Mayhem’s Pastel and X1 Review

Posted by Gilgamesh on November 6th, 2013

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Introduction

Water Cooling over the last couple of years, as any enthusiast will tell you, was in danger of becoming stagnant. Very few companies, if any, were truly innovating and the ones that were making changes, were only making minor changes at best. Essentially there were only three radiator companies manufacturing products world-wide. This being Black Ice (in the Philippines) Thermochill (in the United Kingdom) and finally the massive company in China that produces all the rest, such as the XSPC and Magicool products.

Of the second company we formally had many great products associated with; such as their fantastic PA series radiators and the EC6 range of fluids. However, in recent years we have heard almost nothing of the former-mentioned company and as a result there have been fewer recent outstanding innovations within this field.

Enter Mayhem’s, formally known as ‘Mayhems Dyes’. A British company with an agenda to change the face of the industry forever. They are a small but expanding company with some rather interesting ideas in regards to their products. Previously the aforementioned business introduced us to their ‘Aurora’ range of fluids that are designed for ‘show’ systems and showed us a different approach to the realm of water cooling. Just as we were getting used to this product we are knocked sideways again with another concept, this being a fluid for systems based on ‘Pastel’ colours. However, unlike the ‘Aurora’ range of fluids (which are designed to be in a system for six months at the most), the pastel range can be used for over a two years.

However the above Aurora’ range (as mentioned by their literature) are not designed for performance based systems and this where the pastel and the X1 series of products comes into play.

Company Background

On looking at the company’s website, we note the lack of an ‘About Us’ section and in all fairness the site itself looks a little on the amateur side. However we are not here to judge a website, but whether the products can live up to the standard that all cooling enthusiasts look for.

Water cooling gurus are a canny lot, and after some of the well-documented issues with some other alternative fluids; the latter mentioned enthusiasts can also be a ‘jaded’ bunch. Similar to how ‘Overclockers Tech’ feel about some models of chassis that are so-called ‘Water Cooling Ready’

In 2009, when this review site was in its infancy, we ‘took a look‘ rather than reviewed the ‘Mayhems pre-mix liquids. In all honesty it was not a happy time as the pre-mix separated as the inhibitor failed to work and as such blocked our test CPU water block. However judging by all the press it looks like things have changed and with an open mind (though a small amount of trepidation) we decided to give Mayhem’s fluids another go.

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Product Information

This reviewer and Overclockers Tech cannot afford to have a ‘favourite’ brand of fluid in order to keep an objective view. However, we are still human, and in all honesty it will take a lot to pull us away from Thermochill’s EC6 range. This writer has been using the latter-mentioned for a couple of years. Having said this, what counts the most is performance and alternatively some may say that it is also about looks. So towards that end this review attempts to cater for both.

Let us start by introducing the pastel range of fluids:

“Mayhems Pastel range of ‘Nano’ coolants have been in development for over two years in co-operation between Ice Dragon Cooling and Mayhems. This new range of coolants surpasses anything in the market place at the moment with its outstanding colours and cooling power.”

We ‘oldies’ at Overclockers Tech’ can remember playing with pastel chalks as a child and scribbling in lovely shaded colours on the pavement. Rather like our fellow guru ‘Lvcoyote’ whom was present at Woodstock whilst listening to ‘colourful’ music; erstwhile watching the pretty lights in the sky-ahem, need we say more?

Yes you got it, rather than loud headache inducing colours, which are produced from a certain substance, this is more like the mellow type that a clapped out hippy would experience during a ‘flash back’

Anyway, the aforementioned fluid comes in a series of colours (we have had to use the product photos from ‘Mayhems’ as we only have one colour pastel to test with) of which are demonstrated below:

Blue Berry and Chocolate Brown

Gigabyte Orange and Grape Red

Ice White and Light Red

Mint Green and Perfect Pink

Rasberry Purple and Sunset Yellow

As for the colour scheme of the products, we find them more than acceptable-bar only a few. The mint green, orange and the light blue colour are the very definition on what pastel colours should be like, followed by the grape red and the ice white. However in all honesty we do not like the chocolate coloured one very much as it looks like a case of when your child has quaffed the chocolate milk on the sly and then tried adding water to fill the level back up so nobody would notice. The Raspberry Purple doesn’t look like the latter mentioned colour, and lastly the pink is just a matter of preference really.

