Hardware Award
Cooler Master Nepton 280L
RRP: TBA | Website: www.coolermaster.com
I
n this day of All-In-One coolers,
virtually all enthusiasts have
embraced these cooling solutions
over the more traditional heat sink
and fan combinations. There are very
few vendors that do not have such a
solution or at least aren’t planning on
having one. Not surprising though,
because not only do these by and
large offer quieter operation, but they
do offer better cooling performance
under load, especially with the CPU
overclocked.
If you look at the popularity of K
and Extreme SKU CPUs, you can
appreciate why liquid cooling has
become the standard for performance
thermal solutions. So much so that
both AMD and INTEL offered the same
liquid cooler for their high end CPUs.
In this crowded market, it would
seem that we have every corner
covered as there’s a plethora of
options to choose from to fit almost
every budget. So what purpose would
the new Cooler Master Neptron 280L
serve other than to further saturate
the market? Cooler Master may give
you a myriad of answers to this, but I
primarily think the Nepton series is
Cooler Master trying their hand at
efficient and more notable cooling
solutions than their previous efforts.
Having had experience with the Seidon
series in particular, the Nepton 280L is
a notable improvement on everything
that line of AIO Liquid coolers offered.
I knew this from the minute I
unboxed the Nepton 280L. It was not
only built better, it looked like what I
had always expected Cooler Master
would come up with, rather than what
they had previously shown us. There
are a few changes to this cooler that
automatically make it a better one
than what the Seidon offered before.
For instance the flow rate is increased
thanks to the longer tubing and
increased diameter. The effects of
these two changes are not as obvious
as one would imagine, especially at
idle loads. However, if you load the
system under Prime 95 for instance,
you’ll definitely appreciate the
changes as the 4770K I used to test
the system showed a 4 to 5’C drop in
temperature at the low end. This isn’t
much for sure, but keep in mind that
we are talking temperatures dropping
from 78’C to 73’C. Will this allow a
higher overclock, not likely but it does
give you some piece of mind, knowing
that your CPU isn’t operating at
unnecessarily warmer temperatures.
Mostly what I liked about this cooler
was how much easier it is to install
than Cooler Master’s previous efforts.
The parts are also not susceptible to
wear like the plastic back plate and
metal grommet system used on many
other systems. Not an issue if you’ll
be installing this once into a system,
but if you like I change motherboards
very often for testing, you’ll
appreciate this newer system. It could
be even simpler, but it’s definitely
workable. Not all is perfect with the
Nepton 280L though, the included
JetFlo fans do a great job at moving
air, but they - along with the new
pump - are sources of great noise.
The pump has an annoying whine that
you can hear even inside a system if
you listen out for it. When the system
is up and operating though, the noise
will likely get drowned out by other
fans, but it is audible nonetheless
which is a stain on an otherwise
impeccable cooling system.
In closing, Cooler Master has
improved on their previous systems
greatly. It’s not perfect but it’s
certainly useable and the cooling
performance is definitely amongst the
best money can buy in this market.
[ The Overclcoker ]
Issue 27 | 2013 The OverClocker 43