Well let me be the first to say, "What the hell!?!?"
What sort of nutter would buy that pack, you could build much the same thing for cheaper, probably get better results and have the satisfaction of knowing you had done it.
We really struggle to see the point of fitting watercooling on a card, only to whack an air cooler on top of it; its as if ECS or Thermaltake didnt trust the waterblock alone to cool the GPU, and the result is that appears to be an utterly redundant air cooler tacked onto the cards.
Quote:
Unsurprisingly, the naff blue LED paddle fans had absolutely no effect on the operational temperatures of the cards, so are almost certainly better off being left switched off or removed from the cards completely, but the real surprise here was the noise made by the Bigwater 760iss 120mm cooling fan its significantly louder than anything else in our test system at full speed, and even at half speed, it's much noisier than the stock 9800 GTX+ air cooler when its spinning at full speed.
Quote:
Physics fans will immediately spot the problem here hot air rises, so its not exactly a thermally efficient design, and the fact that the hot air is being exhausted directly down and into your case, not out of it, wont help your system temperatures a great deal either.
Three reasons to not buy that Thermaltake WC solution (or in this case the cards that have it bundled) and all without even comparing it to a real wc solution... wow.. that has to be some kind of negative rec for Thermaltake.
I saw this last month in one of the PC gaming mags here in Oz. My first reaction was "OMG crap in a box" lol, sadly I wasn't mistaken. A few years back when I knew absolutely nothing about water cooling I considered a Thermaltake system with that GPU block to cool my 8800GTX. Thankfully I looked up Danger Den and my tastes have been getting more expensive ever since lol.
I dont know where to begin because there appear to be so many flaws? What a mess.
Fistly why bother with the fans on the water blocks...they really dont get what water cooling is about!
Secondly why then choose to use a molex to power the fan's...did they forget about the fan header on the PCB?
Thirdly why use a monstrosity of a fan on the radiator...again they really dont get what water cooling is about!
This is clearly aimed at someone who has not got the foggiest about anything really :|
Originally Posted by Tim S Bizarre, it's like we were looking at two different products.
I've had too much to drink to work out if you're being sarcy.. Advice plz.
Well, their opinion is almost the polar opposite of ours, so either we were unlucky, they were lucky, or we looked at two different products. I suppose my comment was a little sarcy, but I was just pointing out that we had a completely different experience with the same product. :)
Originally Posted by Tim S Well, their opinion is almost the polar opposite of ours, so either we were unlucky, they were lucky, or we looked at two different products. I suppose my comment was a little sarcy, but I was just pointing out that we had a completely different experience with the same product. :)
Ah. The slightly different review titles got me. I was sat there wondering whether they actually were reviewing another product.
Thank god for Strongbow being as distracting as it is, though.
Side note: Why does anyone trust Thermaltakes W/C products? I mean, sure, TT make cases that weigh as much as a small moon, but that hardly qualifies them as W/C experts..
Originally Posted by liratheal Side note: Why does anyone trust Thermaltakes W/C products? I mean, sure, TT make cases that weigh as much as a small moon, but that hardly qualifies them as W/C experts..
To say it with the review:
Quote:
t’s as if ECS or Thermaltake didn’t trust the waterblock alone to cool the GPU, and the result is that appears to be an utterly redundant air cooler tacked onto the cards.
Personally I LOVE the idea of a "all in one box" watercooled sli setup but it needs work. I surely would pay a tad bit more if I could buy a quality kit(danger den, swifttech, Innovatek, ect) all in one box WITH a complete warranty... A warranty is like car insurance to me.. You hope you never need it but if something happens and you DO need it you regret not getting it!
Originally Posted by Tim S Well, their opinion is almost the polar opposite of ours, so either we were unlucky, they were lucky, or we looked at two different products. I suppose my comment was a little sarcy, but I was just pointing out that we had a completely different experience with the same product. :)
I think I found the main difference, looking at the pics they have they never actually had the bigwater in the 5,25" slots, but outside the case, which would explain due to the controllable fan why they didnt run into the noise issue and ofcourse the temps where also lower which made the wc kit look better than it is.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bjrcboy Personally I LOVE the idea of a "all in one box" watercooled sli setup but it needs work. I surely would pay a tad bit more if I could buy a quality kit(danger den, swifttech, Innovatek, ect) all in one box WITH a complete warranty... A warranty is like car insurance to me.. You hope you never need it but if something happens and you DO need it you regret not getting it!
