INTRODUCTION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   Compared to even just 10 years ago consumers are now getting relatively "good" stock cooling solutions with both their CPUs and GPUs but what happens even if that's just not good enough for some people? Fortunately currently the cooling industry is quite huge with solutions for all market segments so aside all the after-market CPU and GPU air coolers available also are the very effective AIO liquid coolers and the higher-end (which are still consider niche) custom water-cooling kits. As expected most overclockers and enthusiasts choosing to go the way of a custom water-cooling kits usually opt for ones with long 360/420/480/520mm radiators to get the most out of them (especially since aside the CPU waterblock most also add one or more GPU waterblocks) but with a large percentage of consumers using midi, mini-ITX and micro-ATX cases that's not always a possibility. EK Water Blocks is well aware of this so their recently released Performance line includes water cooling kits with 240/280/360mm radiators and today we're going to be testing the 280mm model.

   EK Water Blocks bears the name of its founder Edvard Konig, who started experimenting with liquid cooling in 1999. From humble beginnings in the early years of the previous decade, the company grew steadily to become a global premium liquid cooling gear manufacturer. Today, EKWB offers a complete range of products for liquid cooling, from the renowned Supremacy line of CPU water blocks, to a wide range of CoolStream radiators; from in-house developed Vardar high pressure fans, to the market-proven DDC series of liquid cooling pumps, and thus provides overclocking enthusiasts and dedicated gamers with the best of what the market can offer. With continuous research and design, we’ll always strive to bring extreme liquid cooling performance to our customers all around the world.

   Much like every other water cooling kit in the market today the performance series P280 kit by EK Water Blocks consists by a radiator, pump/reservoir, waterblock and fans. More specifically for the P280 kit EK Water Blocks has combined their high-quality EK-CoolStream CE 280 copper radiator with their EK-XRES 140 Revo D5 PWM cooling pump/reservoir (Xylem D5 water pump), their EK-Supremacy EVO copper water block, two EK-Vardar F2-140 high-static pressure fans and finally 2 meters of their PrimoChill PrimoFlex Advanced LRT premium quality PVC tubing. As already mentioned above with such kits EK Water Blocks aims to cater to the needs of enthusiasts and overclockers using medium to small sized PC cases and since in some occasions we've seen 280mm radiators take head on larger 360mm ones (width and quality are two very important factors) we're quite curious to see just how good this kit really is.

 

 

SPECIFICATIONS AND FEATURES

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PACKAGING AND CONTENTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The P280 kit is showcased at the front of the box right over a list with the used components and a few drawings of its main features.

 

 

You can check out the "key benefits" of water cooling from a list placed on the left side.

 

 

Listed on the right side of the box are the contents of the bundle.

 

 

EK Water Blocks uses 5 pictures placed at the rear of the box to showcase its main features.

 

 

Packaging is quite standard for this type of product so all of the components are placed in their original boxes.

 

 

Contained inside all these boxes are the EK-CoolStream CE 280 radiator, EK-XRES 140 Revo D5 PWM pump/reservoir combo, Revo D5 Holder, EK-Vardar F2-140 fans, PrimoChill PrimoFlex™ Advanced LRT tubing, six EK-ACF 10/13mm G1/4 Nickel compression fittings, thermal paste tube, Allen keys, EK-Ekoolant EVO Clear concentrated coolant, Y-cable splitter, ATX bridging plug and the EK-Supremacy EVO universal water block with its LED diode and mounting screws and backplates for installation on Intel LGA 775/1366/1150/1151/1155/1156/2011(-3) and AMD 939/754/940/AM2(+)/AM3(+)/FM1/FM2(+) compatible mainboards.

 

 

THE EK-KIT P280 PART 1

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The CoolStream CE 280 is a 320mm long and 145mm wide aluminum/steel radiator with brass chambers, copper Tubing and fins.

 

 

With a thickness of 45mm the CoolStream CE 280 has very little to be jealous of the "big" boys in the market.

 

 

This radiator has near-excellent fin quality (features a FPI of 16).

 

 

I was surprised to see that such a premium radiator comes without any shields above the fins.

 

 

In terms of ports the CoolStream CE 280 offers just two G1/4 ones.

 

 

The EK-XRES 140 Revo D5 PWM is a High-Performance water cooling pump with an integrated tube reservoir. The pump used is no other than the Xylem D5 (4800RPM PWM model) which can push up to 1500 liters of water per hour up to 3.9 meters with a maximum power draw of up to 23W. In terms of capacity the reservoir can hold up to 250ml of liquid.

 

 

EK Water Blocks has placed their EK-HD logo inside the Tube (looks rather nice).

 

 

There are two ports at the front of the reservoir/pump combo and a fill port at the top.

 

 

THE EK-KIT P280 PART 2

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The EK-Supremacy EVO is one of the best-selling water blocks in the market not only because of its universal CPU compatibility and high build quality but also because of the modular design of its interior (you can use various inserts and jets to further fine-tune its performance).

 

 

The base is made out of copper and features a nice mirror-like polish.

 

 

We decided to check the interior of the water block to check the multiple very thin channels of the copper base.

 

 

The double-ball bearing 140mm Vardar fans can spin up to 1600RPM to provide airflow levels of up to 84CFM and air-pressure levels of up to 1.90 H2O with just 31.6dBA of noise.

 

 

EK Water Blocks recommends placing their Vardar fans to suck air from the outside and although this is not what we typically do we decided to go ahead and test the P280 that way.