Going back towards the ‘Ice white’ there is a sneaking suspicion that this is more white than milk. Shall we find out? Go on then let us have a look!

When they said ‘Ice White’ they weren’t joking.

Next we have the X1 fluid. This one they rate for performance level and in our testing later in the review we will just have to see if it can live up to its name.

This is what Mayhem’s have to say about the X1 Range

“Mayhems X1 is based on a proprietary blend of refined vegetable extracts that are fully biodegradable and have a very low order of oral toxicity. It comes with a Child Safety Cap as well as a spout so you can fill all manner of systems easily. The X1 has slightly better heat transfer and flow characteristics than propylene glycol for systems operating between + 50°C to – 8°C.”

As with all of the company’s products, with the Ultra Pure H20 being the exception, Biocides are not needed in any form. Overclockers Tech likes the idea of not having to mess around with adding products such as PT-Nuke and so on. However we all know the general dislike ANY true water cooling enthusiast has of ANY pre-mixed fluids, so it will take a lot to convince us otherwise. The latter mentioned is especially true when yours truly has experienced the below issues when with some other fluids. Please note this is a genuine case of a customer of ours that had a serious issue of his processor reaching 90 degrees Celsius (At stock) on full load.

The reason could have been this:

Now being reasonable we all know that occasionally some fluids will have their issues, and the manufacturers address these concerns quickly. However, on the rare occasion that it DOES happen, then it does cause some consternation amongst the former-mentioned enthusiasts.

Lastly just like the pastel range the X1 comes in a myriad of differing colours which include: UV Red and Blue, Clear, Orange, UV Green, Purple and Blood Orange. However for the purposes of review we have chosen X1 clear today.

Let us now get on with the testing.

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Testing Methodology

To test, two inline probes were utilised for water in/out and an additional two for the air in/out for the radiator section. All ambient room temperatures were measured at equipment level with the addition of being three feet adjacent to the equipment. There was a slight variance between the ambient room temperatures, but no more than half a degree at the most. However we have factored this into the equation and the final results will reflect this data. All CPU idle temperatures were taken by running the processor at full load for an hour and then allowed to cool down naturally for an additional hour.

All power saving and CPU features were disabled in the BIOS in order to give accurate results. The Ram was set at 1.65 volts and the CPU at the standard of 1.32. After each change of the fluid the loop was cleaned using ‘Sysclean’ and then flushed out using distilled water. A full day of circulation was allowed after each change of fluid to allow any micro ‘air bubbles to dissipate. Before any results were undertaken three CPU block remounts were preformed in oder to test the optimum position of the aforementioned block. The thermal compound used was OCZ Freeze, as this doesn’t need a length of time to cure. However throughout the testing the block was kept mounted onto the board to avoid any false temperature differential.

Equipment Used

Hardware Equipment Used

ABIT X48 TigerForce motherboard

Intel q6600 G0 (At Default settings)

DD3 4 Gigabyte 1600mhz

G-FORCE 410 GPU

OCZ 550W PSU

Below are a few photographs showing the test equipment. The previously mentioned system is very much a ad-hoc solution however it performs well.

Cooling Equipment

XSPC Rasa CPU Water Block

XSPC RS240MM

XSPC 750 Pump/RES

ANTEC 120MM FANSx2

LAMPTRON FC3 Fan Controller

1/2″ ID Tubing

INLINE Sensor probes for water in/ out

K-probe to monitor rad air in/out

Test Results

As previously mentioned all idle CPU results were taken after the computer was at full load (PRIME 95 small TFT’s) for one hour and then left to cool down for a further hour. All background tasks within windows were disabled to prevent false readings and a customised stripped down version of Windows 7 was used for all test results. However, we didn’t have many liquids to compare with, on hand we had Primo chill’s Excellent PC Pure which is essentially water with Glycol added and Fluid XP! The latter being available for a number of years in differing forms. This review is essentially for the Mayhems Pastel and X1 range of products, however we thought it would be a great idea to add their Ultra Pure H20 product into the fray.

