Review: Fractal Design Celsius+ S28 Prisma

by Parm Mann on 26 May 2020, 14:07

Tags: Fractal Design

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qaelkn

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Conclusion

...there's no superfluous software to contend with and it remains one of the quietest liquid coolers that money can buy.

Back in 2017, Fractal Design's Celsius all-in-one cooler arrived as a streamlined solution for the more discerning enthusiast. Cooling performance wasn't typically a match for the rivals of that time, but Fractal's presentation, ease of installation and low noise levels were enough to garner a recommendation.

Fast forward to 2020 and the new Celsius+ offers many of the same characteristics. Installation is a cinch, cable management puts other AIOs to shame, there's no superfluous software to contend with, and it remains one of the quietest liquid coolers that money can buy.

That's the good news, but pricing has crept up, and stock cooling performance on the many-core processors of today isn't as competitive as we'd like. Add to that a ballooned £190 price tag, and the S28 Prisma becomes increasingly tough to justify.

Bottom line: performance enthusiasts should look elsewhere, but a lower price tag would make the Celsius+ a viable choice for those seeking a sleeker and quieter all-in-one cooler.

The Good
  
The Bad
Sleek pump with minimal cable clutter
Designed to run quiet at all times
Available in 240, 280 or 360 formats
Straightforward installation
Five-year warranty
  
Premium £190 price tag
No spare thermal paste
Default cooling performance not great



Fractal Design Celsius+ S28 Prisma

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The Fractal Design Celsius+ S28 Prisma CPU cooler is available to purchase from Scan Computers.

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At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim.



*UK-based HEXUS community members are eligible for free delivery and priority customer service through the SCAN.care@HEXUS forum.


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HEXUS Forums :: 3 Comments

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Posted by philehidiot - Tue 26 May 2020 15:22
For near £200 I'd be thinking copper radiators. As there's no mention of it I'm guessing this is still aluminium.

That's a lot of money for mediocre cooling performance, even if it is quiet. I wonder how quiet it'd be with better cooling ability and just running the fans and pump slower.
Posted by KultiVator - Tue 26 May 2020 17:06
Broadly agree with the review's conclusions… my previous-gen Fractal Celsius S36 360 is virtually silent under all but the very toughest of workloads (e.g. multi-track 4k / 5k video rendering) - but some manual tweaking of fan curves was needed to achieve a good balance of performance vs quietness that I was happy with.

It was also fairly easy to install and compact enough to not overhang the DIMM sockets - often a key consideration with Ryzen 3 series desktop CPUs - especially if you like your RAM modules with a splash of RGB :-)

Would I buy the same module again? Probably.

The new version with RGB? Harder to say - as the price point is a little steep for quite a small step forwards in overall performance - so that makes for a big RGB tax!
Posted by Euphonium - Wed 27 May 2020 11:43
@Hexus Do you have temperature & noise level data for a stock AMD cooler? I'd be interested to see decent figures for how much difference aftermarket coolers make.