Corsair finally launches Link Cooling, Lighting Kits
The Corsair Link Commander is finally ready for purchase, although it's US-only for the moment.
The Corsair Link system is designed to provide monitoring and control of cooling and lighting systems built into a PC, via the use of a microcontroller system dubbed the Corsair Link Commander. While we compared it to Nvidia's abortive Enthusiast Systems Architecture (ESA) technology when we first saw the system, we remained hopeful that Corsair would avoid the pitfalls that did for ESA and release something enthusiasts would find genuinely useful to have in their system.
Unlike ESA, Corsair Link allows users to monitor and control almost any cooling system regardless of manufacturer. Based around Corsair Link Cooling Nodes, each Node provides support for control of five fans, four sensors, and three temperature sensors. A Lighting Node, by contrast, provide two lighting channels with support for up to 33 LED lighting strips each with a claimed 16.7 million colour pallet.
All in all, the system sounded promising. We've had a bit of a wait to find out if it lives up to expectation, though. Despite being unveiled at CES in January 2011 and demonstrated at events including CeBit and Computex throughout the year, Corsair has been silent on when modders and clockers might actually be able to get their hands on the hardware; until now.
The system is now available in two distinct kits: the Corsair Link Cooling Kit comprises a Corsair Link Commander, a single Corsair Link Cooling Node, and the Corsair Link software to tie everything together; the Corsair Link Cooling and Lighting Kit includes all of the aforementioned, plus a Corsair Link Lighting Node and three LED light strips.
In addition, selected Corsair products - such as the Hydro Series H100 Liquid CPU Cooler, to give it its full and proper title - can be connected directly to the Corsair Link system for full control and monitoring, giving those who have invested in the technology a reason to stick with the brand for all their cooling needs.
'Corsair Link is a complete ecosystem of kits and components that offers remarkable control of a system's cooling and lighting customisation,' explained Ruben Mookerjee, vice president and general manager for components at Corsair. 'PC enthusiasts will no longer have to rely on manual adjustments for fan and lighting control. Corsair Link Dashboard is easy to use and offers both instant and automatic control of cooling fans, case lighting, and compatible Corsair products.'
UK pricing has yet to be confirmed, but the Corsair Link Cooling Kit is set to cost $99 and the Cooling and Lighting Kit $139 across the pond.
Are you tempted to get your hands on a Corsair Link system, or do you think you could hack something better together with an Arduino and a bit of Perl? Share your thoughts over in the forums.
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5 Comments
Discuss in the forums ReplyExpensive.
Other than a few LED lit fans, I've even lost interest in case lighting since this thing was 1st announced.
The control for the coolers themselves should've been software driven as with the Antec line of closed loop watercoolers. Not another item to squeeze into increasingly smaller cases.
Way too expensive for the cooling feature. Mine run just fine as is with their built-in 3 speed pump &/or fan control. I've heard that it controls either one or the other. Not both. I can tell no difference in any setting so it's quite possible that mine are borked. It doesn't really matter as these coolers are the best there is next to a full watercooling loop.
I have no interest or comment about the lighting control feature, either.
The long wait for these things hasn't exactly been good for Corsair. I suggest anybody that wants one buy it asap, as I doubt that it'll remain in production very long.
Not the way the worldwide economy is now, and most people will consider this an unecessary luxury with neither a real need for buying nor that much of a help in cooling and/or lighting.
Guess the Aquero, BigNG and Alphacool Heatmaster are also worthless then? These offer far more advanced control than any 5.25" device, much like you'd edit a fan curve in Afterburner. You have the opportunity for using various temperature sensors to control the fan speeds automatically based on a curve that you define. Great idea if you ask me.
Corsair's offering however is too expensive when compared with the Aquero 5 LT, not to mention that it's looking as expensive as the 5.25" versions which also include remotes and other fancy gubbins.