Radiators:
Radiators are one of the most important parts of a water cooling loop. Not that there are that many to begin with... But... yeah. It is essentially a series of flat tubes to which a large number of fins are soldered to aid in removing heat from the coolant. Radiators come in several major varieties. High and Low density which address the space in between the fins, and thus how restrictive it is to air being pushing or pulled through it. This amount of restriction essentially defines the minimum noise/speed/airflow fans you can effectively use. A high density radiator offers unbeatable cooling capacity but the fans required to accomplish this are often louder than is considered tolerable. This is where low density radiators come in. These radiators achieve peak performance with quieter/slower fans. The second main deifference between radiators is in
Popular radiators include the Swiftech MCR series, the Thermochil PA series, the Feser X-Changer series, the XSPC RX series, and the HW Labs Black Ice GT Xtreme series. Each of these radiators offers excellent performance.
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The Swiftech MCR radiators are regarded as the best bargain. They offer performance only slihtly behind the top radiators at roughly half the price. They are designed to work best with Low to Medium speed fans and have a fairly low fin density. These are single pass radiators which results in the lower price. Also feature standard barb threads and fan spacing.
Petra's Tech Shop
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The Thermochill PA series offers some of the best performance out there and have been around for a fairly long time. They are made in UK and as a result are fairly expensive in the US. They have a slightly lower fin density than the Swiftech rads and are of a dual pass design, meaning water flows up and then down along the entire width of the radiator. A single pass radiator flows up along half the width and then back down the other half. These rads use a less standard fitting that requires special barbs or adapters. The space between fans is also slightly larger than all the others for which they have taken significant flak.
MountainMods.com-Water Cooling-Radiators-ThermoChill-ThermoChill PA 120.3 Radiator
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The Feser X-Changer radiators are essentially a clone of the Thermochill radiators and perform nearly identically. The slight changes include the switch to standard barbs and normal fan spacing.
Petra's Tech Shop
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The XSPC RX series is very new to the scene and offers the lowest fin density among all radiators. These radiators have become very sought after and testing shows better performance than the Termochill and Feser rads. These also come in at a slightly lower price point than both others.
Petra's Tech Shop
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The HW Labs Black Ice GT Xtreme radiators offer unbeatable performance however, they are very high restriction and require high speed fans to perform. They also rank in the most expensive category along with Thermochill and Feser.
Petra's Tech Shop