Cooler Master Hyper 622 Halo

Introduction

The liquid cooling is the go to cooler for the PC enthusiasts who want the best cooling performance, low noise-level, and highest overclocking potential. However, not everyone wants the trouble or have the space for the radiator inside their system. Even with AIO cooler which largely minimize the risk of the leak, there is still a potential complication with a liquid cooler that you won’t find from the tried and true formula of air cooler. The  metal block, paired with cooling fins and a fan is certainly much less easier way to go for anyone who prefer simplicity.

The Hyper series of air cooler has been a successful brand from Cooler Master. The Hyper 212 is probably one of the best air cooler from Cooler Master that delivers a good cooling performance for its price. A quick search online and you can see that the Hyper 212 has earned numerous praise among PC enthusiasts for many years and it is often the recommended cooler for those who want a budget cooler that delivers.

The latest cooler from Cooler Master, the Hyper 622 Halo is aimed toward enthusiasts who want the best cooling performance with its U shape dual pipe towers design. We got one here today that we will take a closer look to see if the latest edition could be another hit for the Cooler Master. 

Close Look at Hyper 622 Halo

The Hyper 622 Halo is available in either black or white and our review unit is the black model. On the outside of the box, we have a diagram showcasing the cooler and its unique features such as dual tower heat sink and ARGB auto-detection.

We also find the cooler’s specification to help you make your purchasing decision in a retail store. With the dimension of 125 x137x 157 mm (4.9×5.3×6.1 inch), the Hyper 622 Halo is a fairly large cooler. So you would want to make sure that you have sufficient space inside the case, specially around the CPU area.  

Among the highlighted features for the Hyper 622 Halo are:

• ARGB Auto Detection
• Broad Base Fitment
• Aluminum Top cover
• Dual Redesigned Halo fan
• Dual Tower Heatsink with 6 heat pipes

 

 I really like how the Hyper 622 Halo is packaged. Upon opening the box, we are presented with the accessory and the manual on the top with a plastic cutout securing the cooler under it. Once we remove it, we can lift the entire cooler out of the box along with the plastic mold. The mold keeps the cooler in place so it stays secured during the shipping. Unfold the two sides of the mold and we are presented with the cooler. There is even a cardboard sandwiched between the two metal fins to prevent any scratches. It is good to see the attention to the detail in the packaging.

The only thing I would like to see here is maybe a little more environmentally friendly or recyclable material than the plastic would have been a nice improvement. 

Including with the Hyper 622 are all of the necessary components (brackets and screws) to mount the cooler on both Intel or AMD CPUs. The cooler cooler offers a wide compatibility that includes LGA1700, LGA1200, LGA1151, LGA1150, LGA1155, LGA1156, AM4, AND AM5 socket processors. Cooler Master even includes a fan splitter and a RGB splitter that have a decent cable length as well as a tube of CryoFuze thermal paste which uses nanoparticles that the company claims to “allow excellent thermal conductivity on all processing components for optimal heat transfer.”

The base of the Hyper 622 Halo is nickel-plated to help reduce oxidation and corrosion. Extending out of the base are six heat pipes in the U-shaped configurations directing the heat away from the CPU toward the dual tower cooling fins. Despite its size, the Hyper 622 is designed to accommodates motherboard with large heatsinks around the CPU socket and taller RAM. We see that Cooler Master shaves off about an inch on one of the bottom portion of the cooling fin to allow the cooler to accommodates memory modules up to 40mm. 

The Hyper 622 Halo can be paired with a single 120 mm fan or dual 120 mm fans and it comes with redesigned halo fans with rated speed of 650 to 2050 RPM +- 10%. It is rated to move maximum 51.88 CFM and 2.89 mm H2O max air pressure and 27 dBA maximum noise level with the help of the rifle bearing.  The fan is powered via 4 PWM pin connector that draws 3.36W of power.

As expected, the Hyper 622 Halo sports RGB light. It supports addressable gen 2 RGB with ARGB auto detection where LED is detected automatically with default ARGB spectrum lightning or user can choose to customize it via the 3 pin ARGB header connector. It is certified compatible with Asus Aura Sync, Gigabyte RGB Fusion, MSI Mystic Lightning Sync, and Asrock Polychrome Sync.   

Priced at $104.99, the Hyper 622 Halo is priced competitive among the dual tower style cooler. It is backed with two year warranty which is a tad shorter than what Cooler Master offers for its liquid cooler but its standard of what Cooler Master offered for its air coolers. Still, other company such as Noctua offers 6 year warranty for its cooler, so maybe Cooler Master could consider offer longer warranty for its air coolers.

