Thermaltake ProWater 850i Water Cooling Kit

Thermaltake is a widely respected company that provides much support to enthusiasts offering enclosures, power supplies, cooling products and other accessories.  When it comes liquid cooling they provided some complete prebuilt systems with their BigWater series of units.  Thermaltake is now tossing a new series in to the arena and we have been testing the mettle of this ProWater 850i.

In the past, all-in-one liquid units (in general) missed the bang-for-buck notoriety.  Many of the high end air coolers kept temperature close to many of those units and some units frustrated most first time users with leak issues.  In the past year we have seen some units that exceeded cooling and ease-of-use expectations, but they came with a hefty price tag.  Now, Thermaltake has thrown a new liquid cooling unit on to the scene, with a very reasonable price tag.  The question is: Will this ProWater 850i system solve the leak and installation issues of the past or is it the same ol' thing, just repackaged?

Just the like the previous BigWater units, the ProWater 850i comes with everything you need for installation.  For those that have used thermaltake air coolers in the past, you will notice the very familiar "I" shaped brackets used for this unit.  Also included is the expansion slot bracket (for those that don't have an enclosure with tube slots), a very detailed user manual, tubing, and coolant. 

The coolant is a non concentrated 500cc bottle of Propylene Glycol, a very common anti-freeze/coolant compound.  It has a light yellow-green tint which might also explain why Thermaltake decided to go with the same color for their tubing.  After months of using a particular color coolant, clear tubing will eventually 'stain' to the color of the coolant (causing no problems to functions of the units).  This coolant will work just fine to transfer heat and protect the parts of the ProWater 850i from any type of corrosion that might occur with regular water.