Performance Analysis

With its fairly beefy fans and a reasonably powerful pump, we had high hopes for the Gamer Storm Captain 240 Pro, but it also needs to justify its high asking price against some stiff competition. The LGA1150 delta T of 42°C was exceptional and matches the Corsair H100i RGB Platinum, meaning it's a little better than the Deepcool Gamer Storm Castle 240 RGB too, although at just 2°C difference, this is practically within the margin of error. 

Even so, it was clearly a better performer than the Raijintek Orcus 240 and Cooler Master MasterLiquid ML240R RGB, both of which were noticeably warmer, and you can expect around 10°C lower temperatures compared to a half decent air-cooler such as the Arctic Freezer 33 Esports One. The RGB lighting, meanwhile, proved to be bright and vivid and easily on par with the best RGB coolers we've seen. The LGA2066 delta T wasn't as impressive, with 64°C sitting around 5°C warmer than the Corsair H100i RGB Platinum but still a few degrees cooler than the Cooler Master MasterLiquid ML240R RGB and Raijintek Orcus 240.

Finally the Deepcool unit dealing with our overclocked Ryzen 7 1800X sits just 5°C warmer than the best result we saw from the Raijintek custom water-cooling system and 4°C adrift of the Corsair cooler on its highest fan speed - still a decent result. The fans were less annoying than those on the Corsair cooler too, producing a noticeable high airflow noise at full speed but nothing along the lines of ear-splitting. However, the benefit of larger, quieter coolers such as the Corsair H115i Pro is clear, offering similar temperatures for lower noise levels.

Conclusion

With solid cooling performance, reasonably quiet pump and fans, and snazzy RGB lighting, the Deepcool Gamer Storm Captain 240 Pro ticks most of our boxes, but even so its price - in the UK at least - is a little eye-watering. £150 will bag you a custom liquid-cooling kit with similar or better performance plus plenty of upgrade potential and the ability to use third party coolants. The likes of Cooler Master's MasterLiquid ML240R RGB and Corsair H100i RGB Platinum are noticeably cheaper, widening that gap, but things get tricky once you hit that £150 mark, especially as the Corsair H100i RGB Platinum does a similar job for less. As a result, it's only in terms of value that the Gamer Storm Captain 240 Pro misses out on an award - in all other departments it's a great-looking, great-performing liquid-cooler.