Crossflow Radiator Options?

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Endgame

Gawd
Joined
Jan 10, 2007
Messages
954
Planning out my new loop for the Ryzen 5950, I'm finding that a top mounted, crossflow radiator would be ideal for routing and likely cooling purposes. That said, I'm not finding very many options for crossflow, at least in 420 size - just HW Labs and Alphacool. Any opinions out there between the Black Ice Nemesis 420GTS XFlow and the Alphacool NexXxOS XT 45 X-Flow 420? Am I missing a top performer / popular model by not looking more at 360 models?

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Endgame said:
Planning out my new loop for the Ryzen 5950, I'm finding that a top mounted, crossflow radiator would be ideal for routing and likely cooling purposes. That said, I'm not finding very many options for crossflow, at least in 420 size - just HW Labs and Alphacool. Any opinions out there between the Black Ice Nemesis 420GTS XFlow and the Alphacool NexXxOS XT 45 X-Flow 420? Am I missing a top performer / popular model by not looking more at 360 models?
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There are some small performance differences between the brands, but I don't think you'll find that any of them are big enough that a smaller radiator from one brand will perform better than a larger radiator from another.

I for one like Alphacool radiators. I have three of them in my current build and used two of them in my old build. Only downside with them is that they need a thorough clean before use. They seem to have more residual gunk in them from manufacturing than some other brands.
 
The NexXos has been around for awhile, so has the HWlabs xflow but it is slightly newer. I will admit that I am a HWLabs fanboy, I am currently running two HWLabs xflows. Both brands are great, the NexXos is not slim and slightly more expensive. There is only one radiator roundup out there atm https://www.xtremerigs.net/2015/02/11/radiator-round-2015/10/ That has numbers on both.
 
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I was leaning toward the HW labs X flow, as I’ve had hw labs all the way back to the first black ice extreme.

I’ve got about 95mm of space in the top of the define 7xl, so I would likely go push / pull - I think I would prefer a thicker option with just push, but I won’t sweat 3 extra fans in the end.
 
Smoked Brisket said:
The NexXos has been around for awhile, so has the HWlabs xflow but it is slightly newer. I will admit that I am a HWLabs fanboy, I am currently running to HWLabs xflows. Both brands are great, the NexXos is not slim and slightly more expensive. There is only one radiator roundup out there atm https://www.xtremerigs.net/2015/02/11/radiator-round-2015/10/ That has numbers on both.
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I can agree with this. I believe the Back Ice models tend to review slightly better, but on the flipside, Alphacool will sell you a radiator in just about any size and any thickness. This is the primary reason I keep going back to them over the years, as they offer the most choice, and I need something as thick as possible for performance, but not too thick, so it just barely fits nicely with fans on either side in push pull.

More times than not, Alpha cool has the closest to what meets my desires.
 
Have used Alphacool cross flow rads in the past. I've nothing to compare them to so this input is of limited usefulness but I had no complaints.
 
VanGoghComplex said:
Have used Alphacool cross flow rads in the past. I've nothing to compare them to so this input is of limited usefulness but I had no complaints.
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I never tested mine side by side either, but from reviews I read back when I was researching, it seems like Alphacools crossflow versions perform ever so slightly worse than the equivalent traditional flow ones, but it was so close that it was mostly irrelevant. Might have even been up to test error.
 
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