bequiet! Pure Loop 240

[testman78]

Introduction

be quiet! is one of the most widely known hardware manufacturers in Germany and across Europe, with ranges including CPU cooling, chassis, and case fans. Back in 2016, be quiet! unleashed its first-ever series of AIOs, the Silent Loop. Fast forward four years from then, and be quiet! has opted for a different route, dropping Alphacool for its pump OEM, and opted for an undisclosed brand and has unveiled its latest series of AIO coolers, the Pure Loop. There is absolutely nothing left of the design of the previous series. Both externally and technically, this is a completely different product. To match individual cooling requirements, Pure Loop is available with four different radiator sizes: 120 mm, 240 mm, 280 mm, and 360 mm. be quiet! themselves recommend the 120 mm for users with AMD Ryzen 3 and Intel Core i3 processors, the 240 mm for Ryzen 5/Core i5, the 280 mm for Ryzen 7/Core i7, and the 360 mm for the high-performance Ryzen 9 and Intel Core i9 processors.Te new Pure Loop comes with a double-decoupled pump. The double-decoupled pump is essentially one that is placed along the fluid lines, and be quiet! says that this design is to ensure quiet operation and minimal vibration.



Pure Loop supports all current desktop processors from Intel and AMD, with the exception of AMD Threadripper (Socket TR4/sTRX4).




Packaging & Contents

The box is typical of the design we usually see with be quiet! with a black box and a stylish photo of the product. You'll also notice it says essential on the left side, highlighting that this is one of their flagship products. On the front side there is an image of the cooling system, thanks to which you can see the updated design of the water block, which is now complemented by lighting.



Around the back, a few technical details on the Effective pump, as well as the Pure Wings 2 120mm fans.



Once opened up you'll spot the liquid cooling unit consisting of the radiator, fan, tubing, pump/cooling block. Mostly pre-fitted and ready to use of course. You'll find Intel and AMD brackets, universal backplate, all the fitting screws, and a tube of high-quality thermal paste. A 100 ml bottle of coolant is included in the retail box and should last for at least six top-ups.



You'll find a multi-language manual.



You can find also a 4-pin fan Y-split cable, zip ties and a SATA power connector for the pump heads lighting effects.




A Closer Look

The black design is accentuated by the brushed aluminum-style cooling block, which is elevated visually with subtle white LED illumination. This makes Pure Loop a true eye-catcher.



be quiet! is equipping the Pure Loops with a 27 mm thick radiator. The radiator is completely made of metal, and its design is dominated by straight lines and angles. The fin spacing has four folds in a centimeter which is relatively open and doesn't require a high static pressure fan to blow through. Everything is blacked out including the radiator fins. Both of the water lines are down on one end.



A hole is located in the center of one of the sides of its body, which will be required to add fluid after 2 years of using the cooling system. The design itself can be called as ideal as possible.




The 40 cm long highly flexible sleeved tubes allow for a convenient installation even in cases with restricted space and increase the lifespan of the Pure Loop by preventing tube fractures, even over time. To increase the reliability, the hoses are additionally fixed with metal elements.




The front-facing top plate holds a big be quiet! logo.The pump head is nice and large coming in a hexagonal style shape. There is a plastic part around its perimeter.



The design of the water block has undergone significant changes - the pump is now moved outside of it. This significantly reduced vibrations and noise levels. The block itself looks elegant and includes white LEDs surrounding the aluminum styled front cover, something more classical instead of RGB LEDs.



The cable that comes out of the water block is needed to power the backlight. Pure Loop water cooling units have a doubly decoupled pump to guarantee minimal vibration. The pump is connected with a 3-pin power cable with a voltage of 12 V. The use of PWM control in this case is not allowed, which is also indicated in the user manual.



The cold plate on the CPU block is nickel-coated copper which means users can use liquid metal thermal compound for better performance, although be quiet! does supply a small tube of its thermal paste in the accessories bundle. The base surface is not polished up to the mirror.



There are two Pure Wings 2 fans included in the box, each rated up to 1600 RPM and designed for high airflow with minimal noise. Each comes fitted with a flat black cable and 4-pin PWM header.




