Review: Thermaltake ProWater 850i

[blueonblack]

I finally did it. I've officially crossed the line from air cooling to water. I felt that I'd tried some of the best air coolers on the market with good results, and wanted to dive in to water cooling because... well, because it's water cooling. Completely aside from its obvious advantages over air cooling (silence and performance), it's just cool to be able to say that my PC is cooled with the same system as that Mopar I've lusted after for more years than I care to mention. There's something I like about the very term "liquid cooled".

Like most people who decide to make the leap, I looked around a lot, read a lot and learned a lot. Who knew there was so much chemistry and metallurgy involved? Also like most beginning water-coolers, I was not about to lay down the cash involved in a full-blown custom-built water cooling setup. Let me try the easy version first, then I'll decide if it's worth moving up. As usual, Xoxide had what I wanted.

The guys at Xoxide sell all sorts of water cooling gear, from individual parts like pumps, radiators and blocks to entire self-contained water-cooling kits that contain everything the new water-cooler could need to get started. Out of all of this, I chose the Thermaltake ProWater 850i liquid cooling system. It had everything I needed, but it was also modular, meaning that while all the parts were there, they were not assembled, allowing me the freedom to install them as needed. The price was right, too.

The box arrived with only slight damage, nothing to be concerned about:

Opening the box I found the contents well-packaged and protected by a thick wall of styrofoam and a sheet of molded plastic across the front.

It never ceases to amaze me how much stuff can be put into such a small area:

There we have the whole system: pump, reservoir, radiator with fan, waterblock, flow indicator, coolant, mounting hardware for various configurations, manual, and enough clamps and tubing to run this setup through several waterblocks. So far so good.

Here we have the pump and reservoir. They are attached in the package and believe it or not, the smooth barrel of the pump connector just slides into a rubber seal on the side of the reservoir. It came apart very easily, I wonder how well it will seal?

Pump specs:
Dimensions: 58mm x 58mm x 35mm
Maximum capacity: 500 L/hr
Connector: 4-pin Molex (4-pin motherboard connector for RPM monitoring only)
Noise: 16 dBA

The ProWater 850i comes with an all-aluminum 120mm radiator with what they call dimpled tubes. When you look closely through the fins you can see small dimples in the tubes like those on a golf ball. Presumably this helps with air flow. The radiator comes with a Thermaltake 120mm variable-speed fan already attached, the speed control being on the end of a small wire on the fan itself.

In this picture you can see the bracket that comes premounted on the radiator. This is removable, and is there to allow different mounting options, as needed by the user.

The waterblock for the ProWater 850i is one of the main reasons I chose this setup. While it's not as pretty as many blocks out there, it is a one-piece block of copper, with no seals or o-rings to leak. It is fairly large, though obviously nowhere near as large as a good air cooler, and weighs in at 336 grams. Like all of the parts in the 850i, it comes with barbs for 3/8" tubing, as well as the upper mounting bracket, preinstalled. You can tell from the mounting bracket that this block is made to fit many different mounting setups. It is officially compatible with AMD AM2 series, AMD K8, Intel LGA1366, LGA775, and P4.

The top has an extremely rough finish, almost like cast iron. This may not appeal to some, but the for the build I plan to use it in it couldn't be better. Thankfully the bottom is highly polished and according to my eye and a machinist square, perfectly flat.

The 850i comes with 500cc of propylene glycol coolant, a flow indicator (which is surprisingly heavy and well-made), the tubing mentioned, and also a sort of spiral stiffener that is wrapped around the tubing to prevent deformation in tight bends. Thermaltake has jumped into the middle of the bandwagon and called this the iStripe.

Scratch a star for that.

Here's the board I'm working with, an Asus M4A79 Deluxe, stripped of all but the ram and CPU:

And with the waterblock mounted:

I have to add here that I while I did remove my motherboard for the purposes of this review, I was one of the lucky ones that didn't actually have to. If you have an AM2 board and the standoffs that are under the retention bracket are pre-threaded, all you will have to do is hold the back plate while you thread the mounting screws in place.

