks do you have? What ambients will you be running under?
In the end, I just simply wanted the best so I wouldn't have to second-guess myself or have to rebuild my WC system. So I went with the PA120.3 of course. ;)
If noise is not an issue for you I'm 100% certain you could achieve the same nominal temps on a PA as a Swiftech with bigger fans. A 120x3 with enough airflow can handle almost any normal heatload (unless if you are running TECs).
A triple Swiftech is about as good as a dual Thermochill. The rest scales down. In terms of flow/restriction, there is just no comparison.
I thought you guys should know that I emailed all of the companies that sell them and performance-pcs.com and mountainmods.com were the only ones who said they would have them in the near future. That was on monday, and performance-pcs said they would have them on friday (which they did, I just ordered one from them) and mountainmods said they would have some in two weeks (next week now).
get them directly from thermochill? http://www.thermochill.com/acatalog/pa_series.htmlQuote:
Originally Posted by Muftobration
its atually cheaper. 48.5 British pounds = 95.5062 U.S. dollars without shipping.
I recently ordered my PA120.3 straight from Thermochill, $146 shipped from UK to Arizona. PPC has them in stock now, but they're $135 + shipping, which for me was the same amount.