I recently got a chance to test the XSPC RX360 radiator.
First of all, let me address the issues with the finish of these radiators that many reported. It seems that the first batch of these radiators were wrapped before the paint dried completely and this led to blemishes on the rad.
My model had almost perfect finish, but was seemingly also wrapped a little too early. The radiators from that first batch have been pulled in the meantime and the new ones are expected sometime next week.
So far, I have only compared this radiator to three competitors:
- Thermochill PA120.3
- Magicool Slim 360
- Watercool HTSF 360
The reason I chose these competitors is mainly that I had them lying around here.
But also, the TC is definitely the main competitor with the RX and the Magicool is a very low budget radiator so it is interesting to see how much better the high-end rads do in comparison.
Testing method
For testing the radiators, I set up a loop with one of the radiators, a Laing DDC (355) with an EK X-Res top, two 300W heaters and two arrays with two analogue thermal sensors each.
This is what the thermal sensor array thingy looks like:
With this, I can measure the water in and water out temperatures.
An mCubed T-Balancer BigNG is logging all of the relevant temps in 5-second intervals and and has three digital thermal sensors attached that are measuring ambient temperatures.
In this test, I measure performance at five different fan speeds: 400rpm, 800rpm, 1200rpm, 1600rpm and 2000rpm.
For the lowest fan speed, I use Scythe Slip Stream 500 fans. For the medium fan speeds I use Nanoxia FX-1250 fans and for the high fan speeds I use Yate Loon D12SH-12. All of the fans are installed pushing air through the radiators.
Each test run lasts for 35 minutes and all of the temps from the last ten minutes of a run are averaged out to recieve the relevant data.
I don't know the actual heat loads of my heaters, so I just refer to the heat loads as 300W (with one heater active) and 600W (both heaters active) respectively, since the heaters are supposed to do 300W each.
Results
300W Heatload:
600W Heatload:
The 600W heatload starts at 800rpm since it's just too much heat for 400rpm fans.
As we can see, the two highend-rads are quite clearly superior to the lower budget competitors.
It's a very close race between the RX and the TC. In short, at lower fan speeds, the RX is the better choice while at higher fan speeds, the TC has the edge. It's a close call either way, but I would certainly always recommend the XSPC RX over the TC for the following reasons:
- The RX has standard fan-spacing
- The RX has standard M4 threads
- The RX (and this is a very minor advantage) has the much more commong G1/4" threads for fittings
- The RX costs less
- And finally, for me personally, performance at low rpm is what really matters. I like my PC silent and at lower rpm the quality of the radiator makes much more of a difference than at high rpm. At 400rpm, the difference between the best and the worst radiator in this comparison is 3.5K at 300W.
At 2000rpm the difference between best and worst shrinks to just 1.3K, a difference that seems much less worth the extra price paid for the highend radiator.
You can find my original (german) article with lot's of more pics and some more details here.
That's all for now. Any questions and comments are welcome!
Cheers,
Shane
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Originally Posted by Chruschef in regards to Thermaltake water cooling
I picked up a supposedly blemished one from jab-tech for $71.95 on friday. I am going to piant it I believe so the blemishes are not a concern to me. It is going to go on the bottom of my case, I was going to get another gtx or a feser, but this price was too good to pass up!!
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