Introduction

AKASA cooling in many people’s eyes has been a brand associated with decent low cost cooling for a while now. They may not shout about being the best, as they are not and they know it. What AKASA is good at is bringing cheap, bang for buck cooling to the market with their heatsinks and fans. Today though, we see AKASA step up a gear with their newest heatsink; the Nero S which they say is their ‘Premier Cooler’.

Specifications

Size (HxWxD): 120 x 87 x 160 mm

Weight: 726g without fan

Material: Aluminium fins, copper heatpipes

Fan Size: One 120 x 120 x 25mm

Socket: Intel LGA775, LGA1156, LGA1366 | AMD 939, AM2, AM2+, AM3

Introduction

The Baram by little known Thermolab first graced the scene last year and scooped up a flurry of awards. In fact this reviewer saw a comparative review with the Baram leading the pack ahead of the usual top performance heatsinks including the TRUE, IFX-14, and Vendetta 2. Nothing much really became of the cooler though and was rather over-shadowed by the more well known brands and availability of their stock. Thermolab have been busy though. Today we are taking a look at the Baram 2010 – an update over its older brother!

Specifications

Size (HxWxD): 160 x 132 x 67 mm

Weight: 710g without fan

Material: Pure Copper and Pure Aluminium

Fan Size: Two 120 x 120 x 25mm

Socket: Intel LGA775, LGA1156, LGA1366 | AMD AM2, AM2+, AM3

Introduction

Dual tower heatsinks usually provide the end user with two things; performance cooling, but also lack of space. Manufacturers are continually trying to not only better their rivals, but trying to develop new ways to have the ultimate cooling solution.  This quest is to be the best of the best, or to have great performance for the pound. From our stand point, air cooling can only go so far, yet continual tweaking is still being carried out to get that ‘just right’ product. Today we are looking at a heatsink that follows this trend; Coolink’s Corator DS.

Specifications

Size (HxWxD): 155 x 140 x 121 mm

Weight: 800g without fan / 1040g with fan

Material: Copper (base and heatpipes, Aluminium (base and cooling fins)

Fan Size: One 120 x 120 x 25mm

Socket: Intel LGA775, LGA1156, LGA1366 | AMD AM2, AM2+, AM3

Introduction

Over the course of the past six months, there has been one brand of cooler causing a real stir among many cooling ranks. This reviewer even had Thermalright banging on ones door demanding answers as to why the Titan Fenrir is so good in the reviews they have seen. Today, we shall be taking a look at a cooler that many consider the best bang for buck on the market.  If you’re reading this and you’re a big overclocker, you know all too well the importance of choosing  the ‘right’ cooler for the job, but at the same time not costing so much that you’d might as well jump on the water-cooling bandwagon.

Titan was launched in 1992 with a focus on low cost cooling solutions for the masses.  Generally speaking, Titan hasn’t had the best track record until they struck a bit of fortune with the Fenrir.  Previously, many Titan coolers have had less than stellar performance, let alone great build quality.  Titan looks to put their uneven past behind them with an up to date Fenrir – the V2, meaning the cooler now supports LGA 1156 out of the box. Something which Titan now hopes will gain them an even bigger majority share of the Intel and AMD cooler market.

Specifications

• For AMD Socket AM2+/AM2/AM3/940/939/754/K8
• For Intel Socket 775/1156/1366
• PWM intelligent controller: automatically adjust fan to provide wonderful balance between performance and rumble generated from CPU
• 12mm Fan – 800 to 2200RPM
• Heat Pipe Direct Touch: provide the maximum heat conductivity and draw heat away immediately
• Unique fin design: reduce air resistance to enhance cooling performance

We all remember the good old days; arguing who has the best cooler – you either were a TRUE or IFX-14 lover!  This reviewer however was a TRUE fan; simply down to how easy the heatsink was to fit on the board, as compared to the huge IFX-14. However; both did have with their own issues. The IFX-14’s downfall was largely due to a poor base. Today we see an eagerly awaited upgrade of the IFX-14 in the form of the ‘Arrow’, but not from Thermalright – instead, a sister company called Cogage.

About Cogage

Thermalright Inc. saw an issue with their high-end cooler – cost!  To remedy this, they created a daughter company called Cogage. Aimed at the more mainstream market, it was founded in order to make higher-end product more readily available due to its lower prices.

Specifications

The specifications from Cogage’s website:

We recall from last year a question that many pondered – just how far can air cooling go? Air cooling can only go so far and it won’t be long until we hit the limit. We’ve already seen some companies take to water cooling solutions with all-in-one kits – some more successful than others. It won’t be long until some of the bigger names start to find new ways to adapt air cooling for the masses and take it to a new level. There are already rumours of vapour chambers and TEC’s in the future. However, one such company that we are reviewing today has taken a step ahead of the big rivals and taken air cooling to a whole new level – liquid metal.