 

 

With the fans installed the radiator part of the kit becomes almost 70mm thick (possible clearance issues in some cases so do take this into account prior to making your decision).

 

 

Mounting the fittings is the last step prior to installing the kit into our tower (remember not to tighten the top of the fittings).

 

 

INSTALLATION - FINISHED LOOKS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This time over we decided to start our installation by mounting the radiator and as you can all see it looks quite small inside the Obsidian 900D (size is not everything however).

 

 

Next is the CPU water block which is extremely easy to mount on the X79/X99 mainboards (you just need to mount the 4 bars, place the waterblock and secure it in place using the provided thumbscrews).

 

 

You can mount the EK-XRES 140 Revo D5 PWM pump/reservoir combo either on its own (the 900D has room for such combos so we used one of those) or by using the bundled Revo D5 Holder.

 

 

The 2 meter long PrimoChill PrimoFlex™ Advanced LRT tubing was more than sufficient to install the P280 in our test rig.

 

 

Once you start filling the loop with the bundled EK-Ekoolant EVO Clear concentrated coolant it may not be clear at first but it will after a while.

 

 

TEST BED

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

TESTING METHODOLOGY

 

   Testing complete water cooling kits or individual radiators is no different than testing CPU Coolers and since we want all of you to be able to compare similar products we created new and separate charts (you can still cross-compare results however since we are using the same test rig). So once again single (120/140mm) watercooling solutions are tested with the radiator mounted at the rear of our test rig while dual/triple/quad (240/260/280/360/420/480/560mm) solutions with the radiator mounted at the top. For the dBA tests complete water cooling kits or radiators with bundled fans are measured both while on idle mode or with the fan controller in the minimum setting and while on extreme load or with the fan controller all the way to the highest possible setting (PWM fans do that on their own without our intervention). Every single test takes place in a temperature controlled room of 23 degrees Celsius Ambient Temp with the help of two AC units placed diagonally inside the room. When testing complete water cooling kits we use the Arctic Silver 5 thermal paste. Finally much like when testing CPU Coolers it's very important to point out that just because a water cooling kit outperforms another when tested with our test rig (when we test complete water cooling kits) that does not necessarily mean that the same performance differences will apply 100% for other CPU models and in other situations (such as different ambient temps and system configurations).

     To successfully record the load temperatures we use the latest OCCT application for around 6-10 minutes to push the processor to its limits and after that is done and the temperatures are recorded we wait for about 10-20 minutes for the CPU to cool down and record the idle temperatures. This is done to allow time for the thermal conductive material to achieve the optimal performance level. Same procedure is then repeated with the Passmark BurnIn Test as a failsafe just in case the OCCT results are wrong. This procedure takes a lot more time than the usual peltier/thermometer tests but this way not only can we deliver real world results to our readers based on real CPUs but we can also triple check the results using a variety of programs. Last but not least the temperatures were recorded using both the latest versions of AIDA64 and RealTemp while the noise level tests (when fans exist in the bundle) are performed using a high precision ExTech HD600 Decibel Meter placed about 10-15cm above the radiator. Still although the same testing procedure applies to all units do take into consideration that unlike the official numbers which are measured in special noise isolated labs with just the fans here we also have both the rest of the cooler and the rest of the system (although all system fans are turned off when recording noise levels).

 

 

TEST RESULTS

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CONCLUSION

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

   I’d like to point out that when EK Water Blocks asked us if we wanted to test the P280 I really wanted one of the 360mm kits since I always encourage competition but as you can clearly see from our charts it was able to compete with every single water cooling kit we’ve tested to date. Of course we can’t skip mentioning that the two 140mm Vardar fans of the P280 where mounted in such a way that they could suck cold air from the outside. However between the temperature of our room set at 23 degrees Celsius, the fans placed beneath the radiator (and not above) and our Obsidian 900D being outfitted with a total of 7 case fans this shouldn’t really affect the cooling efficiency of the kit, at least not by much. With that out of the way thanks to the Xylem D5 pump used and the high-static pressure fans the P280 is aimed towars people who plan on expanding it either by adding a second (and even a third) reservoir or a GPU water block (or both). Unfortunately the Vardar fans are not the lowest Where the P280 shines however is its build quality since it’s easily one of the best we’ve ever used and I wouldn’t be exaggerating if I said that I hope EKWB makes a 480mm in their Performance or Extreme lines which we can also use to cool our upcoming 6850k build.

   Our very good friends over at EK Water Blocks offer some of the best water cooling kits in the market today and much like most things in this industry that comes at a price premium and so the P280 currently retails for USD367.99 inside the USA (Performance-PCs) and for 339.95Euros inside the EU (EKWB webshop). Unfortunately this is the only “drawback” of the P280 especially since you can find even 480mm kits for as much or even less (performance difference may not be what I’d call significant but it’s there). With that out of the way however the Performance 280 Starter Liquid Cooling Kit by EK Water Blocks offers excellent cooling efficiency for its size, it’s easily expandable thanks to the Xylem D5 pump, the EK Supremacy EVO waterblock looks great and ontop of that you are getting two 140mm Vardar fans featuring extremely high static pressure levels. With all that in mind the somewhat “hefty” price tag is simply not enough for us to deny the P280 our Golden Award.

PROS

- Premium Build Quality
- Excellent Top Of The Line Cooling Efficiency
- Universal CPU Compatibility
- Powerful Xylem D5 PWM Pump (4800RPM - 1500l/h)
- Two High Static Pressure 140mm Vardar Fans (1.90 H2O)

 

CONS

- Price (For Some)
- Current Availability