During the testing we will give our feelings on how easy or hard it was to bleed air out and the general consistency of the fluid.

The first set of results are the temperature level of the fluid, both in and out, at idle and on full load after an hour. The reason why we measure this is it gives a good indication on how well the liquid performs under stress. The higher the the output temperature is over the input temperature then the less performance one is likely to achieve. This is especially true if the end user were going to subject the fluid to a high amount of heat, such as a TRI-SLI set up!

Ambient Room temperatures were measured between 24.4 and 24.8 and were factored into all test results.

As one can see all the above temperatures on idle are roughly the same-barring Fluid XP; however at full CPU load then the results become more profound. The X1 product of the Mayhems range performs really well and is overall ahead of the rest, however next comes the Ultra pure H20. What is most impressive is that the X1 performs so close to distilled water that overall there is little or no difference between them. After this is the PC Pure, however in this review and in this test in particular we shall place Primochill’s product in second place. The reason for this is that though the overall results shown here are not as impressive as the ‘H20 ultra Pure’ from mayhems, this was used ‘neat’ and had no biocides within the fluid, whilst PC Pure does. So to avoid being unfair we are using the ‘ultra Pure H20’ for comparison purposes only. After this we have the Fluid XP product and lastly the Pastel range of Mayhem’s.

Looking at the above then it must be noted that with the pastel there is a massive temperature differential between the input and out of the fluid at full load. This indicates that if one wishes to use high end graphics cards with extreme overclocking then this may not be your ideal solution if performance temperature is your goal as this will stress the fluid even more than what we have done here. However, in all fairness the literature on their sites states that this fluid is for ‘looks and modding only’ and if one wanted performance then they better look more towards the X1 and the Ultra Pure H20 range. Fluid XP however cannot lay this claim, and for a bottle that costs fifteen pounds per litre, in all honesty it is quite unforgivable.

For reference purposes below are the air in and air out for the radiator on all fluid tests.

Edit: we forgot to add the radiator out temperatures for FluidXp at idle and on full load and these are 27.9 and 28.9

Before we get to the all important CPU temperature results we shall have a little note about the filling and bleeding of the system on each fluid.

Mayhem’s X1 The viscosity feels roughly the same as of water and the bleeding of air bubbles was exactly the same of the latter mentioned.
Mayhem’s Pastel Feels the same as the X1 however for some reason I had to spend time getting all the larger air bubbles out
Ultra Pure H20 and PC Pure as with all water of the same time, and bubble removal was a simple affair.
Fluid XP this product feels almost like motor oil and air bubble removal was a trial and took around two hours to complete.

The charts below show the all important CPU test results:

Once again an impressive result shown by the X1 product from Mayhem’s with very little or no difference even on full load. Looking at the results of the pastel on idle we can see that the base liquid of the former mentioned must be (pardon the pun) based upon the X1 range. However, though at full load the temperature differences are large at around four degrees worse than the X1. The Primochill does really well since it is essentially only water with glycol added. The Promichill and Ultra Pure difference could be explained due to the lack of a biocide in one of the products and as such would be unfair to compare the two. However, facts are facts and judging by the data at hand the Primochill PC Pure certainly performs well. What is disappointing is again the FluidXp results. We would like to think that this was due to viscosity of the fluid and the combined XSPC 750 Res/pump is unable to cope. However, if we factor in an old Thermochill XSPC EC6 fluid review and the testing on this was with a separate pump and still it achieved the worst results of the bunch by far, then the question begs to be offered ‘Why is FLUID XP still selling?’

To round up the two top performing liquids, these would be the X1 and by a respectful margin Primochill’s PC Pure. Respect is due to X1 from Mayhems as it is not water-based unlike the Primochill’s offering.

Next we can finally move onto the conclusion of this review.

