by Sergey Lepilov
07/05/2009 | 11:46 PM
Against the background of the world leading brands in the PC cooling solutions market, Alpenfoehn Company could remain totally unnoticed if it hadn’t been for one very interesting cooler. Today we are going to introduce to you this particular processor cooler.
Its name is “Alpenfoehn Brocken”. As we learned from one of the company reps, “Alpenfoehn” is a specific wind in the Alps and “Brocken” is the highest peak of the Harz mountain range and also the highest peak of Northern Germany located near the rivers Weser and Elbe. This new processor cooler combines all the best technological achievements in the CPU cooling field and together with excellent German quality gives common users as well as overclockers a lot of hopes for remarkable efficiency and low noise levels. Let’s see if our hopes come true.
Alpenfoehn Brocken cooler ships in a medium sized box with dominating light colors. There is a cut-out window in one of the box corners revealing part of the cooler inside through clear plastic:
As a rule, the manufacturers use these windows to attract some attention and get potential customers a pick at the cooler inside. The side of the box contains the specifications of the device as well as the list of supported processor sockets:
The box is split into three sections. The top one contains a 120 mm fan in a separate box, then comes a divider made of polyurethane foam that covers the heatsink. Below the heatsink there is another divider with a cut-out hole for the cooler base. This way the heatsink is very well protected against any possible transportations mishaps. At the very bottom of the box you find all the bundled accessories:
Let me list all of them from left to right and from top to bottom:
That’s all you get with the cooler, but that’s actually all you need. At this point we only have to add that Alpenfoehn Brocken is made in China and is priced at $59.
We can’t say that the design of Alpenfoehn Brocken heatsink is in any way unique or innovative. However, the more we get to know this solution, the more we get convinced that the engineers simply took everything good from other coolers out there and combined it all in their new solution. Take a look at the heatsink:
It is a classical tower measuring 125.5x104x157 mm sitting on four copper nickel-plated heatpipes, each 8 mm in diameter. The heatpipes form part of the cooler base (Heatpipe Direct Contact technology. The heatpipes hold 51 aluminum plates covered with a layer of nickel alloy:
Each heatsink plate is about 0.5 mm thick and they are spaced out at 1.9-2.0 mm from one another. The calculated effective heatsink surface is 7,730 cm2.
The plates in the center of the heatsink are shaped as an open-top trapezoid and are pushed down by 5 mm:
We have already seen something like that in APACK ZEROtherm Nirvana NV120 Premium cooler and OCZ Gladiator Max cooler. This design of the center of the heatsink may serve to lower the airflow resistance and also increase a little bit the overall effective heatsink surface than in case the heatsink plates were straight. If we continue investigating airflow resistance matter, we will also see that for the purpose of lowering the airflow resistance even more the heatsink plate edges are of variable height (in other words, of wavy shape) in the zone of maximum airflow:
By the way, note that the heatsink plates are all grouped into packs of three with an additional shorter plate separating these packs. I didn’t notice any traces of soldering or thermal glue in the contact spots between the heatpipes and the heatsink plates. Looks like they may have simply pressed the plates against the heatpipes, i.e. used the so called molding method.
By looking at the top of the heatsink you can notice rectangular 15x3 mm slits cut out in the plates:
Another four clips are made around the heatpipes (only the top decorative plate doesn’t have them). As you know, these stamped holes increase the airflow turbulence and improve cooling efficiency.
The heatpipes are split in pairs inside the heatsink distributing the airflow more evenly over the plates:
The heatpipes are at 1.2 mm distance from one another in the base of the cooler. The gaps between them are filled with aluminum inserts. The base is more or less even and the finish quality is pretty typical for a cooler with Heatpipe Direct Contact technology.
Alpenfoehn Brocken is equipped with one nine-blade fan that measures 120x120x25 mm:
This fan is very beautiful: its semi-transparent blades and glossy frame make an unforgettable impression:
The rotor sticker reads “DF1202512CL-005”; however, no search engines could locate the original maker of this fan model.
The fan rotation speed is PWM controlled in the interval from 850 to 1500 RPM. It creates maximum airflow of 60.04 CFM and generated 21.4 dBA of noise (this must be the minimal noise level, according to the manufacturer). The fan uses a fluid dynamic bearing that should last 30,000 hours or over 3.4 years of non-stop operation guaranteed.
The fan is equipped with four purple LEDs and sits on the heatsink over four silicone shock-absorbing mounts:
The cooler accessories include another four mounts for the second fan.
Alpenfoehn Brocken is compatible with all contemporary platforms. The cooler is installed in a very simple and intuitive way. You use the included universal backplate and steel push-in bushes to install the cooler onto LGA775 and Socket 754/939/940/AM2(+)/AM3. In case of an LGA1366 mainboard, you use the provided screw-nuts molded into the plastic bushes and plastic brackets:
After that the installation procedure is the same for all platforms. All you need to do is press the cooler against the bushes with a steel plate and tighten the thumb screws with the screwdrivers slits:
The cooler is pressed against the processor very tightly and you really have to apply some effort in the end. Due to special splines in the plate and four-point retention the cooler doesn’t rotate or shift around the processor heat-spreader. The distance from the mainboard PCB to the lowest heatsink plate is 50 mm that is why Alpenfoehn Brocken won’t interfere with any electronic components or tall heatsinks on the PCB.
The fan is attached to the heatsink with two wire clips that can be turned either way: with the curve facing towards to or away from the heatsink:
There is no mention in the manual of any preferable positioning of the cooler on the CPU. Therefore, we decided to check the cooler performance on an overclocked processor in two different positions. At first we installed the cooler so that the airflow from its fan was directed towards the back of the case (East-West):
The second test was performed with the cooler turned by 90° and the airflow from its fan directed towards the top of the case (South-North):
During our test session we discovered that the CPU temperature was 2 °C lower in the second case than in the first one. We have already observed this temperature difference between different Intel Core i7 cooling methods before, and today we have once again proven that it is indeed the case.
