It's amazing to see such a vibrant AIO cooler market out there nowadays, but to be honest, a lot of them perform so similarly that the right one for you will often come down to personal preference. For example, your options will be fairly narrow if you want an all-in-one liquid cooler that doesn't have RGB. In fact, Corsair's Nautilus RS range was one of the few that offered an all-black stealth look in your gaming PC.
The only problem? The magnetic pump cap. From reading a plethora of reviews, it's clear that the magnet that secured the Corsair logo faceplate to the pump header was flimsy and could only rotate to four strict positions. Today, Corsair has announced an expansion to the Nautilus AIO range with the Nautilus RS LCD, a version that removes the cap and gives you a bright LCD display to stare at instead.
As usual with LCD displays on AIO coolers, this can be used to show real-time monitoring stats like your CPU's temperature or speed. It can also be customized to show images, GIFs, or something else that you'll be able to configure with Corsair's iCUE software. The display has a resolution of 480x480, 2.1-inch IPS panel, and a 600cd/m² backlight.
With this expansion, Corsair has curated a family of AIO coolers to suit (almost) your every whim. There are black and white non-RGB models if all that RGB noise isn't to your liking. There are black and white ARGB options if you do want a rig that's bursting with color. Now, thanks to the LCD module (which you can also buy separately for $59.99 at Corsair), you'll be able to add a bit more personality to your stealthy, non-RGB cooler, although it doesn't seem like the standalone LCD display will be compatible with the ARGB coolers. Of course, like the original Nautilus RS, you also get 240mm and full-sized 360mm sizes of the full LCD cooler too.
All of this is great, but it does detract a little from one of the main things people liked about the Nautilus: its price. Corsair coolers can be fairly pricey. Its Titan 360 RX costs upwards of $250, and its H150i Elite sells for upwards of $300, for example. The $109.99 entry level of the Nautilus RS range attracted a fair few reviewers to base their coverage around the brand "going budget". With the new RS LCD model going for $159 / £149, that's not so true anymore compared with a lot of smaller brands in the market.
That extra money doesn't exactly equate to better performance either, since it would seem like the cooler is otherwise unchanged besides the swanky screen. It still uses Corsair's RS120 fans, and it doesn't look like any changes have been made to the installation process. NZXT's Kraken Elite 360 RGB simplifies the annoying daisy-chaining that you have to do with AIO fans by consolidating everything into one run-off cable and installing the fans as one unit.
Thankfully, the Nautilus RS LCD will support LGA 1700, LGA 1851, AM4, and AM5 motherboards, which is a nice bonus.
Fancy shopping a bit more first?
- View all AIO coolers at Amazon
- NZXT Kraken Plus: $129.99 at Amazon
- Corsair Titan: $219.99 at Amazon
Brush up on your PC components by reading about the best graphics cards, the best RAM for gaming, and the best CPU for gaming.
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