CPU cooler help

[figgly]

I'm going to get a Q9450 and probably a gigabyte X38 board. To go into a P180 case.

I'm interested most in quiet and ease of installation.

Would one of these work?

Scythe Ninja Mini ($20 after rebate)
Tuniq Tower 120 ($50)
Thermalright Ultima 90 ($46)

 

[Syzygies]

The best air coolers are all within a degree of the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme (TRUE), which is the champ in most recent comparisons. It fits your case. "Tower" constrruction, 6 heat pipes versus 4, and the extra height, make a difference.

The Ultima 90 comes surprisingly close, reportedly. But you're going quad core, some would say any air cooler is a compromise, give air a chance by getting the best, period. There's the stereo headphone effect: spend $25 then $50 then $100 then $200 only to wish you'd bought the $400 headphones in the first place. When I look inside my first build, it's filled with mistakes like that.

The Tuniq Tower used to be the reference air cooler in AnandTech reviews. It's said to be pretty close to the TRUE. The full Ninja fits in your case, and it doesn't test as well as it looks. It looks awesome, especially in copper. If you were underclocking, you could go fanless and let the two corner case fans in the P180 take care of the Ninja. But it can't compete with the TRUE, and the Ninja mini is smaller.

In any event, don't get sucked into the "ease of use" of the Intel stock cooler push-pin mounting system. I don't want to ever have anything to do with it, because it's so cheeseball. I helped my wife's daughter build a $500 gaming box for her 12th birthday, she wouldn't let me teach her how to overclock the E2200, so we used the stock cooler, and you could see the ASUS board flex. This flexing can compromise chipset cooling, yada yada if you need to justify a distaste for these pushpins. A backplate rigidifies the cooler, preventing this.

If you cringe at the idea of having to take the motherboard out every time you want to fiddle with the cooler, there are three answers:

1. You'll never touch it again, don't worry.

2. Do the "mobo tray" case mod, and cut a hole for rear access to this region of the mobo.

3. No, practice makes this stuff routine. I once dreaded Linux installs until I had to do one over and over, debugging what was really a memory issue. Now I can install and customize Ubuntu server in a coma. Same with builds. I have the guts of my favorite machine in my carry on, to bring to CA tomorrow to build into an identical case, power supply, burner there, because this was far easier than packing and shipping the machine whole. This way, it's apart for lapping the cooler and cpu, seize the moment. Hey, when you're camping you make and break camp every day.

 

[figgly]

Thanks for the detailed reply. I was turned off to the TRUE because of this review:

http://www.anandtech.com/casec...ng/showdoc.aspx?i=2943

"The adapter frankly won't fit through the heatpipes in the new design. We actually had to bend the Socket 775 adapter to mount the Ultra 120 Extreme on a Core 2 Duo." And also because it said the cooler isn't secure when mounted.

PS, are the stock Antec P180 fans worth keeping ?

 

[figgly]

PS, I have the same power supply and same hard drive as you waiting to go in to my case so maybe I will just get the Scythe fans too. ;-)

Do you think the quieter S-Flex Ds for the case will do it? Maybe E for the CPU cooler ?

 

[nitromullet]

Originally posted by: figgly
Thanks for the detailed reply. I was turned off to the TRUE because of this review:

http://www.anandtech.com/casec...ng/showdoc.aspx?i=2943

"The adapter frankly won't fit through the heatpipes in the new design. We actually had to bend the Socket 775 adapter to mount the Ultra 120 Extreme on a Core 2 Duo." And also because it said the cooler isn't secure when mounted.

PS, are the stock Antec P180 fans worth keeping ?

I'm using a TRUE, and I didn't have that issue at all. It comes with a different adapter now, I guess... Mine is a two piece X shape that you can squeeze together to get it in between the pipes and then expand once it's in, not like the solid one in these pics:

http://www.anandtech.com/casec...ng/showdoc.aspx?i=2943

Thermalright makes quality stuff, and I imagine that they took feedback from Anandtech to to heart. I've used a bunch of Thermalright sinks with Athlons, Athlon XPs, P4s, and now I'm back with my C2Q after a stint with Zalman.

The nice thing about the TRUE (and a few others) is that is uses a standard 120mm fan, so you can go as quiet as you want to go and still get decent cooling. Of course, the higher the rpms the better it will cool.

I'm not sure what kind of fans are on the P180, but I actually replaced all my fans in my Lian Li case with Antec Tri-Cool fans. They're quality fans, fairly quiet, and I like the fact that they have three different speed settings. They come with or without LEDs too, which is nice because I'm not really into case bling, but I know some people are.

edit: I wish there were more 120mm fan options with Intel PWM support (the 4-pin that adjusts rpms according to cpu temp).

 

[toadeater]

OCZ Vendetta 2.

 

[Syzygies]

Originally posted by: toadeater
OCZ Vendetta 2.