Also on the installation front, the mounting holes on the radiator itself (I did not use the bracket for the installation I decided on) were very hard to get a screw into. The threads were filled with black paint. Be sure to chase these threads with the screws (or a tap if you have one) before trying to mount it.

Once I had everything in place I simply estimated how much tubing to put in each section of the loop and cut it. I then cut it down little by little until it was right. There is more than enough tubing in the box (see the coil left over in the background?). The tubing supplied is supple and slid over the barbs perfectly, not too easily but firmly enough to know it was seated. The spring clamps are also perfectly sized to the job. Once I had everything connected, I set it all on shop towels, filled the reservoir and turned on the pump. As the reservoir emptied I simply added coolant to the fill hole on top until it stopped. The amount of coolant provided was just a hair more than needed for my loop.

Now to check for leaks, especially at that worrisome joint between the pump and the reservoir. I left them running for an hour:

Not a drop. Not a single miniscule drop of coolant seeped out of any of the connections. An absolutely perfect seal the first time.

Now to hook it all up in my machine. I was too lazy to drain the loop again to install it. I actually connected the whole system to my PC with the water in it. And after all that moving around and bending and stress, still no leaks. Not one. Only one problem. It won't fit in my case.

Admittedly I didn't measure my case. It's technically a mid-tower, but the Hiper Anubis is not a small case by any standards. Unfortunately, with the large HD4870 video card and larger after-market cooler on it, the pump and reservoir simply would not fit inside the case. If I was planning to keep my system in this case I would have boxed it all back up right then, but I'm building a new one and it will be plenty roomy. Warning to the potential buyer: the pump and reservoir on this system are large. Be sure you have the room!

On to the testing. I used what has become standard testing for me, using OCCT for a 30-minute stress. The tests were all conducted on an AMD Phenom II 940 3.0 CPU at stock speed, using the thermal paste supplied with each cooler. Since the fan included with the 850i is adjustable I ran 2 tests, one on the lowest fan setting and one on the highest. First let me include the graphs from the testing I did on two high-end air coolers for comparison.

The Thermaltake Spin Q CPU cooler, with the fan on high speed. I did not include the low-speed test as the change in noise level was negligible.

The Tuniq Tower T120.

And the Prowater 850i with the fan on its lowest setting:

And its highest:

So, the spin Q topped out at about 59.5. The tuniq beat that at approximately 55.5. The ProWater 850i did outperform both of them, with the low fan setting providing a max of 53.5 and the high topping out at 50.5. I really only include the high fan speed setting here for academic reasons, as the noise level at this setting makes the entire machine absolutely unusable. It is easily the loudest computer component I have ever heard.

So what's the bottom line? From a purely statistical viewpoint, the ProWater is a better choice than either of the air coolers tested, and the Tuniq is the most effective air cooler I've had the chance to test. However, there are some serious drawbacks that you have to overcome to get the 2-degree improvement in temps. The first obvious problem is installation. Compared to an air cooler it is a serious pain. Second is space. With all of the components involved it takes up a lot more room. Third is maintenance, especially with the dissimilar metals in the waterblock and radiator. Galvanic corrosion will happen, it's only a matter of when, and that will depend on the amount of time you are willing to spend in maintaining the system.

So what do I think?

Pros:

• It's water cooling (come on)
• Modular
• Completely leak-free on the first attempt
• Slightly improved temps over the best air cooler I know
• Silence - With the fan on low and the pump on a piece of rubber it was completly inaudible.

Cons:

• Price
• Size
• Installation
• Upkeep

The Thermaltake ProWater 850i can be had at Xoxide for $139.99 at the time of this writing. Substantially more than a very high-end air cooler, but that is to be expected. To be honest, for the money I was disappointed by the system's performance. It is an improvement, but barely. The main thing this system has going for it is that it contains everything the new water-cooler may need, and everything in it can be replaced, one piece at a time, with other, more effective components. If you have to get into water-cooling, and don't want to spend a ton of cash to start off, this is the kit for you.