Installation

The installation of the Hyper 622 Halo is a fairly simple process and the entire process can be done in about 10 to 20 minutes. This is due to the fact that I do have a fairly large ATX case and the motherboard tray has a cutout on the CPU area for easy access to the back of the motherboard. If your particular system lacks the CPU cutout, then you would have to remove the motherboard to install the backplate for Intel boards. Overall, the process is straight forward and fairly easy. First, you attach the four stand-offs to the backplate. Intel motherboard would use the included backplate while the AMD system uses the one that came with the board. I like the Intel backplate that Cooler Master uses where tabs are clicked in place for the desired socket. It is simple and yet secure.

I do have a small complaint here. Cooler Master did not clearly label the standoffs for AMD and Intel boards since all of the accessories are placed in a single bag so it is up to the user to differentiate between the two. Luckily the threads for the screw are slightly different so you won’t be able to make the mistake of using the wrong stand-off. Still I spend a few minutes before installation to make sure I am using the correct ones. I would much prefer that Cooler Master placed each socket screws separately with labels to avoid confusion.

Once the standoffs are installed, you just attach the two retention bars, and apply the include thermal paste (or use your preferred one). Finally, secure the cooler to the retention bars via the pre-attached screws. I like that the screws are built into the cooler. One less component to fiddle with. However, you do need to remove the middle fan in order to screw the cooler to the retention bar. 

The two fans included can be mounted in front, between, or behind the cooler. They are attached to the cooler via two wire clips which can be removed to change the direction of the airflow. 

We see the cutout hovering above the RAM module to accommodate taller RAM. However, if you place the fan on the front, it will still need to be positioned slightly higher if you are using taller modules. This may have slight impact on the cooling performance. 

Testing

• Motherboard: TUF GAMING Z690-PLUS WIFI D4
• CPU: Intel Core i5-13600K
• Memory: Neo Forza Faye DDR4-3600 2X32GB
• Graphics Card: ASUS GeForce RTX 3070
• Storage: Crucial P5 Plus 2TB
• Case: Cooler Master HAF 700
• Power Supply: ACooler Master XG Plus 850 Platinum PSU

	Cooler Master Masterliquid PL360 Flux	Noctua NH-D15	Cooler Master Hyper 622 Halo
	Fans at 1000RPM	Fans at 1000 RPM	Fans at 1000 RPM
Idle	31C	30C	30C
Load	61C	59C	58C
	Max fan speed (2300 RPM)	Max fan speed (1400 RPM)	Max fan speed (2050 RPM)
Idle	29C	29C	29C
Load	56C	58C	57C

The Core i5-12600K has base power of 125W and during stress testing, AIDA64 reports roughly 124W of power. At the stock clockspeed, we see that the Hyper 622 Halo is capable of keeping up with the biggest air coolers on the market, the Noctua NH-D15.

Running the fans at 1000 RPM, both air coolers performs roughly equal with the Hyper 622 Halo edges out the load temperature slightly. When we ran the fan speed at the maximum RPMs, the Hyper 622 is able to keep our processor running one degree cooler than the Noctua NH-D15.

In terms of noise level, at 1000 RPM, the Hyper 622 Halo noise is barely noticeable when sitting next to the system. The noise is easily drone out by ambient noise. However, running the fans at the maximum speed, we can clearly hear the fan noises. As expected since the fans on the Hyper 622 Halo is spinning at 50% more than the Noctua. So, we are trading the noise for the better cooling the Hyper 622 Halo. Luckily, the noise is not terribly loud and if you plan to overclock your processor, it is always better to have slightly better cooling.

Conclusion

Aesthetically, I like the way the Hyper 622 Halo looks. I like how Cooler Master pays attention to the detail rounding the cooling fins. And while I am not a huge RGB guy, there are users out there would appreciate the RGB on the fans with addressable Gen 2 headers. The unit is well constructed. Despite its size, the cutout for the RAM offers some help with the clearance issue. However, it could still pose problem for taller DIMMs which requires placing the fan slightly higher position. While we do not have issue with this in our system, we can see that users with tighter space could potentially run into issues.

The cooling performance for the cooler is impressive. While it is falls slightly behind the liquid coolers, it is nonetheless able to keep our processor cool and keeps up with the Noctua NH-D15. Noise-wise, it is slightly louder than the Noctua due to the fact that the fans are spinning at higher RPM under maximum speed. Despite this, it is no mean loud or annoying. And we would be more than happy to trade the cooling performance for a tad of extra noise.

The Cooler Master Hyper 622 Halo is certainly an excellent choice for those who are seeking a dual heat pipe cooler that not only is able to keep the CPU running cool at stock speed but should have not issue at managing the heat output of an overclocked processor. Retailed at $104.99, the Cooler Master’s Hyper 622 Halo delivers a good cooling performance and noise level at a relative affordable price.