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LarKooler SkyWater 330 DYI Kit Review

Cooling/Water Cooling by leeghoofd @ 2014-05-19

LarKooler was established in 2009 to manufacture cost-effective PC cooling solutions. MadShrimps reviewed their first entry in to the DYI in the end of 2009; while it was not the most high end or best performing kit out there, the total picture was right on track with LarKooler's main objective: provide good cooling performance at an amazing bang for buck ratio. Since a few years AIO units took over a big part in the cooling business, with the most successful being the Corsair Hydro series. Ease of installation is their main trademark, however as most of these are closed loop, there is no option to integrate extra components in the cooling loop. The latter is the strong point of the DIY kits besides being versatile to add extra components they also provide awesome cooling performance at a low noise ratio. The SkyWater 330 kit today is one of those ready to build kits, however price wise it retails at a similar price as the high end 240/280 AIOs. Million dollar question can it beat those in raw performance figures ?

Conclusion

At first glance, this Larkooler SkyWater 330 kit looks a bit outdated. Purely based on the aesthetic design of the block and pump/reservoir unit, one could think this kit dated from a few years back. LarKooler did remain loyal to the looks of their previous complete kit, though with some refinements left and right, the performance has improved and thus adding to the bang for the buck.

The LarKooler SkyWater 330 performs as good as similarly priced high end AIO kits; great news and to be honest slightly unexpected. We haven't tested the SK 330 in a build-in radiator scenario; logically performance would get a small hit. Nevertheless when using the ambient room air the Larkooler 330 is a decent performer. The assembly requires a bit more work versus the AIO offerings, though due to the simplistic design it's a matter of half an hour max. Too bad Larkooler only included the bare minimum of tubing. For our assembly we had like 2 inches left of the included hose. The included amount of cooling fluid also leaves close to no chance of spilling any.

One of the strong points of this LarKooler Skywater 330 is the ability to hook up extra GPU or motherboard blocks. Keep in mind that the included 3/8" tubing is pretty rigid, so for short bends it might be a better option to just replace it by a higher quality and more flexible tubing. Secondly the pump is clearly audible when being operated at full speed. At the lowest possible pump settings the noise and vibrations are far more acceptable.

All in all the LarKooler SkyWater is a solid entry kit in the world of the Do It Yourself water cooling; fast and easy assembly in combination with decent cooling performance at an acceptable noise ratio is one of the strong points. Best of all is that the SkyWater only retails at the price of a high end AIO unit which is far lower than any complete 240 DIY kit, therefore MadShrimps awards the LarKooler SkyWater 330 with the value award.

PROS:

Straightforward assembly
Decent cooling capability
Price for a DIY
Low Noise level (with pump speed adjusted)

CONS:

Pump noise at full speed
Stiff and limited tubing length
Velcro mount for the pump
Still air in the loop

We wish to thank the following people:

Samuel from LarKooler division for the SkyWater 330 kit

Sven from ASUS for the Rampage IV Extreme motherboard

Harry from Corsair for the 32GB Vengeance Pro quad channel kit

Tones.be for the Intel i7-3960X processor

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