Installation

Installing the Swiftech H220-X is a piece of cake. First, remove the water block by simply unscrewing the mounting screws. Once done, place the backplate onto the motherboard. Make sure to properly line it up with the curved indentation facing the two screws on the Intel socket.


With the backplate in place, it is now time to apply some thermal paste before lining the CPU water block up with the mounting holes. Screw the four screws down in a criss-cross pattern after you have lined them up with the backplate. With that done, the cooler is mounted to the motherboard and ready to go. As for mounting it in a case, Swiftech includes eight fan screws for that purpose, still the fans come pre-attached and ready to go all users will need to do is attach the radiator to the case.


Swiftech's included PWM splitter allows you to easily control the entire unit via the motherboard's PWM function. Starting with the red spot, attach the PWM splitter to the CPU fan header before attaching your fans to the first and second spots along the splitter. Only the red spot provides an RPM reading, so keep that in mind. I attached the pump to the CPU fan header before attaching the PWM splitter and MCP30 to the power supply's SATA power cables. With that, installation is now complete.

The mounting hardware Swiftech uses is exemplary as it makes installing the cooler with most of the hardware, parts which make the H220-X match your system's color theme, a breeze. Overall, on a scale of 1 (hardest) to 10 (easiest), I would rate the Swiftech H220-X's installation a 10—yes that's right, a perfect score. The general ease of installation is due to a combination of the hardware already being ready for use and the easy-to-understand directions Swiftech includes. Add to that the fact that most of it comes pre-installed and you end up with an incredibly easy-to-install cooler.