Verdict: 3.5 out of 5

[Trace]

In lieu of this, I would recommend the Swifttech H2O 220. I reviewed it on here a while back. Of course, if you can afford it, go custom.

Good Review!

[Oneslowz28]

nice review BoB

[SXRguyinMA]

nice review! I've got an older thermaltake setup with the older style radiator and waterblock, but almost the same pump, and I ditched that res in favor of a 5.25" bay one (again because of space, but I've got a thermaltake armor case so bays are no issue lol. nice write-up!

[Spawn-Inc]

ugh... thermaltake the worst name in water... nice review skills but horrible product. give it a few months to start breaking and killing your system.

SXRguyinMA's is the only person i know who seems to have good luck with their stuff.

[Zephik]

How does the quality feel? I know they used to be horrid in that department, mostly in long term use, but I haven't read up on any of their newer stuff.

Sounds like their performance is about the same as usual though. That's what they were back in the day too, just barely better or equal to high end air coolers. I think I'd blame mostly the pump they use, maybe the block too. But its probably a collective of everything.

At least its cheaper than professional water cooling and its usually at least a tad bit better than high end air. Just hope they fixed their quality issues over long term use.

SXRguyinMA's is the only person i know who seems to have good luck with their stuff.

They're hit and miss. But generally they aren't known for getting a good hit to miss ratio which is why they have a bad rep. Still, kind of curious about their newer stuff. The performance is obviously the same, but if they fixed the quality, then at least people who want to water cool just to water cool can now do that without spending a whole lot. But... you pay cheap and you get cheap, at least that's the general rule of thumb it seems.

[Spawn-Inc]

in the water cooling world i've yet to see a sinlge hit from thermaltake and highly doubt i ever will. koolance was the same way, but recently they have started to stop making aluminum blocks or blocks with steel. there cpu block (cpu-350) is a great block, but restrictive.

the Swiftech H20-120 Compact CPU Liquid Cooling Kit is a much better kit then the thermaltake at the same price. but with the swiftech you can go from a kit to a custom kit with new water blocks and an aftermarket top for the pump. then add some more rad if you want to cool more then the cpu.

the only improvements i see are no plexi on the water block and flat tubing for the rad. but they still insist on using aluminum...

[Zephik]

in the water cooling world i've yet to see a sinlge hit from thermaltake and highly doubt i ever will.

I was referring to personal use, as in non-headache inducing experiences. SXRguyinMA seems to have had a pretty good run with them so far. But there are still a lot of not so great stories out there, but that seems like forever ago, haven't been looking into it much lately.

Man, I remember the days when I used to visit Danger Den like every other day. I have been out of the scene for so long now it feels like. Is the apogee still on top or is there anything better out?

[blueonblack]

How does the quality feel? I know they used to be horrid in that department, mostly in long term use, but I haven't read up on any of their newer stuff.

I'm obviously inexperienced in the water-cooling area, but I've got an extensive mechanical background, and here's how I would answer that:

The block is one of the main reasons I went with this setup, as I mentioned in the review. It is a solid block of copper, the brazing was very well done, and I can't see how it would ever fail, aside from the inevitable galvanic corrosion.

The radiator *looks* well-built, with the flat tubes and dimples, but the fact that it's aluminum makes that a moot point in the long run.

The pump is very quiet and gave excellent flow through this small loop, but again I can't vouch for its durability. As far as what I *can* judge from the little while I've had it, it's perfect.

The tubing is ugly, but very flexible and, as I mentioned, sealed perfectly on the first try.

I've removed it from my current system since it wouldn't fit in my case, but I plan to use parts of the kit in the case I'm building now. I plan to buy a Swiftech Quiet Power brass-bodied radiator to use with it, and I'll build my own reservoir, but the block and the pump will be used.

[blueonblack]

but with the swiftech you can go from a kit to a custom kit with new water blocks and an aftermarket top for the pump. then add some more rad if you want to cool more then the cpu.

Any kit that's not hermetically sealed together can be made into a custom kit if you buy new parts for it, this kit included.