Performance Testing and Results

I used the following machine to test the Thermaltake Water 2.0 Pro CPU cooler:

The 3770k is an interesting CPU, it doesn't put out a tremendous amount of heat but it runs very hot. I tested the Water 2.0 Pro against the Thermaltake Frio Extreme and the 3770k's stock cooler, testing was done at stock clock speeds (1.04vcore), 4.1GHz (1.11vcore) and 4.5GHz(1.29vcore). To further complicate matters all Frio Extreme and Water 2.0 Performer tests were run with the fans at maximum as well as minimum speeds.  If that isn't complicated enough, the Pro was tested both with its stock pre-applied paste and the same AA Ceramic 2.0 paste I used for the Frio Extreme and Intel Stock cooler. The Frio Extreme is used for comparison because at the testing speeds/voltages used it beat the TRUE I usually use.

The results are the average core temperature measured in degrees Celsius over the ambient air temperature. This makes the results easy to compare as it takes away a huge variable. The ambient temperature was measured using a Fluke 51 thermocouple thermometer with the probe about one inch in front of the fan hub.

Here we are with default BIOS settings loaded and XMP enabled for the ram:

This probably isn't news to anybody, but the stock Intel cooler is terrible.  The pre-applied paste on the Tt Water 2.0 Pro is clearly good stuff. The Water 2.0 pro is very nearly matching the Frio Extreme with the fans on high. With the fans on low the Water 2.0 looses more than the Frio Extreme does, likely because it has a lot more restriction to airflow.

I'll add some voltage and some clock speed, here we are at 4.1GHz:

The Water 2.0 pro is falling behind, not by a huge amount, but enough to be noticed. The Intel cooler is barely hanging on.

Let's crank the OC up a bit more, to 4.5GHz and plenty of vcore. These are the heatloads and overclocks that serious cooling like the Water 2.0 series and the Frio Extreme are really built for.

At this point the Intel cooler won't even boot, so it has been dropped from the chart. The Water 2.0 has actually caught back up with the Frio Extreme. It still has slightly higher temperatures, but they're less than a degree apart. This is very good!

The Fans

The fans are very nice by and large, the PWM control works beautifully and they are very quiet in the mid range, nearly silent at the low end, and not at all obnoxious at full speed. However if your PWM fan controller uses a low frequency signal they squeal nastily. The spec calls for a 25kHz, if your controller or motherboard uses that frequency everything is great. My motherboard does not, it uses a ~4kHz frequency. At that frequency the fans squeal quite a bit, very obnoxious. My custom fan controller can run at 3kHz or 25kHz (some Nidec server fans want 500Hz to 3kHz), at 25kHz the fans are wonderful, at 3kHz they're quite annoying. This is the case with all four fans on both Water 2.0 coolers I have tested.

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