About

Many people will be unfamiliar with Danamics and wouldn’t have known they produce CPU coolers. Founded on the principle of providing manufacturers of electronic hot spots the very best in cooling, Danamics started in 2005. Since then, Danamics has worked on developing, manufacturing and commercializing their core technology, which centres around the principle of using liquid metal as a heat remover. Danamics were keen to improve on their earlier cooler; the LM10. Much hyped and talked about, it proved to be only average and couldn’t keep up with the very best standard air coolers, let alone justify such a high price tag! They redesigned the whole cooler from the ground up but have kept the same Sodium Potassium Alloy used for cooling.

Liquid Metal you say?

Sodium Potassium Alloy (aka NaK) is a top substance for heat transfer. However, reading through the nice detailed warning booklet, it is highly reactive to air and water. Something that puts many people off due to the fact that if the substance were to leak, well, watch out for an explosion! This NaK is pumped around the cooler’s nickel plated heatpipes via the electromagnetic pump which is silent and features no moving parts. This pump is a REV.2 (PowerBooster 2) over the previous LMX Pump, which Danamics has told me is smaller, cheaper and more effective. Note – this does get very hot so be careful! Moving parts are totally eliminated as the magnetic force is created within the particles of the liquid metal causing it to flow.

See the image below for the step-by-step of how this electromagnetic flow works:

Step-by-step

Corsair has been known for a long time for their great RAM. When they entered the power supply market, they established themselves as a force to be reckoned with. Recently they entered the case market with their Obsidian 800D to equal accolades.

Today we’ll be looking at the Hydro Series H50, their attempt at breaking into the CPU cooling market. Thanks to Corsair for supplying this unit for review.

Continue reading the article here.

When you think of CPU cooling on air, many will say it’s not all that great. This is why we have forms of cooling better than air/passive, like water cooling, TEC, Phase, DICE, LN2 and so forth. However, choosing one of the latter can be rather expensive. So what you need is the best value for money that air cooling can give you.

Of course you can buy the ‘all in one’ water-cooling solutions from the likes of CoolIT & Corsair for a decent price of approx £50-60. The problem is that although they are good and effective, a top of the line CPU air cooler like some were reviewing today may beat them and defeats the object of going water-cooling. If you want to water cool your CPU, you’re better off doing it right and having a custom built setup instead. You can’t go cheap on water-cooling. A custom low cost water cooling loop is featured in the review.

The Heatsinks

Meet today’s contenders. The Mega Shadow from Prolimatech is considered by many on the enthusiast scene to be the best air cooler on the market. Coming in at approx £60, it’s quite expensive for an air CPU cooler. When you consider the fact you need to buy a decent fan for it, we’re talking £70.

Our two other coolers featured today include Thermalright’s successor to their previous king (the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme, or TRUE); the Venomous X. Priced around £47, it could be something special. 47 aluminium fins, six heatpipes and a pressure mounting system. What more do you want?

Last, we have Noctua. We all know and love their quiet cooling solutions giving us the best airflow to noise ratio, but this time we see Noctua surprise us a little with one beasty looking cooler; the NH-D14. 6 heatpipes, dual radiator design, support for all current platforms right out of the box (no more buying that mounting kit you need, mainly AM3, that they don’t supply) 2 fans included – 1x 120mm and 1x 140mm. This baby comes in at a jaw dropping £70. However, given the price of the Mega Shadow which doesn’t include 2 fans, let alone 1, or even an AM2/AM3 kit included, Noctua priced it about right. Will the design work? Keep on reading.

In the ever advancing world of technology, products – even companies – come and go in an instant.  One company, Noctua, that was founded in Austria; through cooperation between the Austrian Rascom Computer distribution Ges.m.b.H and the Taiwanese Kolink International Corporation, seems to be here to stay.  After having a hit with their split fan range offering higher airflow (NF-S12) vs higher static pressure (NF-P12), while remaining relatively silent throughout! They have returned with an enhanced version of their NH-U12P, dubbed the NH-U12P SE2 Premium CPU cooler.

So, since the NH-U12P performs comparatively well to other coolers according to various sources on the internet, on paper the NH-U12P SE2 should be an interesting product.

An important point to note is that due to the customized back plate the NH-U12P SE2 is incompatible with the Intel Xeon 5500 platform; however, Noctua has an alternative in the form of the NH-U12DX 1366.

The official specifications, which can be found online at Noctua’s website here or below in pictorial format.

As you can see from the specifications, the socket compatibility out of the box is expansive, covering most users’  needs. Additionally they also tell us that the weight is slightly less than 1KG! However, due to motherboards being quite flexible, this would not damage your hardware if the motherboard is installed correctly.

Continue overleaf for the packaging…