A decent cooler. Here's one chart from a source I trust:

ZEROtherm Nirvana: Designed for Top Performance

The TRUE reaches the highest stable air overclock of 3940 on an X6800, while the Vendetta reaches 3870. Pretty close.

Edit: Wrong version of the Vendetta.

Here's the review in question, debated around the web:

OCZ Vendetta 2

Quad core G0 Q6600 at realistic overclocking speeds for air, so if one believes the review it's quite relevant.

Before critiquing this review, go look at any random review at

Martin's Liquid Lab

There's no polite way to put it, these guys on water are in a different reading group. When there's a dead heat, you see curves that cross. Understand what the curves mean, and you know which way to shade the results for your purposes.

Every review comparing air coolers is one or two sample points, usually on a dual core. Quad cores put out more heat. As you overclock any chip, the heat scales like F * V * V where F is frequency, V is voltage. So these sample points are often pretty far off from my needs. I'm itching to go to water myself, and I'll have to for future projects, but yet I'm pretty happy on air with a push/pull TRUE for my sig rig.

Looking at my own data, I can't make head or tail of the curves I see of core temps using the TRUE, trying to use any formula I've heard of. It's as if the heat pipe technology needs to be kick-started, does well, then gets overwhelmed. True also for water, that's why single 120 rads can get trounced by air in some tests, but water shows more predictable curves.

So it's hard to argue for one's favorite air cooler using any single dead-heat chart.

I like the TRUE because I can mod it (cable ties) to use two fans push/pull. I bought the Scythe S-FLEX SFF21F thinking I could slow them to E speeds, and I can but I don't. Great fans but expensive; going to a cheaper alternative on two fans will dominate the price difference between the TRUE and alternatives.

The Vendetta, and some of the other lead runners alongside the TRUE in charts, can't take two fans. They're tying one hand behind the TRUE's back to make the race fair. At home, your race doesn't have to be fair. In the Vendetta 2 review I cite, some other lead runners can take two fans, but not the Vendetta 2.

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: Syzygies
The full Ninja fits in your case, and it doesn't test as well as it looks. It looks awesome, especially in copper. But it can't compete with the TRUE, and the Ninja mini is smaller.

I'm not sure who told you that about the fullsized Ninja, but they obviously didn't know what they were talking about, especially if someone is capable of mounting a higher-flow fan.

 

[jg0001]

FYI: Antec makes the P180 and therefore, the fans inside it are Antec fans, with the tri-cool 3 speed switches. (I have 2 P180s and 1 P182).

 

[Drsignguy]

Tuniq has my vote!

 

[GullyFoyle]

Recent Cooler Comparo

If I were in the market right now, I'd be looking seriously at the Kingwin RVT-12025, an Xigmatek HDT-S1283 clone being sold for $32 + shipping at Newegg.

 

[Syzygies]

Originally posted by: myocardia
I'm not sure who told you that about the fullsized Ninja, but they obviously didn't know what they were talking about, especially if someone is capable of mounting a higher-flow fan.

Thanks for the link. Other reviews didn't make the Ninja look as good. (No one should believe what anyone "tells" them unless they can confirm it by experiment and via sources they find authoritative. This situation is particularly pathetic in blind-leading-the-blind Linux forums, people need to bite the bullet and buy Linux Administration Handbook, one of the best technical books ever written.)

I have a gag reaction to being in the same room with Intel's 775 push pin mounting system. On a cooler this heavy, it's insane. There are aftermarket backplate kits, and Ninja versions that now come with a backplate mounting system. Whatever cooler anyone gets, understand this issue. Accept the push pins, or make sure you're not getting them.

The Ninja suffers particularly from reviews that insist on testing coolers as configured by the manufacturer. Some people have used four fans on a Ninja. I'd love to see if that beats a push-pull TRUE, and I'd switch in a heartbeat if I thought I could do a few C better.

Alas, a memory-side fan overhangs the closest memory stick on most boards, ruling out e.g. OCZ Reaper sticks in all four slots.

Here's a quote I've been mulling from the Thermochill radiator FAQ:

For best temps on the HE series, pull-pull. IE: On each Thermochill shroud stack a PAIR of fans pulling thru the rad, one fan attached to the other fan attached to the shroud attached to the rad. This has always produced better temps than push, push-pull, push-push, and pull on the HE range cores. Generally this would result in:

* Grill/Guard > Fan > Fan > Rad > Case > Grill/Guard

It would seem to me that the air cooler implications of this observation have been unexplored. On an Antec P180/P182, with many mobos and if one can find room to get the power cable out of the way, one could couple a pull fan directly to the rear case exhaust fan, for the same effect, perhaps shrouding the sides of the TRUE to channel the air better. Similarly, I would be able to use three fans with a Ninja and 8 GB of Reaper memory.

I'm about to lap my TRUE and Q6600, and mod my case for better airflow. The elephant in the room here is how each of the proposed solutions in this thread, if optimized to extremes that are still less effort than installing water, can trounce mediocre water cooling kits that sell for $$$. This is a DIY crowd; why can't reviews focus on the extremes that are possible with air?

