Thermaltake is the cooler powerhouse, one of the best coolers all-round, ranging from the smallest conventional air coolers or to more money conscious passive coolers, then to the water-coolers, water blocks or accessories, with all of the rest in the big file cabinet. More ever, the slight problem with the Thermaltake is the passive and the air-coolers, with them like the VI coolers, given a really big cooler expectations, hard installation, with the power cables everywhere, you would just give up. And the performance of the thing is exhausting, 70 degrees at high load with the fan at full power, with the help of external fans.
The water block alternative
While it interests me on the best way to cool the computer, the water-coolers are on top of the list. I own, personally a gigabyte 3D galaxy, for the prime reason that is has a complete set, VGA expansion, and also an external water-block. As Thermaltake suggest me to re-think, slightly, with their Big Water 780e liquid cooling system.
While they said cooling system, on their product, is would expect like my Gigabyte one, but all I get is a CPU connector for the pipes to be connected. And a large water-block, the size of two bricks needs at least two 5.25in on the front of the case, so much for the two DVD optical drives I have on top. The rest is a 140mm fan with LED lights, and with only two pipes, one inlet and one outlet.The 780e main unit has a larger front mesh bezel than its little brother 760i kit, this is to enhance the ventilation for cool air intake. The P500 pump is the heart of this cooler, it can move up to 500L/hr of coolant for under 16dBA of noise, which is directly connected to a black transparent reservoir that contains 530 c.c. of liquid capacity. It has built-in temperature sensor and coolant level indicator. The 780e not only has one coolant flow meter with temperature sensor but it actually has two; one is on the intake line to monitor the hot coolant and the other one is on the exit line right after the radiator exist port (front bezel) to measure cooled coolant. The radiator is a compact one-inch wide aluminum fin design.
How hot cold is it
All important bang for buck performance and the hardest judges I could think of, me, performance, is an impressive cooling power of the Thermaltake but I have to take into account that I only cool a specific place, VGA or CPU you choose (if you forget to order expansions). While it cools in below the 20 degree count at idle, then up to high load and the Thermaltake kept the temperature and 40 to 50 degree mark. With the over-clocked Intel Q9550, from its stock frequency 2.5GHz to 3.2GHz, surprising enough it held its ground and not letting the temp to about the mid-50 degrees at high load.
Conclusion
Thermaltake is a great on only the water-cooling, for the rest of the product they make is a bit of a disappointment, I couldn’t count on cooling on certain VGA products, as an example of a particular video card (3870X2) doesn’t have yet the VGA block for it to be cooled, probably the 8 and 9 series of NVIDIA and the rest of the 3 and 2 series of ATi, could be possible. I would still prefer the full package type water-cooler.