Verdict: Pre-filled and pre-assembled, the Cool River is ready to cool within minutes

We first looked at the 80mm version of the Cool River Deluxe five months ago, and even used one to water cool a Shuttle XPC. Since then, Cool River has started making a slightly upgraded model with a 120mm radiator and fan.

Installing the Cool River is very straightforward, as all the tubing is pre-attached to the other components, and pre-filled with coolant.

Three separate waterblocks are supplied: CPU, GPU and Northbridge. These all have universal mounting mechanisms, so they should fit a wide variety of components.

The metal clasp that holds the GPU block onto the graphics card is quite poorly designed, though, as it often comes into contact with components on the back of the card when you slide it into place. The 120mm fan on the radiator is a fixed-speed model, and as it spins at 2,500rpm, it's relatively quiet.

The larger radiator and fan have definitely improved the Cool River's cooling ability, compared with the original 80mm Cool River; it cooled our Pentium 4e and Athlon 64 CPUs to 7ûC below the reference Intel and AMD HSFs. This is really quite an impressive achievement for such a low-cost kit, as cooling a heavily overclocked and overvolted Pentium 4e is no easy task. However, the Cool River will almost certainly struggle to keep the same CPU cool if it was also trying to cool a GPU and Northbridge. However, the lower heat output of an Athlon 64 should mean the Cool River is able to cope with a multicomponent system.

While the Cool River isn't the most refined system around, it's easy to install, and you don't have worry about filling and bleeding the system. Compared with the high-end Asetek, Corsair and Swiftech kits, it's very basic and not as effective, but, up against the other low-cost kits from Thermaltake and Cooler Master, it's definitely the one to buy.

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