Gadgetory

- tech tips coverage of CES 2016 is brought to you by Squarespace build it beautiful and on a subject of building it beautiful we're here in the Swift Tech Suites and they have actually a surprising number of things on display their launching not one but two actually no not two but three no not three but actually two times that it's like three times two of one type of product anyway they've got six different all in one liquid coolers everything from a dual 120 to a dual 140 to a triple 120 millimeter radiator design with a couple of different variants but first let's walk through all the changes that they've made from the H x-series so this is the H whatever number corresponds to the side X - very creatively named congratulations you guys so first of all they have made some changes to the mounting system for the CPU block instead of me being subjected to that whole finicky hold the back plate on or maybe get sticky residue all over your back plate while you try and screw it in from the front thing they've gone with a male-to-female adapter so that it right out of the box you can screw it into an LGA 2011 socket or with the adapter you can screw it into the m3 threaded so the actually thinner threaded more traditional backplate with one little adapter and then you screw the block right into that I've seen other guys use this system in the past and it is legitimately better the next thing you'll probably notice about it immediately is whoa that block looks really really cool in addition to having LED lighting effects and more on the LED lighting effects later actually they've also added an acrylic top that I think looks absolutely sublime especially when you see it installed in a system with the LEDs turned on to go with that they've changed over from their traditional sort of black kind of frankly sorry boring tubing to a clear tubing design that is going to complement very well this little addition now this is cool the first thing I said when Swift tech told me hey we're going to include dyes in the box was are they any good and the answer was there mayim i'll so you've got to be kidding me a you're using the best eyes on the market best regarded eyes on the market bar none and be you're actually just saying it yeah we partnered up with those guys we're including their dyes you mix and match any color you want and boom you're clear tubes look like that which leads us to and I know this is a lot of different changes actually considering that all they called it was the X - and not the X completely something different because there are more changes on the radiator they've upgraded the paint finish it is much more durable actually feels nicer to the touch they have completely altered the reservoir and I think it looks great so they've got an LED strip that actually illuminates the water whether it's clear or whether it's colored it is just a I don't know what to say about it it's clearer it's larger and they've managed to do all of this without making it any higher profile and any more likely to interfere with anything because if you look at it from the side actually compared to even most custom blush and say most even custom water cooling radiators the tanks at the end are very very short the pump hasn't really been altered it's still an MCP 350 so that's your your quieter version of the DDC it is still PWM controlled but on the subject of PWM control I also want to introduce you guys to this little number so I've used their PWM controller probably most famously in our whole room water cooling setup where we ran a bunch of radiators on the roof of a house but they have made some changes this time so now you've got the one that controls the others you've got only three four pin fan headers but they've added some other interesting things so these little headers right here are for addressable LEDs which means that each individual LED is controllable and mixable and with the right software something they're actually working on you can actually create effects with them but if you're not even into effects anyway and you just want basic control this puppy will do that for you - there's a little button on board so what you got to do is you take out your case side panel you open it up you reach in you find your little fan controller doodad that you tucked away somewhere because it's a bunch of wires you press the button actually you don't have to do that so they've actually put a little two pin connector so that you can change your reset switch something very few people use and some case manufacturers don't even include or any other button you can wire it up yourself and you can cycle through different colors so this technology is going to get even better over time because it allows us to mix not only colors but also different brightnesses for a wide variety of different effects now I talked about the radio talked about the reservoir talked about the pump what I've ignored is the fans those aren't Hilux fans let's art Swift tech fans at all in fact those are those are those are those are those are noise block your fans those are their ellipse fans well hold on a second once again acknowledging that you know unfortunately designing widely regarded as the best if not one of the best fans on the market is not freaking easy Swift Tech has decided to just straight-up partner with noise blocker on these in order to provide the absolute finest of performance for their customers that is assuming that they're willing to pay so these SKUs are available in a couple of different configurations each that's why there are actually six different models the dual 120 millimeter version of the base model is one 39.99 the dual 140 comes in at 149 99 if I recall correctly and the triple 120 is 165 if you want the version with the noise blocker fans you're going to pay an additional $50 per skill but the good news is that you also get Swift text compression fittings instead of their barbed and collared fittings that although very reliable aren't as attractive looking especially if you're looking to expand your system in the future and expand you can just like the last generation it is no problem to add a video card add two video cards out another radiator it's an MCP 350 it is legitimately custom aftermarket grade and honestly with all the improvements that they've made to it this time around everything from improved case compatibility to improve CPU mounting to improved aesthetic in my opinion this is looking like a pretty attractive product considering that for the base model they haven't altered the price over the last generation and we've got another little treat over here this is the Apple G SKF the upcoming flagship standalone enthusiast block from Swift tech they won't tell me everything about it necessarily like I don't know anything about the intern floo optimizations that they're saying are particularly badass but what they did tell me because the first thing I said when I saw it was holy crap those things are really close together and it's kind of smug smile yeah their point one five millimeter in thickness so about a piece of paper with that much distance between them like it's freakin unbelievable so I was like come on you gotta you gotta be kidding me here how did you do that well the answer is not by taking a hunk of copper and then running a bit through it to create channels the answer is through a technique called skiving that's where the SKF asked I've in my naming schemes man right that's where that comes from so what's actually done is like a blade is used to to slice to like to shave the copper and then bend it up into a fin over and over and over again so the fins are actually like kind of curvy if you were to look at them from the side but that is how they are able to achieve such tiny little fins and of course you know the looks being able to stare at it and admire through the window of the block how tight they are together is cool but if it didn't contribute anything to performance then I'm sure they wouldn't bother doing it but Swift exclaiming compared to their previous flagship up to a 6 degree improvement something I would have thought was impossible at this point so thanks for checking out not only this but all of our Linus tech safe coverage of CES 2016 and another huge thank you to Squarespace for allowing us to be here remember you're building a website whether it's a blog a store you know just a page full of pictures of your face for whatever reason or someone else's face you creep you can do it over on Squarespace visit squarespace.com slash Linus use offer code Linus to save 10%