Do 120mm AIOs ACTUALLY Suck? Maybe Not...

I am not sure why you're saying 1800rpm is anemic. I mean, anything beyond 1200rpm with a 120mm fan is too loud ! If it does not cool enough at 1200rpm , you can throw it in the garbage !

Rocking the ATARI... nice,,

I have a thermaltake 120mm AIO cooling a ryzen 7 5800x, and it maintains around 72c under load as long as the pc is cleaned well. That's also with a mild cpu overclock applied

Corsair should make a new version of the H80i v2. That's my opinion.

people scared of aios are just like people who were scared of liquid cooled cars.

Damn, just found this channel and it already answered 2 specific questions that I was sure would not find it, yet here I am, not only answered but with a lot of MORE information that just added up. Subscribed without a doubt

Ive had a 120mm aio in my 570x case with my 10700k and have loved it so far. Noise isnt my concern, looks nice and cleannnnn

i have deepcool gammax l120 v2 pushing 75c on i5 9400f is it good?

I had one of corsairs older 120mm coolers. It kept my i5-2500k running at 5ghz cool for damn near 7 years.

Rather than just having an SFF/ITX build, another sub-niche I found myself to be part of is needing space to air-cool naked VRMs. 120mm AIOs allowed me to do so, larger and it wouldn't fit.

Add a second fan to the Arctic and you have the only current 120mm AIO that matches the old Corsair H80iv2, which I've been running with a 225w CPU for a decade. How durable the Arctic would be is another question.

What about the nzxt kraken 120?

I agree about deep cool’s birds nest

should've done a test where they all had the same fans

I have usually liked your content but this makes no sense. I don't get your message here. All your stats show they really do suck. To keep up with the air coolers you had to add a custom fan to an already $100+ dollar AIO and it nets you TWO DEGREES better than the $60 air cooler that costs HALF as much. When you have to pay double for equal performance, that means the AIOs SUCK. Full stop.

240mm + T30s here, absolutely awesome

Nice video, would have liked to have seen an Aliexpress 120mm AIO in the mix (supercheap), especially with the upgraded fan.

120mm AIO doesn't stink if there's no space for 240mm–360mm. The only difference is that more fans mean faster heat dissipation and longer radiation means more heat to transfer. I've been using a 120mm AIO for the past 8 years; yesterday was my 3rd one due to a lost CPU fan cable. Still works great for small ATX or those who do not have top mount

I have a Ryzen 7 5800X3D. Its TDP is 105W, the same as my Ryzen 5 3600X. I'm using an AMD Wraith Prism box cooler that cost me ZERO CANADIAN DOLLARS. It was quick and easy to intall, looks amazing and it keeps my 5800X3D plenty cool in all situations.

Only a complete idiot would buy something expensive for CPU cooling because it's not needed. Of course, if you bought a 13900K, then it IS needed and you're an idiot for having bought a 13900K.

I do have a question, isn’t the LT the latest from DeepCool or is it the LS the latest one? Also what’s up with LS SE? Is SE better in some ways??

as someone who's planning on my next cooler upgrade being an AIO, one thing that while you do mention, you don't really give enough credit for IMO: space constraints, my case is a bit on the narrow side and i can't fit any of the large tower coolers like the nh-d15, and a lot of the low profile air coolers cause ram clearance issues, or just may not perform well enough to keep my pc comfortable

use Artic to make custom water loop in SFF case? :D

AMAZING! LS360 does great and looks great and basically with in a degree from nh-d15! Artic also look great specially with more modern fan!

PLEASE do continue! people need to give 120mm second look! I'm decently not gonna do dual loop or air-cooling in SFX case with 5800x3d any more! - you should do x3d chip tests on those 120mm AIO because they are design uniquely and it is harder to cool smaller die area

Thanks a lot for explaining the test methodology and the charts.

Well for modern powerful cpu, answer is yes, they suck , for 65watt or maybe upto 95watt cpu like ryzen 5600G/5700G etc , it should be fine

sometime the confusing part about hardware reviewes chart, why not making the decibels on the vertical instead....

Deepcool's LS series are unbeatable for the price when looking at other aio's out there.

very nice thanks alot i was looking for performance charts because im gonna do a ryzen 3000 or 5000 in a small for factor that i could hold in my hand

As long as there’s itx builds people will buy 120 aio’s but if you have room for a 240, 280, 360 or even 420 go for that. But I just ordered parts for a tinker build and i went with air cooling. I had a spare 360 aio but bought a case that is really
made for air cooling and I went with a peerless assassin 120. I think it’s probably the best cooler you can buy for the money. Just hope it cools the 5800x3d it’s a hit cpu.

