Scythe Kaze Master Fan Controller

 

Testing of the Scythe Kaze Master was conducted within my watercooled test rig AquAus and the hardware contained within has been listed below:

 

 

I began the testing phase of the Scythe Kaze Master by comparing its VFD panel to that of the Scythe Kama Meter. I found the VFD panel a lot easier to read from a distance than the Kama Meter. The Scythe Kama Meter comes with 7 different colours that can be chosen for the background, and few of the colours available tend to make reading the screen a little difficult. The most problematic of the colours seems to be: aqua, dark blue and the green. The green and blue tend to give the screen a slightly ‘washed out’ appearance particularly. The Scythe Kaze Master’s VFD panel on the other hand is very easy to read from eiher side-on or at a distance. Both the green and blue display characters are easily discernible and bright.

 

Fan control on the Scythe Kaze Master is equal to that of the Scythe Kama Meter. The knobs actually feel more responsive than the Kama Meter’s too. When adjusting fan speed on the Kama Meter there seems to be a little lag between when you turn the knob and when you actually see a reduction/increase in the fan speed reported. By comparison, I found that the Scythe Kaze Master didn’t exhibit the same lag seen on the Kama Meter.

 

The Scythe Kaze Master is able to run fans at their rated RPM or completely bring them to a stop. I am happy to report that this feature of slowing a fan to a standstill certainly works, but it isn’t recommended for any extended period of time. Furthermore, I tested the fan malfunction feature and am happy to report that the highly audible alarm does sound and the display panel shows a ‘0’ for that channel.

 

Temperature reporting was acceptably accurate when checked against a common mercury thermometer allowed to acclimatise. I ran a series of tests from various points around my TJ-07’s chassis and I am happy to report that the greatest amount of deviation seen by the Scythe Kaze Master and its thermal probe was a mere 0.5 degree Celcius. I wasn’t able to get the high temperature alarm to sound during my thermal testing, which leads me to suggest that it is set too high to be of any real use. According to the Scythe Kaze Master’s documentation the high temperature alarm will kick in at 75 degrees C/165 degrees Fahrenheit. Personally, I’d like to know something is getting hot well before that. Perhaps Scythe could look at incorporating an alarm that the user can customise the trigger temperature themselves. Interestingly, this was an issue that I reported during my review of the Scythe Kama Meter where the trigger temperature was a whopping 90 degrees Celcius. At least Scythe has reduced the trigger point significantly since then.

 

Let’s head over the page to see how the Scythe Kaze Master scored in the conclusion page…