 

[figgly]

Wonder why the OCZ Vendetta 2 is a "deactivated product" at Newegg

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16835202007

 

[toadeater]

Originally posted by: figgly
Wonder why the OCZ Vendetta 2 is a "deactivated product" at Newegg

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16835202007

Maybe OCZ decided to get out of the heatsink business? I can't find it in stock anywhere else in the US. Here's another review of it with a Q6600 @ 3.6GHz, I don't know if he bought it or got a review copy:

http://www.diy-street.com/foru...e5&p=791640#post791640

If the OCZ Vendetta 2 isn't going to be available soon, there are other "HDT" heatsinks that are just as good. They weigh less, they perform just as well, and they cost half the price of something like the TRUE or Zalman 9700. I don't see why you'd want to pay ~$70 (with a good fan) for a giant, heavy heatsink like the TRUE anymore.

Look at Frostytech's list. All the top heatsinks are within a few degrees of each other. So what's the real difference? Cost, ease of use, reliability, how loud they are, etc.

http://www.frostytech.com/arti...?articleid=2272&page=5

If you don't trust Frostytech, then Google reviews of the Xigmatek S1283, which the Vendetta 2 evolved from, because dozens of sites have reviewed it and the results, overall, are the same as Frostytech's.

Syzygies, I read what you wrote up there. Two fans do help the TRUE, but it's not a huge improvement, except possibly at extreme temps. Extreme temps is what separates some of these heatsinks, especially the 92mm ones from the 120mm ones. There is a point where lesser heatsinks are overwhelmed with heat and you get a critical failure of the heatpipes where they stop working entirely and your temps will skyrocket within seconds.

That's why at idle temps you see 92mm and 120mm heatsinks doing equally well, and also why you see them doing equally well on dual cores @ average overclocks. But when you're dealing with quad-cores and extreme overclocks, the difference becomes apparent. I'm not sure how much push-pull fans on the TRUE will help overall, because in the end you're still limited by the thermal resistance of the heat spreader. It doesn't matter how much airflow you have if the heat is still being conducted at the same rate. You need more efficient heatpipes of some kind, which is pretty much what watercooling does.

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: Syzygies
I have a gag reaction to being in the same room with Intel's 775 push pin mounting system. On a cooler this heavy, it's insane. There are aftermarket backplate kits, and Ninja versions that now come with a backplate mounting system. Whatever cooler anyone gets, understand this issue. Accept the push pins, or make sure you're not getting them.

Well, Syzygies, since you already have a TRUE, you've got the best air cooler available. I wasn't trying to imply that the Ninja is better than a TRUE, only that it's fairly close, if you don't use the low-flow fan that it comes with. As you can see from the linked comparison, it's actually roughly equivalent to a Tuniq or a non-extreme Thermalright Ultra 120, which is good, just isn't quite as good as a TRUE.

What kind of temps are you getting with your TRUE? Here's what I get with my Ninja B, which, BTW, uses the push pins. That's with a high-flow fan, not the stock fan.

 

[Syzygies]

Originally posted by: myocardia
What kind of temps are you getting with your TRUE?

Lately (not yet lapped, but opening up the case for better ventilation) my results are virtually identical with yours. It's an important point that the "lead runners" in air cooling are very close. Luck-of-the-draw differences in chips are more significant. A different VID, and Freq * V * V kicks in for how much work the cooler has to do.

The Benchmark Reviews study where the TRUE fared so poorly had a wretched base to the TRUE. It looked like the rake marks in a Japanese sand garden; mine looks nothing like that. Thermalright kept telling them they had enough reviews and wouldn't send them a sample, if read correctly they had to buy one. The cynical gheezer in me found me wondering if this was reverse rotten-cherry picking.

I'd love to see the "ultimate air" competition where lapping, push/pull is the norm.

In addition to lapping, I'm modding my P182 with a three bay Scythe Kama Bay, two fans and a tube, to feed ambient air as directly as possible to the true. Opening my case made a far bigger difference than differences between the best air coolers.

Our consumer society has us picking brands to achieve results, but the DIY perspective here is that everything matters, brand is only part of the equation.

 

[Tweakin]

Originally posted by: myocardia

What kind of temps are you getting with your TRUE? Here's what I get with my Ninja B, which, BTW, uses the push pins. That's with a high-flow fan, not the stock fan.

I love my Ninja. I used to use TR products, but I tried this as it was on sale for half the price of a TRUE...and here is what I get. Excuse the short timeframe but I wanted to post this quickly for the OP.

edit: My current room temp is ~74 or so, and my case is burried between a wall and my desk...poor air flow. The fan is a 600rpm scythe...not much for air but nice on the ears.

 

[Tempered81]

theres a new cooler around giving the TRU/TRUE a run for its money... It's called a xigmatek S1283 or something....