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Test Method
All our coolers follow the same rigorous testing conditions. We strapped on a single 120mmx38mm fan in the shape of the San Ace 9G1212H1011, widely considered one of the best fans on the market due to its under-volting ability (lower RPM) and high static pressure – perfect for heatsinks. This fan can produce up to 99CFM at full speed. If a heatsink is supplied with a fan, we shall be testing that stock fan(s) on full RPM.
We now use LinX Build 0.6.1 for our entire load testing of heatsinks as this stresses the CPU more so than other load tests and really puts strain on the heatsinks. Idle testing was taken after a LinX run had finished. We allowed a ‘cooling off period’ of 10 minutes for the idle test. Both minimum and maximum temperatures were taken from Real Temp Build 3.58; an average of the cores was taken. Any energy saving features were disabled in the BIOS. OCZ Freeze was the TIM of choice.
All tests were run a minimum of 3 times (each run was followed by a remounting of the heatsink) and only the best results are represented.
Our test system can hit 4.41GHz stable with 1.45v. However, due to the high voltage, not all heatsinks can cope, so we decided on a ‘safe’ voltage level of 1.35v, and a lower stable clock speed of 4.20GHz for our testing.
Test System
- Intel Core i7 930 @ 4.20GHz w/ 1.35v
- Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7
- 6GB Crucial Ballistix Tracer @ 1600Mhz 7-7-7-18
- 80GB Intel X25-M Gen2
- HIS ATI Radeon HD 5850
- 800W Fractal Design Newton R2
