asetek WaterChill Review

It is hard to pinpoint when the first hardware enthusiast decided build and install their own watercooler but if memory serves the practice didn't begin to pick up until the introduction of the Pentium 3. Any event the idea behind a watercooler is to use the cooling properties of water to remove heat from hot computer components. The goal of this is to get the chips at or below the ambient room temperature to further increase overclocking speed and stability. Though that is not the only use, a watercooling system is incredibly quiet when compared to conventional methods and cools quite a bit better. Combine that with increased component life and you get a win/win situation for overclockers and computer enthusiasts alike.

What makes up a watercooling kit?? The basics include things like a pump for water movement, a reservoir for water storage and air collection, a radiator to cool the heated water, a hose to transport the liquid, and Waterblocks to provide the heat transfer. Of the things listed many can be obtained without too much difficulty. For instance many overclockers have used car heater cores as radiators, though now days you can buy some pretty good ones online. Water pumps are fairly standard items and can be obtained from just about any aquarium supply store. Some of the other items can be purchased at any local hardware store.

The only item missing is also one of the most important and complicated pieces to acquire, the waterblock. In the early days many people would drill elaborate mazes into solid copper blocks just to get a taste of what watercooling could do. These early designs were labor intensive and oftentimes lacked any serious performance gains. As popularity rose many manufacturers got involved by building enhanced versions of these early designs and from there launched commercial watercooling.

asetek, The VapoChill people, have launched their own product into the watercooling arena targeted at the mid-level cooling market. The mid-level customer may not be a hardcore overclocker but might be avid hardware enthusiast, gamer, or someone just totally annoyed with their heatsink fan. Simply put they are targeting just about everyone that has ever thought of using a watercooler.