maximumpc.com MAY 2020 MAXIMUM PC 61
THIS IS A SPECIAL BUILD for a number of
reasons, not only because it’s Zak’s first
build since his return to the magazine, but
also because it’s pink. And there’s a story
behind that, as there often is with these
systems. In short, Zak asked his significant
other what color she thought the coolant
should be, and she replied, “Pink!” Not
because she’s female, but because it’s one
of her favorite colors. And, to be honest, we
were more than happy to oblige. Reason
being, in the publishing industry, especially
in the technology sector, pink is seen as a
feminine color, and management doesn’t
really like it. After all, the majority of our
audience is male. Because of that, we’ve
always had an in-joke among the team
that it’s secretly a hyper-masculine color,
and should therefore be called MANgenta.
Because, in our eyes, the fact that
management thinks it’s not manly makes
us think it is. In fact, during Zak’s original
tenure on the magazine, he threatened the
erstwhile executive editor, Alan Dexter,
multiple times with making a pink liquid-
cooled PC, because that was the only way to
get mangenta on the cover.
That said, after this was built, the pink
really does work quite nicely. Combined with
the white lighting thrown out by the various
LEDs situated across the components,
it really does make the machine pop. In
fact, it’s one of our all-time favorite builds.
Aesthetics aside, it’s not perfect—it has
some serious problems. Some that stem
from building a show build like this, others
due to overlooking stuff from a thermal
perspective. It is way too hot; even with no
overclocks, the system traps heat after two
or three hours, and the fans ramp up anyway,
negating a lot of the benefits you find from
liquid cooling. The stock Phanteks fans we
picked weren’t sufficient, and ideally should
be replaced with Noctua NF-F12s, Corsair
ML120 Pros, or EK-Vardar fans. Something
with high static pressure and low noise.
Alternately, if Phanteks releases a mesh
variant case, as it has done with the smaller
Evolv Shift model, that may help, too.
It could also use some custom cables
made to length specifically for it, because
the Corsair Pro ones, although a fantastic
kit, add far too much bulk to the cable-
management space. And then there’s the
show-build element. W ith most of the liquid-
cooled systems we build for the magazine,
they have to be put together quickly,
considering aesthetics above all else. That
means there is usually only one fill port
on a build. For long-term use, you need a
drain port at the lowest point, too, because
it makes it far easier to maintain your loop.
We’re using Mayhems coolant here, which
is particularly long-life, but if we wanted to
swap that out, it would be a real pain.
Build process aside, it’s a fairly solid PC
for living-room gaming. It’s not a seamless
experience, though. To get it set up properly,
you need a standard install of Windows with
a local account and no password. Then it’s a
case of configuring Steam to open in Big
Picture Mode on startup, at which point you
have access to your entire library. In fact,
you can even link Uplay and other titles with
Steam, too, although you need a keyboard
and mouse handy from time to time.
Ultimately, our Pink Pariah is a gorgeous
showpiece that can manage gaming at 4K,
unhindered by any game you throw at it (with
a little tweaking, of course), and it’s more
than ideal for your living room. Expensive?
Yes. Very. And you could achieve something
similar for half the cost. But, hey, then it
wouldn’t be pink.BUILDING COMPLETE
(^1)
There’s actually a
Phanteks branded
magnetic cable cover that goes
across here, but with the 24-pin
cables in pl ace, it was easier to
remove it than secure it.
2
We had to use a fan splitter
cable here, because the
motherboard only has three fan
headers, and we have a total of
four fans in the build.
3
We’ve also not plugged in
the front USB 3.0 header
for these two ports, because
there’s simply not enough space
for them up there.
4
This is our rudimentary
fill port: just an angled
90-degree fitting and a plug.
It’s simple and easy, and
means we can perform coolant
maintenance when necessary.
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BENCHMARKS
ZERO-
POINT
Cinebench R15 Multi (Index) 1,701 1,320 (-22%)
CrystalDisk QD32 Sequential
Read (MB/s) 3,522 3,438 (-2%)
CrystalDisk QD32 Sequential
Write (MB/s) 2,237 2,955 (32%)
Middle Earth:
Shadow of War (fps)^5649 (-13%)
Total War: Warhammer II (fps) 44 38 (-14%)
Assassin’s Creed Odyssey (fps) 35 32 (-9%)
3DMark: Fire Strike (Index) 22,503 19,597 (-13%)
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Our zero-point consists of an Intel Core i7-8086K @ 5.3GHz, 32GB Kingston HyperX Predator DDR4 @ 3,200MT/s, an Asus GeForce
RTX 2080 Ti Turbo, and a 512GB Samsung 970 Pro M.2 PCIe SSD. All tests were performed at 4K at the highest graphical profile.