Closer Examination

Given Seasonic had sent over three of its MagFlow ARGB fans, I had to show them all together to start this page! This also tells us a few things including that the fan isn't a standard 120 mm square frame offering. Seasonic's specs, and I can vouch for this, puts the MagFlow ARGB at 120.4 x 124.2 x 26.6 mm which is hilariously specific but appreciated. Note that these numbers are for a single fan as it ships, meaning those rubber pads you see the fans currently resting on in the first photo are part of those dimensions and why one side is larger than the other. But those pads will be inserted into other fans if you are daisy-chaining then so that's really more of a support structure than anything else. I really like how the MagFlow ARGB looks with its predominantly black colorway, the clean Seasonic branding on the front hub—43.3 mm in size—as well as on the inner side of the frame. Indeed, here we see a stepped frame design similar to what some high performance fans use. Then we get to the LCP impeller which is darker in color than your usual gray and we see the nine blades get real close to the frame too. This is the benefit of LCP as a material in that it helps prevent the blades from "creeping" further towards the frame and eventually hitting it over time. Most fan blades will have a larger gap to account for this which in turn means less surface area for the blades and less eventual air velocity pushed through the fan.

The fan is quite solid feeling and heavier than average at 214 g. The black frame has striations adding grip when you hold/install the fans and we see more Seasonic and MagFlow branding here in addition to arrows indicating the direction of fan rotation and that of air going through. One side has cutouts where the rubber pads from the adjoining fan will fit into and the opposite side has the magnetic pins used to make the actual fan-to-fan connection for power and data alike. The fan corners are closed and we get anti-vibration dampening pads on all four corners at the front and back. This makes the fan 26.6 mm thick but realistically the rubber pads on one side get squeezed in place when installed so the eventual thickness reduces further. More importantly, the fan holes in the corners are inset to be such that typical screws provided for 25 mm-thick fans will fit just fine. As such, you can just use the stock fan screws that come with your radiator or air cooler. The best part of the fan's design, at least for me, is that this is an ARGB fan which doesn't look like one at all. There are two LED rings here—one on the hub, one on the inside the frame—which you can barely notice unless you are deliberately looking for it.


From the back we see a fairly standard 4-way stator vane configuration employing a typical straight design, although clearly one is larger than the others to accommodate the fan cable. The sticker on the back has the expected certification labels in addition to the model number of the fan, the rated current draw (fan motor only, includes start-up boost), the rated fan speed, and confirmation that the fan motor has a metal shell. A 4-pole motor is responsible for driving the fan and, at 0.2 A each, you can get away with driving 3-4 fans off a single 1 A PWM fan header on your motherboard without issues. The LEDs are powered separately anyway, be it via a motherboard header per fan or using the included LED controller/hub which is probably the way to go since it gets powered from the PSU directly. The Seasonic MagFlow ARGB uses a fluid dynamic bearing with a 100,000 hour MTBF (mean time before failure) rating and this is sealed in the same metal shell as the motor to help provide a similar experience years down the line as it will on day one. Too bad the warranty is three years though which is at least two years less than I'd like based on where the market is at.


I saw the Seasonic MagFlow ARGB with its magnetic pins and realized immediately what kind of daisy-chaining was being used here. There have been a few such fans released recently which do similar—some are apparently too similar based on the lawsuits being filed. You simply align the male magnetic pins on one fan with the female magnetic receptacle on the other and join them together. The magnets do their job and the rubber pads on one fan go into the cutouts on the other to help facilitate a longer such chain. The three fans can be thus put together in a matter of seconds if you are planning to have all of them together. Seasonic also provides a fan-to-fan cable which allows you to connect two separately installed fans together, provided they are within 45 cm of each other anyway.


Irrespective of whether you have one fan or a chain of them, the lead fan will have its male pins exposed and this is where the power cable comes in. You connect it to the fan similar to the fan-to-fan cable seen before and now you have a standard 4-pin PWM connector and 3-pin ARGB connector. The provided extension cables for each help a lot if the fans are further away from your motherboard. Alternatively, you can also use the LED controller/hub for the LED cable if you want to rely on the onboard lighting effects. Either option will also allow you to sync the LEDs on the fans to your motherboard and other connected devices for a uniformly lit PC.


Speaking of which, seen above are all three fans powered on and lit up so you get a better idea of what to expect from the LEDs on board. The impeller is opaque and thus Seasonic has relied on two LED rings for lighting outwards from the hub and the inner frame. It looks remarkably bright and consistent despite the absence of a frosted white plastic rotor/frame as with most RGB fans these days. There are still 26 ARGB LEDs per fan for those counting numbers and this is quite possibly the best compromise of a performance-centric design with LED lighting that I've seen so far. Let's move to the next page to see if the performance aspect remains justified.