Review

Corsair Hydro Series H100i GTX CPU Cooler Review

We have tested and reviewed few of All-In-One (AIO) liquid CPU cooler solutions. Corsair H100i, Cooler Master 240M and Corsair H80i GT, But today we have the opportunity to review the all new Corsair Hydro Series H100i GTX Series Liquid cooler. An updated version of Corsair H100i cooler with new cooling block and new regulated control for pump and fans along with new braided tubes and Corsair Link compatibility.

Now let's see what Corsair H100i GTX CPU Cooler have for us.

Features

• Dual SP120L PWM fans with Corsair Link monitoring and control for extreme liquid CPU cooling performance - The Hydro Series H100i GTX is an extreme performance, all-in-one liquid CPU cooler for cases with 240mm radiator mounts. The 240mm radiator and dual SP120L PWM fans provide the excellent heat dissipation you need for highly overclocked CPUs. Corsair Link is built in, so you can monitor temperatures, adjust cooling performance and customize LED lighting directly from your desktop.

• 240mm radiator - The double-wide radiator offers approximately twice the cooling area of our Hydro Series coolers which use a 120mm or 140mm radiator. It fits virtually any case that has dual 120mm fan mounts spaced for a 240mm radiator.

• Advanced SP120L PWM fans - Our custom-designed SP120L fans are different than standard case fans – they're custom-designed to deliver high static pressure for mounting directly against radiators, and the fan blades are specially shaped for maximum air delivery with minimum noise. Since they're PWM controlled, you can customize the fan speed to choose the optimal point on the performance/noise curve.

• Built-in Corsair Link for monitoring, customization, and control - Attach the included Corsair Link cable to a USB header on your motherboard and download the free Corsair Link software to unlock even more power. You can customize cooling performance, monitor coolant and CPU temperatures, and change the color of the RGB LED lighting from the default white to match your system, or to change color based on temperature readings and other inputs..

• High-performance CPU cooling made simple - Gone are the days when watercooling required lots of work. The H100i GTX is a closed loop design that comes pre-filled, and it comes with a modular, tool-free mounting bracket for faster installation..

Specifications

Package

Corsair H100i GTX comes in a red-black-white colour theme with product image in front and few paragraph describing features on back side.

Inside the box

Beside Guide and accessories box also includes two 120mm PWM Fans Model no. SP120L .

Looks

Corsair made many changes in this new cooler. Besides adding new design for improving the appearance, Corsair also introduced new block, new braided tubes and Corsair Link compatibility.

Pump is powered via regular three pin fan connector.

Both 120mm fans are also powered via two 4 pin PWM fan headers coming from the block. Block also includes a Corsair Link connector allowing user to customize cooling performance, monitor system temperature, and change the color of the RGB Corsair logo LED.

Bottom of the block is perfect flat copper plate with very fine surface finishing. Corsair H100i GTX comes with pre-applied thermal compound, but we have removed it to have a close look at the copper plate.

Corsair H100i GTX radiator is made from aluminum and the fins seem to be nicely spaced apart and will allow for a good amount of airflow through them. We also have a sliver plastic strip with Corsair logo on both sides of the radiator along with new braided tubes, giving a good appealing looks.

Testing

Test system configuration - Intel i7-4770K, 8GB Kingston 1600Mhz RAM, Corsair H100i GTX, Corsair H100i cooler, Samsung 830 SSD 256GB, Corsair RM1000 PSU.

Bundled Softwares

Benchmarks

For testing of AIO coolers we created a constant thermal load machine, having four thermostat heating filaments of 30, 40, 40 & 60 watts respectively to simulate thermal load from 30 to 170 watts. Also including a thermal programmable controller which can turn all thermostats off if temperature crosses 80C.

All tests were started at 21C and between every reading machine internal fan and both fans on cooler ran on full RPM for 5 minutes for cooling the hot plate and coolant inside AIO to 21C. During testing AIO pumps were powered to a constant 12v supply.

Before starting the test, the thermal load machine is tested for thermal turn-off (i.e. temperature reaching 81C) at different loads without any cooler.

Temperature reading at Low rpm

Temperature reading at High rpm

CPU Temperature reading of Test system

Pros

• Excellent Cooling Performance
• Eye-catching design
• Two High performance Fans
• RGB LED on the block
• 5 Years Warranty

Cons

• Only two fans connection option whereas H100i offered four fans connectors.
• Little loud in Performance mode.
• Tubing is fixed on the top of the block making it more rigid and slight difficult to manage.

Conclusion

Corsair H100i GTX is showing a good performance improvement than its older version H100i. Definitely the new pump design and tubes result in better coolant flow. The same block is also used in Corsair H80i GT and there also we have seen great improvement in performance. Stock fans are good, but are slight louder at 4.4GHz max load, still temperature readings were nice. Only difficult part is the laying of tubing on Corsair H100i GTX waterblock. It is located on the top of block and not on the side more rigid and more difficult to manage when installing in some PC cabinets. With a 5 years warrant in hand, the Corsair H100i GTX is a well build AIO cooler offering superb performance and an excellent choice for CPU Cooling Solution and worthy of our PC TeK REVIEWS Choice Award.

Manufacturers Info

Thanks.

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