Just a few short months ago, I had the opportunity to review Swiftech's original Compact water-cooling kit, the H20-120 Compact.  What we concluded then was that the Compact idea was a great way to simplify installation of a water cooling kit without sacrificing performance.  Fast forward to 2008, and we have the second iteration of the Compact series: the H2O-220 Compact.  The challenge has also changed, however, as the original Compact was tested on an overclocked Opteron 170; this time the challenge is Intel Q6600, and I fully expect to push the kit to its limit. 

In the past, I have been able to reach 3.6GHz on air with the Q6600, and I fully expect to blow past this limit on water.  Ideally, I want to hit 4GHz on this quad, though I know that is a lot to ask.  Can the H2O-220 Compact hack it?  Read on to find out!

First Look:

     The packaging for the H2O-220 is similar to the H2O-120, just a little bigger.  The box does a good job of showing how exactly it is meant to be installed.  Again, Swiftech boldly claims how easy the installation is.  Along the bottom, we can see the 220 is compatible with essentially every socket commonly used today. 

     The back of the package shows off the specifications, as well as graph to show how well it performs under different situations.  For example, it rates a seven to nine for an overclocked quad if silence isn't an issue, all the way to a three to five rating when overclocking a quad and two GPUs with silence a factor. 

     Everything is packed well within a Styrofoam insert.  Everything has a special place where it fits, as the styrofoam has been specifically cut for the contents.

     If you compare the contents picture above to the one for the H2O-120, you can see there is a lot more stuff.  The tubing is longer, the radiator is longer, there are more screws, lots of extra fittings, and even more options to step down the fan voltage via the power cables.  The 220 also includes the Radbox, which is only optional on the H2O-120, and a PCI bracket, which is necessary as the Radiator will have to be installed externally.   

     The included tubing is neoprene wrapped with smartcoils, just like the H20-120, only longer.  The H2O-220 ships with 24" long tubes as opposed to the 10" on the H2O-120.

Specifications:

Apogee Drive 350 Self-Powered Waterblock:

     What really makes the Compact series so unique, is really this component right here.  Just like the H2O-120, the H2O-220 utilizes the Apogee Drive 350 water block with the integrated MCP350 pump mounted on top.  By combining components, we get to save space, and make installation that much easier. 

     The Apogee Drive comes ready to run for Intel Socket 775, and as we can see from the above picture, the copper plate is baby-bottom smooth. 

MCR220-Res Heat Exchanger:

     The primary difference between the H2O-120 and the H2O-220 lies right here in the combination radiator/reservoir.  The larger the capacity of your reservoir, the more heat you will be able to funnel out of your case.  While the larger size helps performance, it may hurt installation options.  While the H2O-120 can easily fit inside the case, the MCR220 will likely have to be mounted externally. 

Just for kicks and giggles, here is the top view, showing off the reservoir portion of the kit. 

     The fans from the H2O-220 are identical to the H2O-120, except that there are two of them.  It is the RDM1225S 120mm fan, capable of 81CFM at 36dBA. 

Other Specifications:

Features: