Gadgetory

there aren't many ways for cooling manufacturers to differentiate a top of a suppliers product like the ASA tech Gen 5 pumps but you'd be surprised at how much goes into them behind the scenes and the XT for example was the first manufacturer permitted to build a fully custom and complex PCB for its RGB eliminated cracking coolers followed up in short order by EVGA who dropped price significantly for the same sized radiators while still instituting RGB we're reviewing the new EB GAC LC 240 today following up our previous CLC to 80 and 120 reviews and we'll be looking at the noise normalized performance along with total performance overall this video is brought to you by the be quiet dark bass pro 900 white Edition the DBP 900 marks a return to full tower cases equipped with ample harddrive support effective noise damping foam high performance fans and the option to be inverted into an alternative layout the tinted tempered glass window and Qi charger at a high untouched to an already well-built case learn more at the link in the description below to quickly recap the first two reviews of EVGA CLC units the CLC is named because they're closed-loop coolers came out earlier this year the 120 and 280 were first and both use ASA tech John 5 pumps to get you up to speed something like the courser h 100 IV 2 is also an ASA tech pump as is the entire NZXT kraken series the fractal Celsius series and basically 80% of coolers in the US market if not more at this point so the CLC 240 is new it's a smaller radiator obviously than the 280 it's priced at 110 dollars you can get about 100 with a rebate if you count those and that's the exact same price as the H 100 IBT which is also priced at $110 also with a $10 rebate if you count those if not they're both 1/10 the CLC 280 we originally liked for value proposition versus other 280 millimeter coolers a lot of this comes down to the fact that unlike NZXT EVGA CLC's are a lot more simplified in terms of the LEDs and the illumination and software and things like that but it allowed them to compete right in between where the Corsair h-series coolers h1 15i and the NZXT crack and X 62 coolers landed and the 280 at $130 was and remains a good value the EVGA CLC 120 we didn't really like at all it was pretty poor performing overall it really made no sense to buy it because you could spend a couple dollars more and get a 240 millimeter H 100 IB 2 which offered significantly better cooling performance with better noise levels so the EB J now has its 240 millimeter option which will more or less kill the 120 except in specific use cases where you can't fit a 240 and that's what we're reviewing today so we'll look at the 240 versus the kraken and Corsair cooler is along with everything else we have on the bench just as a reminder here because it's been a while since we've gone through some of the testing methods we account for ambient temperature every second so that's that goes into a sheet we can monitor it second a second we account for power consumption by the CPU at the EPS 12-volt rails which means we can monitor if the CPU draws more power and one test versus the other because if it does it's an invalid test because power equals Heat at the end of the day and we also account for voltage and frequency locking them to be the same thing so it's fixed it's not automatic it doesn't change and then after that point we run the standard test at max rpm and then we run a noise normalized 40 DB a test where the cooler is tested for noise levels at 20 inches away from the cooler at which point we determine a 40 DBA rpm and test again at that rpm for thermals starting with the torture test that's just max rpm for everything EB GAC LC 240 cooler performs exceptionally well it lands at around two cooling levels of the slowed-down rpm for the kraken x 62 or slowed-down c LC 280 the advantage of course still goes to the larger coolers by operating at 1500 rpm X 62 can match the maxed out CLC 240 perforins thermally but at significantly lower noise levels we'll look at those in a mo the same is true for the CLC 280 page 115 IV 2 and so forth these roughly matched the CLC 240 performance but with lower rpm at thirty four point nine six Celsius over ambient the CLC 240 place is marginally cooler than the ek fluid gaming with course there's H 100 IB two fans compared to the max rpm H 100 IB two at 2500 rpm the CLC 240 manages about a one degree Celsius advantage that was awfully close to our tolerances for error considering even just a plus or minus 0.5 degree Swain would equalize them these are pretty close to the same that EVGA does hold a lead here strictly in terms of noise at the peak rpm which is what most of our previous charts and numbers were based off of EVGA manages to lay claim to the loudest cooler on the charts at fifty eight point one DBA the CLC 240 is rivaling 100% rpm noise levels out of blower fans from reference GPU coolers at this noise level we're in in tolerable levels of whirring but we obviously have full control to reduce that noise level as necessary well we have now our numbers representing peak their own performance and worst case noise performance for reference the CLC 280 at 1500 rpm matches the 2500 rpm CLC 240 in terms of thermals but operates at 45 DBA verses 58 DBA that's what you get with a larger cooler this is more than a two times perceived reduction in noise as decibels are a logarithmic scale so as far as the human is concerned to the human ear you've dropped more than 2x the noise by going to the 280 with the same thermal performance the crack connects 62 at 1500 rpm is in the same boat achieving lower noise and equivalent performance that's again the value but let's move on to the noise and normalize thermal chart where we can figure all coolers the output at 40 DBA and then thermally bench them normalize that 40 DBA on all coolers plus or minus about 0.5 the 280 millimeter and 360 millimetre coolers predictably land at the top of the chart this consists of the 280 millimeter NZXT X 62 at 1200 rpm leading at 35 degrees Celsius delta T over ambient it also consists of the 360 millimetre Celsius at 1350 rpm at 37 degrees C over ambient and the 280 millimeter H 115 I at 38 degrees Celsius I over ambient we next hit the 40 C mark with the ek fluid gaming 240 open loop kit cooling only the CPU and then we encountered the CLC 240 at 1250 rpm from EVGA the ek fluid gaming kit and EVGA CLC 240 are functionally equivalent in our noise normalized cooling test as 39.9 C and 40.3 C fall within usual variants of our test and we can't really determine at that resolution which is better anyway so they're functionally the same in this test Corsairs competing 240 millimeter H 100 ib2 falls behind at 42 degrees Celsius one noise normalized and as the closest thing to competition on this newer charge age 100 IB 2 is the same price as the EVGA CLC 240 so EVGA does command a small victory here but a two degree difference isn't much of one to phone home about you can buy either cooler knowing that they perform reasonably at 40 DB a particularly given that they're the same size and about the same price but be aware obviously though there are differences in other aspects for example EVGA has its led options whereas the H 100 IB 2 is a plain and doesn't have RGB LEDs in it whether that's good or not is up to you so this comes down to the price then which is $110 for the H 100 IV 2 and EVGA CLC 240 they're about the same price they're pretty close and performance EVGA outperforms a bit when noise normalized EVGA has or we're not fully sure if the fans are better just the solution as a whole works a bit better but either way it's it's marginally better they have small victories where they might not have victories comes in the looks the appearance this block is probably a little bit polarizing it's it's kind of fat it's got LEDs which not everyone wants and it's EVGA branded LEDs so if you like those great you get it at the same price as the h1 heartbeat ooh if you don't like them you get the H 100 B 2 and it's just a plain block that I think says Corsair on it and has really no LEDs or anything like that so that's what it comes down to at this point is do you want those LEDs or not in terms of installing them on things they are a Sutekh gen-5 pumps they have the same mounting kit they both fit and four they fit thread Ripper they fit everything you just need to have the right bracket for it and thread Ripper comes with an eight a Sutekh bracket you can get an T and Intel brackets in the box so they are both pretty much compatible with everything and then installation wise same process same procedure so temperature is about the same just comes down to how much you care about our one ish degree difference which is pretty close to error and how would you care about the LEDs so that's all for this one as always that you can check us out on patreon.com slash gamers Nexus you get a store that gamers Nexus not net to pick up a shirt like this one this is the GN Graff logo subscribe for more I'll see you all next time that's your white balance