X-bit labs

Old New Coolers from Zalman, Tuniq, Noctua and Thermaltake for the Overclocked Yorkfield Processor (page 8)

Category: Coolers

by Sergey Lepilov

[ 04/29/2008 | 06:44 PM ]

Design and Functionality

The heatsink of this cooling solution remained unchanged:

The cooler sits on four copper heatpipes, although this time they are covered with a thin layer of nickel alloy. The heatpipes hold an array of aluminum plates set about 3mm apart. The side edges of these plates are bent downwards in the center partially blocking the airflow through the sides of the heatsink:

As you may remember from our previous review, the heatpipes are not linear. They sit in special grooves in the base of the cooler:

Although the base is not polished, it is impeccably even and its finish quality is way better than that of the previous two testing participants:

The second distinguishing feature of the modified cooler is a new more efficient Noctua NF-P12 fan, which we have already discussed in our previous articles, that is why we will not dwell on it here again.

The fan is attached to the heatsink with two wire clips that are much more convenient to use than the retentions of a Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme for instance:

There are four clips bundled with the cooler, which will allow you to install two fans onto the heatsink (the cooler comes only with one fan, though). Moreover, before installing the fan you should stick vibration absorbing silicone stripes to it that should also reduce the level of generated noise.