NZXT Kraken 240 AIO Cooler Review

Peter Donnell / 1 year ago

How Much Does it Cost?

The NZXT Kraken 240 All In One 240mm Intel/AMD CPU Water Cooler (2023 Edition) is available now and launched with an MSRP of £129.99.

Overview

NZXT has hit it right out of the park with this one, I’ve been testing, retesting and retesting some more to really get to grips with cooling reviewing again, but it doesn’t take much experience in doing this to see that NZXT is cutting ahead of the competition. This isn’t the most expensive cooler (pointing fingers at the £300 ASUS AIO we reviewed recently), or the biggest given it’s only 240mm, or the most complicated or innovative design, given it was made by Asatek and is largely off-the-shelf components.

However, despite the somewhat industry-standard hardware that’s being used here, NZXT has delivered something that works really well. The fans are utterly superb, able to deliver high airflow and low noise, and obviously, the cooler is capable of taming our i9-12900K. With a good voltage, locking in a stable all-core ratio, and leaving the fans on their standard profile, there was only a slight bump in acoustics, but temperatures dropped drastically, while Cinebench scores improved.

Should I Buy One?

This is the coolest, one of the quietest coolers I’ve ever tested, and I’ve tested many. Furthermore, it scored the highest in our Cinebench run, and what’s more, it’s very reasonably priced for an AIO from a premium brand such as NZXT, and even more so for one with an LCD display in the pump, which can be used to show performance figures, images and more to suit your needs. Overall, I think I may even have to get one of these for my own PC!