Lian Li Galahad II Trinity Performance 240 AIO Review: Raising the Bar

The best-performing 240mm AIO we’ve tested.

Lian Li Galahad II Trinity Performance 240 AIO
Editor's Choice
(Image credit: © Tom's Hardware)

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Thermal Results with noise normalized to 38.2 dBA

Finding the right balance between fan noise levels and cooling performance is important. While running fans at full speed can improve cooling capacity to some extent, the benefits are limited and many users prefer a quiet system. With this noise-normalized test, I’ve set noise levels to 38.2 dba. This level of noise is a low – but slightly audible – volume level.

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Albert Thomas
Freelancer, CPU Cooling Reviewer

Albert Thomas is a contributor for Tom’s Hardware, primarily covering CPU cooling reviews.

  • Soaptrail
    Is spell check and editing dead?
    Reply
  • phxrider
    Lian Li is definitely a rising star - I just did a build with their 216 case and it is amazing how well thought out and well built it is.
    Reply
  • Zforgetaboutit
    Soaptrail said:
    Is spell check and editing dead?

    This vague post could've been more helpful with at least a few examples.

    The "pump seed" in the "Specifications" table is funny as a double entendre,
    Reply
  • Soaptrail
    Zforgetaboutit said:
    The initial error of "pump seed" is funny, but the poster's lack of evidence isn't helpful.
    I did not even catch that, I found the other 2 before it. Hilarious!
    Reply
  • Ravestein NL
    "The inner diameter of the water tubes has been increased from 5.8mm to 7mm, increasing the total volume of liquid by roughly 20%, which allows for better heat absorption."

    It's not the volume that has influence on heat absorption! I could have a bucket of cooling fluid but if the flow and absorption in cooling block/ discharge heat in radiator aren't up to par it will be a bad cooling system. It's the flow of coolant and the delta T over cooling block and radiator that makes an AIO-cooler good or bad. And the rule is that "to" is always bad (as we say in dutch). So it really means the balance between flow and Delta T has to be exactly right to have a good cooling system. In this case I think they upped the rpm of the pump and enlarged the hose (and also changes in block and radiator ofcourse) to get a higher flow and keep the Delta T in block and radiator as small as possible. And here to small ain't good and to large ain't good either, every part must be in balance to make a good cooling system
    Reply
  • Udyr
    Albert.Thomas said:
    We have to list a "con" for our articles.

    Personally, I don't feel that there really are any "cons" for this product.
    Cons-
    None!

    Huh?
    Reply
  • MoxNix
    Soaptrail said:
    Is spell check and editing dead?
    It's done by AI now.
    Reply
  • helper800
    This is going to be a bit of a long one, buyer beware of these new Lian Li products.

    @Albert.Thomas Did you have any issues with either version of the Galahad trinity II?

    I bought the 360mm Galahad II Trinity Performance to replace my 360mm Coolermaster ML360R that I had before because it was getting long in the tooth for permeation and the pump. I have had several issues with the Lian Li AIO.

    I have a strange issue where the pump does not start and my CPU quickly goes to 90c. I thought to myself I forgot something simple like, bad mounting, not plugging in the pump to the Motherboard, or even a low or bad duty cycle on the pump in BIOS. I checked everything and nothing was amiss. So I tried starting up the PC again and the previous issues were gone, pump was working, temps were normal even under stress testing. I restart after a firmware update to the AIO through the Lian Li L-connect software, and the pump does not start again. Scratching my head at this point, I decide to do a few reboots as a test. Four of the ten reboots I did on my PC would cause the pump to not start pumping. I would get as far as my desktop before I see that the CPU is at 90C and the fans are blaring at 100% as I log into windows. I thought to myself that I should see if it is related to the Lian Li software that has pump and fan controls causing the issue due to bugs by booting straight into BIOS. I get to BIOS and everything is normal. I reboot and again go back to BIOS, but this time while watching the CPU temps, I can see them climbing all the way to 90c and on the fan control page I can see that the pump is not responding to the CPU temps. Pump was at 0 RPM. So I am left with having to restart my PC after booting up if I notice my fans spinning up trying to compensate for no RPMs on the pump until the pump magically decides to start working.

    I went over my PC three times making sure everything is connected where it should be, updated BIOS, and still no resolution to this issue. I also have another issue with this AIO while it is working. The pump is, while "working," loud, very loud even. This issue of the pump being loud happened gradually over time. I figured I would go to Lian Li support to potentially get a software or firmware update to fix the 0 RPM pump issue on startup, so I kept it installed and would restart when it did not start pumping until it worked. I have had the AIO for three weeks now and the first week the pump was nearly silent with a small amount of whine at 4200 rpm so I kept it at 3600 rpm. In week two I noticed that it would have a slight grinding sound every once and a while. Now, and in the third week, the grinding sound is constant, but is lesser or greater at different RPM breakpoints. I can stand buggy, or janky software / firmware because that is fixable, but the pump was also seemingly failing as well. Because of these issues, I decided to return the AIO to amazon because it is still within the return window. I will be replacing it with an Arctic freezer 2. Wish me luck, I think I need it at this point...

    TLDR, 0 RPM pump at startup randomly, and when it does work after about a week the pump itself became louder, and louder...
    Reply
  • Albert.Thomas
    helper800 said:
    This is going to be a bit of a long one, buyer beware of these new Lian Li products.

    @Albert.Thomas Did you have any issues with either version of the Galahad trinity II?
    I haven't experienced any problems with them, but there will always be a few defective units. I'd advise RMAing the unit, honestly this 360mm AIO and Cooler Master's new 360 Atmos are what I consider the best AIOs on the market right now.
    Reply
  • helper800
    Albert.Thomas said:
    I haven't experienced any problems with them, but there will always be a few defective units. I'd advise RMAing the unit, honestly this 360mm AIO and Cooler Master's new 360 Atmos are what I consider the best AIOs on the market right now.
    I was able to return the Lian Li unit to amazon. I was also able to get a next day drop off of the Arctic liquid freezer II. The Arctic AIO is so much quieter and is performing better than when the Lian Li unit did work, though that may be due to the AM4 offset bracket it comes with. Also, i do not know if the Lian Li could perform as intended considering the issues it had. Either way, I am with the Arctic AIO.
    Reply