I have an arctic freezer ii 120mm push/pull in a itx tinker build that ive tried 3600, 3900x and even a 5950x and it cools all them better than I expected.

HI,Can i use one of those for cooling my brand new amd 7800x3d since i have purchased an nzxt h1 v2 and it comes with a 120mm aio? Thanks.

How do these AIOs perform when you put a 120mm x 38mm 5,500rpm industrial fan on them?

I use the Arctic LFII-120 with my new system Z690/i5-13600KF/DDR5 with a Thermalright Contact Frame + Arctic MX-6 and with a second P12 fan in Push-Pull to queeze the max out its performance because my nice + loved now kind of Vintage Lian-Li case (w all Arctic P12+14 fans) I still use for 15y don't fit larger Rads...but this set up is more than capable dead cool + quiet.

So i guess i will be fine with the enermax using a silent wings 4 fan... Probably a lot more cooling than my shadow rock LP.

Sorry, I use the ak620 at a 12700 kf and it is as loud as an airplane!
I would like to buy a water cooler that is 120mm and has a display for gifs
Can you recommend a good quiet and cold brand?

I have a Corsair Hydro H80i with my Ryzen 7 2700, I just upgraded to a Ryzen 7 5800X and I’m wondering if I need something more

Love your cooling reviews, keep it up!

Mike is da best!!

how's nzxt kraken 120mm aio?

Damn, what would T30 do on a LF 120, if Nidec does this to it?
Think I'll actually make that combo and beat most ''premium'' 240's on the market for half the price

Unfortunately, it looks like one of the front runners from your test (EK) has dropped out of the 120 AIO race, as the EKWB AIO cannot be found on their website or Amazon. What you feared is slowly coming to pass, Mike - damn shame, too, because that cooler was absolutely gorgeous! Sad I won't be able to get it, now.

Should have also included the best of low-profile coolers from your other comparisons in the mix. What a lot of people don't realise is the thing about 120mm AIOs is they are extremely low profile at the socket There's lot of small ITX and mATX cases (particularly older ones but even many modern ones) which don't have any room whatsoever for a monster tower air cooler, though they can fit a 120mm AIO just fine since the radiator is remote and works with the majority of 120mm fan locations. So it doesn't matter that some gi-normous air cooler is as good as or more quiet when you can't fit it at all to begin with. And by gi-normous/monster I mean even cheap tower-style air coolers are in this category--just way. Too. Big. Anyone that has been building smaller form factor PCs consistently over the years, knows this.

There are no LP air coolers that seem to even come close to a 120mm AIO. Look at your guys' own review of "the GOD of LP coolers" and watch how at 95W and say 38dB it's at *82C*. The worst AIO in this test group, at 95W and 38dB it's at 61C--a full 21 C degrees lower! Even at 125W, 38dB, the worst in this group is better than "the GOD" of LP coolers at 95W in your LP reviews. This is what you should be comparing 120mm AIOs to, because they fit in the same space (provided there's a 120mm fan mount in the case with good space) at the socket. Plus they don't interfere with things around the socket like RAM, etc. like some LP coolers do.

I love Mike hosted videos, so chill yet so energetic. Like a fast CPU properly cooled.

I have an MSI aegies ZS with a 120MM AIO that died in less than a year - did NOT make the recall for some reason (same exact thing as the two that did - but what evs) and just sent in for RMA -- my question, would it be smart to stick a case fan in its place (rear mount) and instead place a 240 AIO up top? the case will accomdate, but can't seem to find a clear answer any help greatly appreciated!

I still continue to use my 120mm Arctic Liquid Freezer II. An absolute beast for my Ryzen 7 5700x. Would recommend it to anyone looking to use an AIO on low to mid range CPUs!

Deepcool one is best the ls version

They do objectively suck, always. Because for the same performance you can install a better looking, quieter air cooler that doesn't create a dead air pocket killing the VRM of the motherboard in 5-10 years. I realize in this consumerist society most people burn through electronics like candy, but some of us are responsible. I only recently went from a 3570K (whose P8Z77-I Deluxe motherboard would be dead by now with its 4.9Ghz OC if it was using an AIO) to a 5800X3D, and it's still going strong in my dual system case as a headless Linux machine filtering out network garbage from my main PC.

You must try id cooling frost flow 120mm. Its cost less than 40usd