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Conclusion

This is by no means a definitive review, as essentially we didn’t have more samples for comparison at hand. However, it certainly gives a great indicator on the raw performance of all the fluids tested. As a result we see this as a ‘growing’ review where differing comparison liquids will be added over time , along with a myriad of different equipment. For example we wish to test all these fluids against our previous product the ‘Thermochill EC6’ and of other makes. However, we are here to report our findings as we see them today and not what they may be in the distant future.

Please keep in mind that a review is a ‘snapshot’ in time and one cannot realistically write about new fluids when using the performance over time ratio and still keep to a dead-line.

As mentioned above we shall conclude our review by making comments upon each of the fluids presented here today.

Mayhems X1

A great product overall, easily performs to the level of a distilled water product and the evidence shows this. Though it is not water based ( in other words needs additives), so there is no reason to add any third-party products, albeit if you wished to make your own colour by using a dye from another manufacturer. All though the costs is more than the regular water based product it does save the need for the aforementioned and that for many is the deciding factor. We only wish we had the chance to review the coloured version of this product to see if there are any performances losses when utilised under the same conditions as our test.

In short it does exactly what it says on the tin and by a comfortable margin to boot!

Mayhems Pastel

A product with great looks and the other colours offer the same ‘eye-candy as the Ice-White. Whilst we are speaking of the looks, all the range of the pastel is obviously based upon the white colour as when you add any dye to a strong white base then you always get a pastel shade. So with that said experimentation is the key and your own unique colour can be used by adding your own dye to the Ice-white base. We at overclockers tech, truly appreciate creative products and if this product where slightly better performing it would have obtained our first EVER double gold award for creativity and performance. However this product is not aimed at the performance market but of the ‘Modder’ variety.

Having said the above, performance is the key here as well as eye candy for many and yes the literature certainly states that it is not meant to be aimed at the performance market and the results show this, but in the end it does factor into the equation and the final result listed below will be include in these options.

PrimoChill PC Pure and Mayhems Ultra Pure H20

Both products perform really well with the Primochill being the exception. Due to Mayhems product actually performing better we still cannot give the H20 an award as it does not contain a biocide with the addition to the Pure containing Glycol. As such a like-for-like comparison is impossible at this moment in time. and if the ‘PC Pure’ were the subject of the review rather than a comparison fluid then we would give the product a silver award.

FLUID XP +

Photo taken from Overclockers Online

Once again the product has shown that it simply cannot keep up with the big boys. For a fluid that is so-called ‘Designed by a NASA scientist’ then it is woeful that the performance results are as bad as they are. Two reviews and under differing equipment the fluid has been used and has produced the worst results of the products tested.

There is an old saying, Once is a coincidence, twice is something to think about, but the third time is the final result, and rest assured we will be using this fluid for comparison in other reviews.

On balance it could be worth testing a differing CPU block, perhaps this fluid is made for ‘Danger Den’ products as they both seem to be recommending each other on their respective websites? It could be possible that this is the case and as a result we will hold our full judgement until this has been tested.

Awards

Mayhems X1

Based upon the performance of the products tested thus far, this fluid gets our Gold award with a total score of 9.1 out of 10.

PC PURE (Primochill)

We mentioned that we could not give this product an award with it being a comparison fluid only, however we would not do this review or any reader justice if we didn’t give it an award for its performance value and as such obtains a 7.9 out of 10, and therefore a silver award.

Mayhems ICE-WHITE Pastel

This is where things get a little tricky as we have many things to factor into the equation. If we take into the account its looks and adaptability into a myriad of differing colours, and then we add-in a certain amount of performance results, then the judgement can get tricky indeed. However let us attempt to render our view in a section by section format.

Originality, Creativity, looks and adaptability= GOLD
Performance=Bronze

Therefore if we average them out then this would obtain a silver with a score of 7.9 out of 10. We already have a silver award in this review and so to be totally fair whilst factoring into this review that this product was NEVER designed for the performance market.

Due to the fact that we will be using this product (as the colour fits the case theme and all in all is a good product) and it DOES tick most of the boxes. Therefore we render a joint Silver with the Primochill product and an Editors choice award for its creativity.