In conclusion, we would like to show you the fan LED lighting in the dark:
I think it looks very beautiful and not too bright, so it will not start to annoy you after a while.
All tests were performed inside a closed system case. Our testbed was identical for all coolers throughout the test session and featured the following configuration:
During this test session we managed to overclock our 45nm quad-core processor with the multiplier set at 21 and “Load-Line Calibration” enabled to 3.99 GHz (+49.6%) using the weakest cooling system of the today’s testing participants. The nominal processor Vcore was increased to 1.36875 V in the mainboard BIOS.
The memory voltage was at 1.64V and its frequency was around 1520MHz (7-7-7-14_1T timings). All other parameters available in the mainboard BIOS and connected with CPU or memory overclocking remained unchanged (set to Auto).
All tests were performed under Windows Vista Ultimate Edition x86 SP1. We used the following software during our test session:
So, the complete screenshot during the test session looks as follows:
The stabilization period for the CPU temperature between the two test cycles was about 10 minutes. We took the maximum temperature of the hottest processor core of the four for the results charts. The ambient temperature was checked next to the system case with an electronic thermometer with 0.1 °C precision that allows monitoring the temperature changes over the past 6 hours. During our test session room temperature stayed at 23.5-24 °C.
The noise level of each cooler was measured after 1:00 AM in a closed room about 20 m2 big using CENTER-321 electronic noise meter. The measurements were taken at 1 m and 3 m distance from the closed system case. During the acoustics tests all five 120 mm case fans were slowed down to ~520 RPM. In this mode the background noise from the system case measured at 1 m distance didn’t exceed ~33.3 dBA. When the system was completely powered off, our noise meter detected 28.8 dBA (the lowest on the charts is 30 dBA). The subjectively comfortable noise level is around 34.5~35 dBA.
Keeping in mind the design of the Alpenfoehn Brocken cooler, we picked a tower-cooler of similar structure and highest cooling efficiency – ThermoLab BARAM ($50). We tested this cooler with one and two 120 mm Scythe Slip Stream 120 fans ($9.70) at ~830 and ~1880 RPM rotation speeds. We also tested our today’s hero, Alpenfoehn Brocken cooler, with the same fans (marked as “SS” on the diagrams):
Our ultimate performance reference, Thermalrigth IFX-14 ($79.90), which is the today’s best CPU air-cooler, was also included into this test session with one and two identical fans installed:
Well, let’s check out the results now!
First of all, let’s see how Alpenfoehn Brocken compares against its today’s competitors:
As you can see from the results, the cooling efficiency of Alpenfoehn Brocken is about the same as that of ThermoLab BARAM. In quiet mode with only one Scythe Slip Stream fan, Brocken loses only 1 °C to BARAM, while with two fans it get 1 °C ahead. At maximum fan rotation speed, BARAM appears a little more efficient with one and two fans. Thermalright IFX-14 is invincible again and leaves no chances to anyone in both: quiet mode and at maximum fan(s) rotation speed.
I think it is also pretty interesting to compare the maximum CPU overclocking results for Alpenfoehn Brocken and THermoLab BARAM coolers tested with two powerful fans:
 Alpenfoehn Brocken (~1880RPMx2) |
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As you can see, the heatsinks of both coolers are equally efficient. Knowing how advanced and highly efficient ThermoLab BARAM heatsink is in terms of design and cooling characteristics, it is very pleasing to see that Alpenfoehn Brocken didn’t give in. Thermalright IFX-14 is again way ahead here.
As you can see, the default fan of the Alpenfoehn Brocken cooler works perfectly fine here: it is extremely quiet in idle mode and generates moderately acceptable noise during Linpack tests. As for its complete performance details, the following chart will tell you more:
We have already discussed our fans testing methodology and equipment in the recent ultimate 120/140 mm fan roundup, so please see this article for details. As for the 120 mm Alpenfoehn Brocken fan and the results obtained on it, we can say that it demonstrated pretty average airflow and noise readings. At low rotation speed (up to 690 RPM) you can hear slight crackling sounds that later dissolves in the rumble of the fan blades. Nevertheless, this fan can be considered subjectively quiet up until 870 RPM, moderately quiet – until 1110 RPM. After that as its rotation speed increases, you may find it acoustically uncomfortable to be close to this fan. Although, I have to admit that it is still tolerable especially compared with Scythe Slip Stream at 1880 RPM.
Summing up the results of our today’s test session we have to repeat the same phrase we’ve been using a lot lately: we have another super cooler available to us! Yes, Alpenfoehn Brocken is a very efficient air cooler that doesn’t yield to the best tower-cooler in its class – ThermoLab BARAM. Moreover, unlike the latter, Alpenfoehn Brocken is bundled with a 120 mm fan with silicone shock-absorbing mounts and LED lighting that are not included with BARAM. Luckily, these additional goodies didn’t affect the price of the German cooling solution too much (it is priced at $59). I should also give Alpenfoehn engineers due credit for providing their solution with a very convenient retention mechanism featuring extremely secure hold and for taking care of those users who might want to add another fan to their CPU cooler later on.
Are there any drawbacks? Well, they could have chosen a quieter fan for real “quiet maniacs”, but they are too hard to please anyway, you know it. It is a real pity that Alpenfoehn solutions are not that widely spread yet. That is why we would like to express sincere hopes that this company will consider expanding their distribution channels, so that we could get fresh excitement and additional competition in this segment, which could push the prices down and inspire the development and launch of new even more efficient cooling solutions.