Installation Process

bequiet! has provided an installation manual, with very easy to follow instructions and detailed diagrams, setting out the various steps of the installation process and wiring connections. To begin the installation process, we first need to prepare the retention back-plate. Next, align the retention back-plate mounting posts up with the four holes in the motherboard from the underside and lower it in place.



We install four standoff screws to the back-plate and then secure two bracket plates. We'll place the CPU block on top of this all. Apply thermal paste before attaching the CPU block to the motherboard.



Fitting the two fans is as simple as you might expect, just grab a screwdriver and use the eight included screws to fit them in your desired configuration. We've opted for push configuration, but there's no reason why you couldn't mount them as pull. And this is how the Pure Loop looks like when installed in the case.



The low-profile design of the pump, as well as those top mounting tubes means that there are no conflicts with the motherboard VRM coolers or memory slots, which is always a positive thing.




Test System & Methology

Test System:

Cpu:Intel Core i7-6700K@4.6 GHz.
Motherboard:Gigabyte G1.Sniper Z170
Memory:16Gb Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 2666Mhz
Graphics Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti 11GB SC2
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNova 1200 P2
Storage Drive: 3TB Seagate Barracuda
Boot Drive: SSD 850 PRO 2.5" SATA III 2TB
Chassis: Dimastech Bench Table Easy V2.5
Windows 10 64-bit




Software:

Speedfan
CPUID HW Monitor 1.23
CPUID CPU-Z 1.65
Prime 95

I am testing the performance as follows:

Ambient temperatures are kept at 23C throughout my tests.
The CPU Fan is set to 100% to eliminate inconsistencies as a result of PWM control.
Idle temperatures are obtained after booting the PC and idling on the desktop for 30 minutes.
Load temperatures are obtained after running Prime 95′s for 30 minutes.



Temperature

The Pure Loop 240 was tested first at stock idle and turns in a temperature of 21C, which is the same as D15S. Next we crank up the load - which brings us to 54C. The Pure Loop 240 turned in a remarkable 54C (CPU load - non overclocked) below the Kraken X73 360mm AIO from NZXT for this test.



When overclocked, we’re obviously putting a lot of strain on the cooler, but it still puts up some impressive figures, beating out many other 240mm AIO coolers and performing well enough that I’d be comfortable running this overclock and cooler full time.





Noise Level

In idle, the bequiet! Pure Loop 240 is quiet. The pump is very quiet indeed and we detected none of the ticking noise you get with some All In Ones. Under stress, it's still nice, especially considering the good temps.




Final Thoughts

be quiet! may be the masters of air cooling, but today that all changes as they show their technical abilities can span to the world of water cooling too. Introducing a new all-in-one liquid cooler isn't easy if you're not using Asetek's designs, but be quiet! has come up with a creative solution to circumvent their patents. We were expecting great things from the Pure Loop today, and we were not disappointed. The design allows users to top up the fluid with easy to access fill ports, meaning longevity is a big factor, with a supplemental bottle of fluid in the bundle. When it comes to cooling performance, this is one very capable cooler. The Pure Wings 2 fans are already known to be a great quality component and we've proven that much today with their excellent performance. What really impresses the most, however, is how quiet the pump was. be quiet! are proud to shout about their pump design, but at the end of the day, it does the job, it makes very little noise and that's what really matters to the consumer. And really I have to mention the often overlooked packaging. be quiet! cuts no corners in the packaging department and ensures that your cooler will be in pristine condition when you open the box. The hardware is also cleanly packaged for easy identification during the installation. While the installation process takes a little more time compared to other coolers on the market, we have no complaints about this. The design is rounded off by white lighting around the cooling block, which can only be switched on and off via a plug. For the rest, there is simply nothing to complain about.



We have before us a completely new product, which is characterized by very high efficiency, reliability, low noise level and easy maintenance. The price is quite high, but this is a flagship AIO water cooler with impressive performance, once again proving that you really do get what you pay for. Pure Loop is available for purchase at $84.90/€84.90 for the 120 mm version, at $94.90€94.90 for the 240mm version, at $104.90/€104.90 for the 280mm version, and finally at $119.90/€119.90 for the 360mm version.