Corsair H90 review - Final words and conclusion

Final words and conclusion

Great stuff, if you are not voltage tweaking heaps on your Ivy Bridge based processor then the h90 might be an excellent alternative towards bulky big heatpipe coolers. At 1.30 Volts however you can see what they have invented 240 and 280mm radiators. Overall though this new 140mm cooling solution is offering good performance at a great price. The aesthetics however are 10x better then any heat-pipe based cooler you can purchase.

Stress

Whatever you fire off at the processor, Ivy bridge remains hard to cool once overclocked with added voltage. I do say overclocked with added voltage specifically here though as at normal voltages and default settings, it is such a sweet processor. A handful of coolers can take 4600 MHz @ 1.30+ Volts, but really there are only very few in our tests that kept the temperature acceptable, and that was the 70 EUR Noctua NH-D14, a cooler design that has proven itself to be leading, many times over the years.

The 100 EUR Corsair H100 series is capable and the Kraken X60 as well, but that one is a 150 EUR already (has more bling, LEDs, software control). We can now add the Corsair H110, priced much like the number at 110~120 EUR and the H90 at give or take 90 EUR. At 1.30+ Volts CPU voltage tweaks however do do recommend you the 280mm product as things otherwise get too borderline with the H90. With 'normal' stress at default settings or up-to 1.25 Volts, this cooler works marvels though. 

Aesthetics & design

The overall looks remain just terrific as far as I am concerned. All black design, fairly easy to install with the mounting system and prefilled it's one of the most easy and comfortable kits on the market to use and install. Reality remains though, this will continue to be a high-end cooling product and not enthusiast one. It simply is a good alternative toward heatpipe coolers with the added benefits of being fairly quiet whilst offering very nice looks.

We like the simplicity, only one wire goes from the water-block to the motherboard, and then the fan need a FAN header on your mobo as well. 

Pricing

The price of the H90 remains competitive, right above the more expensive heatpipe coolers. Corsair can manage to keep the price at this level by leaving out any LINK related options, but for the 90 bucks you do receive more radiator and fan efficiency due to the increased surface area and airflow going from 120 towards 140mm. 

Final words

Corsair has a nice offering with the new Hydro H90 liquid cooling kit. Please do make sure it can actually fit inside your system before you purchase it though. It needs 140mm fan mounts which is a little more uncommon. If you stick to Corsair cases, all new 900D (review soon), 650D, 500R and C70 can be used for top mounting. 

The overall performance we think is really fine, and combined with the low noise levels the H90 easily gets our approval. You will not have software control, you will not see any LEDs but even better, you won't have to worry about a bundle of wires either. Overall the kit is fairly easy to install, good looking and offers great cooling performance. Leaving the bling out of this kit keeps it quite affordable, and as such comes recommended by Guru3D.com.

Overall the H90 manages really well with the tested Core i7 3770K Ivy Bridge processor, once you need 1.30 Volts we do recommend you to look into the H90 as it shaves of that little edge you need in temperatures. I am seriously interested though how a kit like this would perform if we delid the 3770K, it could shave off 20 maybe 25 Degrees easily. Unfortunately we need this CPU to stay in its original form for future testing. But interesting stuff alright.

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Handy related downloads:

• Prime95
• SiSoft Sandra
• AIDA
• CPU-Z
• HWMonitor