iCUE LINK RX120 MAX First Impressions by HoodRat

We sent HoodRat a set of our RX120 MAX 30mm thick fans, so they could take a look and give us some first impressions. The following is entirely in their own words.

CORSAIR kindly sent me a pack of their new iCUE LINK RX120 MAX fans to try out. The RX MAX fans are 30mm thick iCUE LINK compatible fans, which come in both RGB and non-RGB versions. The RGB version is available in both black and white, whereas the non-RGB is only available in black, but that isn’t the only difference. The blades and frame of the non-RGB version are made from liquid crystal polymer, which is said to allow for better performance. Also, the RX MAX non-RGB variant has a temperature sensor built directly onto the fans to monitor intake or exhaust air temps.

I opted to test the non-RGB versions because I was interested in how the material affected the fans' performance.

The fans are available individually or as part of a starter pack, which includes 3 fans and an iCUE LINK hub. Crucially, the fans also include the necessary screws for both radiators and CORSAIR's own awesome QuikTurn screws for mounting the fans to the case. With the fans being 5mm thicker than normal fans that I'm used to, I totally forgot that I wouldn't be able to use the plethora of radiator screws I already have lying around, so I'm glad the longer screws are included.

The fans themselves are very understated, perfect for a stealthy build. They feel solid and very well built, with no creaking or flexing in the frame. The blades are super close to the edge of the frame, and the rear features the familiar AirGuide design with the tiny temperature sensor protruding. Rubber gaskets are placed over the mounting holes to prevent vibrations, as you would expect to find. These are, of course, iCUE LINK fans, which connect together and make installation a breeze via a single cable solution. I’m impressed by what I have seen so far, but how do they perform?

To put the RX Max fans through their paces, I decided to test them against the Corsair iCue Link RX 120 RGB fans on the Titan 360 AIO. The radiator of the AIO was placed outside of the case during testing so that the case itself and additional heat from other components wouldn’t become a factor.

Specs of the test setup:

• Specs of the test setup:
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7700
• Motherboard: Gigabyte B650M Aorus Elite AX ICE
• GPU: Asus TUF 4080 Super
• RAM: 2x 16GB Corsair Vengeance DDR5 6000
• Storage: Corsair MP600 Elite 1TB NVME
• PSU: Corsair SF1000-L
• AIO: Corsair Titan RX AIO
• OS: Windows 11 23H2

Testing consisted of 3 x 30-minute Cinebench R23 runs per fan type with a 1-hour break in between. I started off with the RX fans, then switched to the RX MAX fans. The following day, I repeated the tests, but with the RX MAX fans going first this time. All fans were locked to 1500RPM, and Precision Boost Overdrive was enabled on the CPU throughout the tests. The ambient temp was kept at 22.5° C.

First off, I started with a noise test. For this, I used an app on my phone to measure the sound 30 cm away from the fans when mounted to the AIO, and here are the results:

Whilst the table above shows only a slight decrease between the 2 fans, to my ears, the RX MAX fans sounded a lot more pleasing, especially at 1500 RPM. There was noticeably a lot less whining from the fans themselves and a lot more noise produced by the movement of air through the radiator.

For performance, data was recorded using a combination of iCUE’s built-in data recorder (to capture liquid temps) and HWInfo. It took me a long time to go through these huge CSV files to collate the data into something meaningful, so I decided to create a chart of the average of the combined runs instead of posting it in a table format. Due to the way PBO works, I decided on CPU Temp and CPU Clock speed to show the differences between the 2 fans.

As the charts above show, the RX MAX fans kept the CPU around 1° C cooler whilst providing consistently higher clock speeds on average. This was also reflected in the slightly higher Cinebench Score across the average of all 6 runs:

Overall, I’m extremely impressed by the RX Max fans. They are a premium product, and that shows in the build quality and performance of the fans themselves. The Starter pack is well thought out, with the included hub, screws, and cables providing everything you need to get up and running quickly and effortlessly.

The RX MAX fans show a performance improvement over the RX Fans, however the biggest improvement for me is on the noise front. They are much more pleasing to the ear, and the increased performance means that they can be run at a lower RPM to provide a similar cooling capability.

Using the AMD Ryzen 7 7700 for the comparison tests was not ideal, and I'm sure I would have seen bigger gains using a more powerful CPU, but it was all that I had available at the time without taking apart my other builds.

Of course, the RX Max’s that I have tested here do not have RGB, and that may be a deal breaker for some. Thankfully, as I mentioned earlier, they are also available with RGB, and my fellow insider Zafiast has provided his own comparison between the RX120 MAX RGB and LX 120 RGB fans here:

iCUE LINK RX120 MAX Unboxing by Zafiast | CORSAIR