Five years ago, in the far away 2006, the Japanese Scythe Co., Ltd. released Mine (SCMN-1000) cooler, which was a comparatively compact and quiet product with average cooling efficiency. Mine’s distinguishing feature was then unique design with the fan installed between two heatsink arrays. At that time only Tuniq Tower 120 and Thermaltake Sonic Tower coolers featured the same design, but they were much more effective than Scythe Mine due to their larger size. Later on Noctua and Thermalright also implemented this design concept in their NH-D14 and Silver Arrow products, which won the leadership crown following one another. We all remember that in some modes they were outperformed by Thermalright Archon cooler, but the actual idea of having a fan installed between two heatsink towers proved superbly effective.

Scythe has also recently introduced their new implementation of this design concept – the new Mine 2 (SCMN-2000). Today we are going to take a closer look at this product and try to find out how efficient it is and if it is capable to compete against its forefather proudly bearing the “super-cooler” title as well as against the today’s best CPU cooler.

Packaging and Accessories

Large box with the cooler photo on the front and top is made of thick cardboard and has a tab with a hole in it:

As usual, Scythe’s packaging is loaded with information. Here you can find everything imaginable, including even the barely ever read comments regarding the limited warranty:

At the same time, the bundled accessories strike as exceptionally modest and include a Backplate, two sets of retention brackets, Scythe thermal compound, a set of screws, washers and nuts, and a manual:

The new cooler is made in Taiwan and should already be selling at a recommended price of $59.99. It comes with a 2-year warranty.