EVGA used to do exactly that, but those days are over since they started manufacturing their own waterblocks, sure you can buy a card with a wc block from them now to get the benefit of warranty with wc, but nothing compared to the old days when they teamed up with innovatek to create this. (link doesnt work in opera for some reason, stupid tomshardware).
Originally Posted by mrb_no1 rubbish product really, but a nice article harry, i especially like the closing sentence on the article too. Nice work
cheers :)
It's always nice to review a good product, but when the stinkers come along it can be a little frustrating -when the pwm heatsinks started falling off i genuinely could not believe what i was seeing.
Originally Posted by Baz when the pwm heatsinks started falling off i genuinely could not believe what i was seeing.
They should be ashamed of producing such crap. What did you do about it though? I wouldn't feel comfortable running them without the PWM heatsinks but if that is how it came then maybe you should live with it.
Oh well, a brilliant example of companies catering to idiots who fall for the SLI = better and water = better (obviously it is in some case but you get what I mean)
Out of interest, why have you removed the 9800GX2 from your lists? I noticed you said you had stopped testing it but surely it should be very similar to this combination? Or maybe that's why you aren't testing it...
The votes are in (COUNTING) and we have it lady and gents. This product is utter crap. What can you expect. Thermaltake + water cooling in the same sentence is always going to end badly.
Originally Posted by The boy 4rm oz The votes are in (COUNTING) and we have it lady and gents. This product is utter crap. What can you expect. Thermaltake + water cooling in the same sentence is always going to end badly.
Hear Hear..
I have never used a TT product. After hearing so much about how s**te they were and having a few people i know faceplant the desk voluntarily because of the disappointment. I swore never to touch any of their products.
Comments 1 to 25 of 26
ReplyWhat sort of nutter would buy that pack, you could build much the same thing for cheaper, probably get better results and have the satisfaction of knowing you had done it.
It's not a graphics card pack. Can't be. Even OEM cards made from match sticks and epoxy look better than those things :/
Probably perform better too..
Three reasons to not buy that Thermaltake WC solution (or in this case the cards that have it bundled) and all without even comparing it to a real wc solution... wow.. that has to be some kind of negative rec for Thermaltake.
Fistly why bother with the fans on the water blocks...they really dont get what water cooling is about!
Secondly why then choose to use a molex to power the fan's...did they forget about the fan header on the PCB?
Thirdly why use a monstrosity of a fan on the radiator...again they really dont get what water cooling is about!
This is clearly aimed at someone who has not got the foggiest about anything really :|
http://www.guru3d.com/article/ecs-geforce-9800-gtx-hydra-sli/1
Bizarre, it's like we were looking at two different products.
I've had too much to drink to work out if you're being sarcy.. Advice plz.
Well, their opinion is almost the polar opposite of ours, so either we were unlucky, they were lucky, or we looked at two different products. I suppose my comment was a little sarcy, but I was just pointing out that we had a completely different experience with the same product. :)
Ah. The slightly different review titles got me. I was sat there wondering whether they actually were reviewing another product.
Thank god for Strongbow being as distracting as it is, though.
Side note: Why does anyone trust Thermaltakes W/C products? I mean, sure, TT make cases that weigh as much as a small moon, but that hardly qualifies them as W/C experts..
To say it with the review:
I think I found the main difference, looking at the pics they have they never actually had the bigwater in the 5,25" slots, but outside the case, which would explain due to the controllable fan why they didnt run into the noise issue and ofcourse the temps where also lower which made the wc kit look better than it is.
EVGA used to do exactly that, but those days are over since they started manufacturing their own waterblocks, sure you can buy a card with a wc block from them now to get the benefit of warranty with wc, but nothing compared to the old days when they teamed up with innovatek to create this. (link doesnt work in opera for some reason, stupid tomshardware).
cheers :)
It's always nice to review a good product, but when the stinkers come along it can be a little frustrating -when the pwm heatsinks started falling off i genuinely could not believe what i was seeing.
They should be ashamed of producing such crap. What did you do about it though? I wouldn't feel comfortable running them without the PWM heatsinks but if that is how it came then maybe you should live with it.
Oh well, a brilliant example of companies catering to idiots who fall for the SLI = better and water = better (obviously it is in some case but you get what I mean)
Out of interest, why have you removed the 9800GX2 from your lists? I noticed you said you had stopped testing it but surely it should be very similar to this combination? Or maybe that's why you aren't testing it...
Hear Hear..
I have never used a TT product. After hearing so much about how s**te they were and having a few people i know faceplant the desk voluntarily because of the disappointment. I swore never to touch any of their products.
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