Vantec Stingray

Triple the coolness in a tidy beginner's pack.

These days the idea of cooling your PC with water is no longer as silly as assuming that Paris Hilton’s head isn’t as vacuous as outer space.

It’s a sure bet that we’ll start seeing water-cooled PCs being factory produced in the near future, and off the shelf H2O systems are now commonplace.

The Stingray goes one step further than most water kits, supplying nearly every hot spot in your PC with a cool, refreshing stream of sparkling spring water. But has Vantec overreached by trying to do so much?

This pricey pack includes the usual water block for the CPU, which is both AMD and Intel compatible, but also throws in extra water blocks for your GPU, Northbridge and Southbridge. These are built of a copper faceplate, with an aluminium body – some might find this corrosive mix a little unsettling if faced with long term use. The external, and rather ugly, Hydor L20 pump pushes through an impressive 700L per hour of water, while the radiator uses a 12cm 1600rpm fan to keep it cool.

Disco biscuit lovers will appreciate the flashing LED which has been installed in the transparent reservoir, while the rest of us will soon want to smash this annoying bulb into a million pieces.

Installation was a snap thanks to the excellent manual and easy to use connectors, although we did find that the hosing was a little prone to kinks. Replacing these with more rigid hoses could be a worthwhile mod, as well as installing a slightly faster fan.

We tested this kit on an Athlon 64 3800+ running at stock speeds, and found the results to be more than acceptable. The CPU core temp dropped from 47C on standard air-cooling to 38C, and this was achieved with both the Northbridge and Southbridge blocks in place. Unfortunately we were unable to test the GPU cooler due to the stock cooling system in place on our test video card.

While it’s not quite as powerful or affordable as a well thought out, home-built water-cooling system, it’s hard to fault the simplicity of installation of the Stingray. A great kit for those who want system-wide cooling, and don’t want to have to think too hard about it.