I wonder about liquid coolers in general. They are apparently able to beat air coolers at the very top end, but do they make any sense for even an "enthusiast"? You still need a very good fan and radiator, and a good thermal interface to the CPU. But now you've got a liquid link in between those two components, which must be a disadvantage. Not to mention the huge decrease in reliability. The only compensating advantage is that the hot air is handled outside the case. My case has fans above and behind the (air) CPU cooler, so my "enthusiast" but not "top end" system wouldn't gain anything on balance from a liquid cooler. I can't imagine putting one in, especially a mediocre unit like this. Where / who is the market for it? People who just want "water" because it sounds elite?

Fair play for new design that bypasses Asetek patent. In other news, that title pic made me very nostalgic for my old Z87 Sabertooth board. None of this RGB nonsense and no bare PCB nonsense.

Arbie:

a liquid link in between those two components, which must be a disadvantage.

Water, that is being pumped around, is by far more efficient in transporting heat then a solid block of metal or heatpipes. No heatsink fan combo can cool as much as the better liquid cooling solutions. And LCS can be used for very quiet systems. But the risk is a downside indeed.

How nzxt decided to release a product that is inferior to every other aio on the market eludes me.

What a terrible product. According to the reviews on guru3d, my air cooler (msi core frozr l) outperforms it and costs half a much. I don't see any benefit of this except maybe for less noise.

The Reeferman:

Water, that is being pumped around, is by far more efficient in transporting heat then a solid block of metal or heatpipes. No heatsink fan combo can cool as much as the better liquid cooling solutions.

1) I acknowledge that the best liquid beats the best air. But that may ultimately be simply because it has more radiator area - and the only way to move the heat to those big radiators is via liquid. 2) I also acknowledge that a fast moving liquid will transport heat better than the liquid in a heatpipe. But I wonder if the thermal interfaces common to both a liquid and an air cooler are not the dominant factor. Which gets me back to (1). Maybe a mechanical engineer with particular knowledge in thermal transfer can explain the big picture. My guess / feeling is that only top-end liquid coolers have any place in the market, and a niche market at that.

A pretty big advantage to a liquid cooler like the AIO ones are that they make transport of your PC much easier when you don't have to worry about that 20 cm tall block of copper and fan combo weighting 1kg sitting up from your CPU.

AlmondMan:

A pretty big advantage to a liquid cooler like the AIO ones are that they make transport of your PC much easier when you don't have to worry about that 20 cm tall block of copper and fan combo weighting 1kg sitting up from your CPU.

A valid point. And others have noted that water can fit some small form-factor PCs better. I doubt that water is still "quieter" for a HTPC because those actually require little cooling, with today's CPUs. In any case, these are primarily benefits from "fit" rather than performance, leaving that subject open i.e. does water (still) make any sense for the average enthusiast desktop?