Thermaltake 420mm TOUGHLIQUID 420 EX Pro ARGB Sync AIO Cooler Review

How Much Does it Cost?

The Thermaltake 420mm TOUGHLIQUID 420 EX Pro ARGB Sync All In One CPU Water Cooler is big, it’s powerful and comes with some of the absolute best fans on the market, so when I tell you that it costs £159.98, I don’t think you would be shocked. Honestly, I think it’s a bit of a bargain when people are paying double that for AIO coolers with lower cooling performance and some fancy OLED display on the pump and seem quite happy with that. However, when you want to take performance seriously, £159.98 doesn’t seem all that bad and is only about £40 more than the best air coolers on the market.

Overview

This is a seriously great cooler, and while it’s cooling performance wasn’t the coolest we’ve seen, it’s still one of the top few we’ve ever tested, and honestly, the ones that were slightly cooler are quite expensive even compared to this, or noisy, or even hard to get hold of. That being said, as an overall package, the Thermaltake TOUGHLIQUID 420 EX Pro ARGB Sync is the cooler I would buy with my own money over literally any other on the market right now. Partly, I’m basing this on the fact I own the model that came out last year, and I’m very happy with it, as it tames my i7-13700KF perfectly with the fans set to 25%, and it’s virtually silent. This new model not only cools better, but it’s also quieter than the model I own.

The build quality is top-notch, with a very clean and tidy-looking radiator design, durable tubing, and a robust and quiet pump that not only looks great but proved very easy to install too. Thermaltake has improved the 360-degree top cap, making it easier to orientate, and it has built-in ARGB lighting for a subtle touch of lighting, rather than going all-out with RGB fans for a rainbow disco, which I don’t really care for.

The biggest thing here, however, is the new fans. They’re the heart of both the cooling and acoustic improvements on the new cooler, and in my opinion, they’re the best fans on the market right now. They drive enormous amounts of airflow even at their lowest RPM settings, and if you ramp them up higher, they’ll make light work of cooling even the most demanding video rendering rig 24/7. They’re also some of the easiest fans to configure too, as they require just a single cable that connects using a magnetic header to just one of the fans, and the rest are cable-free daisy chained thanks to connection pins and strong magnets that snap the fans together.

Should I Buy One?

Thermaltake has taken one of the absolute best and most powerful AIO coolers on the market, and given it some tasty upgrades with a revised pump design, and some truly awesome fans, resulting in even better cooling performance and lower noise, while also still being good value for money for a cooler of this size. That being said, if this is too big for you, there’s also a 240mm, 280mm and 360mm now available in the same series.