CoolIT Systems USB Beverage Chiller Review

Taking A Look Inside

We took apart the CoolIT USB Beverage Chiller to see what makes it tick and found exactly what we expected when we removed the six screws on the base plate that holds everything together. Inside was a cooling fan, heat sink, TEC cooler and the cold plate for the drink.

After removing the parts from the plastic housing the thermoelectric cooler (TEC cooler) could be easily located. The cold side of the plate is is direct contact with the beverage surface and the hot side is attached to a very large heat sink that removes the heat generated from the current flow. If you’d like to understand how a TEC cooler works please go back and read this article where it was covered at the bottom of page one.

To keep things cool inside the chiller, CoolIT uses a fan that is made by Young Lin Tech Company, which is a company we have never heard of. The fan is brushless and has a model number of DFS301005M. Other than the 1W rating on the label we know nothing else about the fan. We tried to check the Young Lin website, but it seems their website is down and the model number of the fan used doesn’t even come up in Google!

The reason we are mentioning the fan is due to the reason pictured above. The USB Beverage Chiller is louder than any of the laptops that we have on the test bench and when we run the cooler it can be heard across the room. Just for fun we used the RadioShack sound level meter and found that the chiller puts out roughly 63dB with our meter. While the chiller is considered noisy, it makes sense as it’s a fan in a plastic box (think car sub boxes here). The product was designed to keep cold beverages cold and it does that at the cost of a little noise.

Final Thoughts

The CoolIt USB Beverage Chiller does exactly what it’s advertised to do and nothing more. The chiller is also great for turning heads. Everyone that saw the chiller sitting on our desk had to take a second look and thought it was cool (no pun intended). When it comes to pricing the CoolIt USB Beverage Chiller can be found for roughly $29.99 online, which makes this a USB gadget that is affordable for most.

If you are looking for something to turn heads at the office and actually be a functional device then CoolIt USB Beverage Chiller will without a doubt not let you down. Just remember that it’s a bit noisy and won’t make a warm drink cold! If those aren’t an issue then give it a try!