Pulsing RGB LEDs seemed to be present in nearly every product on show at Xigmatec's Computex 2023 booth. Peering through the light pollution, we spotted an alluring new PC test bed. The as yet unnamed easy-access component testing chassis is resplendent in white (with a black option also on display), and features RGB LED cooling fans (of course).

In our images you can see the Xigmatek test bed with its easy access hinged motherboard platform on full display. With the motherboard angled up, we can see plenty of room for components such as PSUs, storage, and so on, along with plenty of room for rummaging around. Of course, Xigmatek has put an RGB extension cable in there for added lighting.

With the hinge closed you can see plenty of room for cable routing around and behind the motherboard mounting area. The design also offers eight PCI slots, a backplate cover, the stylish angled cooling array, and a decent number and variety of ports, power, and a reset button up front.

Xigmatek didn't have a name for this test bed case right now, so it's unsurprising that we don't don't yet have information on things like pricing and availability.

Xigmatek Cases - Plenty of Room, With a View

Another major draw at the Xigmatek booth was the array of cases on offer. The most high profile new cases we saw were the new Aqua Ultra series. These are three sided tempered glass PC cases. In the image below you can see a black, white and pink Aqua Ultra sitting beneath one of Xigmatek's new test beds (in black) which has been encapsulated in a glass box.

These are big PC cases, as you can probably tell, fitting otherboards up to E-ATX, CPU coolers up to 185 mm tall, graphics cards up to 430 mm in length, up to triple 360 mm cooling radiators, room for up to 8 HDDs, and PSUs up to 220 mm long.

Xigmatek has designed the Aqua Ultra cases to be tool-less for easy access. Also, there are some pleasing build options, like being able to choose a full sized vertical GPU installation, plus lots of fan and radiator options.

The Xigmatek Elysium II and Endorphin range of PC cases are also new for Computex. We don't have the specs for the Elysium II, but you can see that it is also a substantial design with a largely transparent section. It certainly looks tall with the five (seemingly 120 mm?) fans up front, and it looks like the top is level with the counters used in the booth (about 700 mm).

Moving on to the Endorphin range, our image shows the Endorphin 9, Endorphin 6, and Endorphin 3 in a line. The case volume reduces in accordance with the numerical suffix. Xigmatek uses a glass corner design here, so there should be more airflow / cooling options. We have the specs of the Endorphin 9, which are reproduced below.

Xigmatek is also pretty well known for its PC cooling. Its new Starlink fans had a cool "flexible modular design" where fans can be clipped together into neat arrays. Similarly, power/data cabling clips into place. The fans support PWM control, ARGB Sync, ARG passthrough, and work with the Galaxy II remote control.

In the above slides you can also see Computex showcased Xigmatek products like AiO coolers, and air coolers.

If you've been on the lookout for a new Mini-ITX case but have been disappointed that most of them are either too big, plastic, clunky, or just incompatible with your desired hardware, Xigmatek might have the solution. The company just revealed a new enclosure called Eris.

Eris is a Mini-ITX case made out of SECC steel and ABS plastic. It measures 355 mm long, 225 mm wide, 180 mm tall, and when empty weighs just 3.06 kg. Inside you'll be able to fit decently powerful hardware, for a compact Mini-ITX system. This includes a standard ATX PSU, CPU coolers up to 140 mm tall, and a dual-slot graphics card up to 300 mm long.

Storage placement is rather limited, with the 5.25" optical drive bay offering room for either an optical drive or a combination of a 3.5" and 2.5" hard drive. On top of the limited storage mounting space, if you want to use the 240 mm radiator mount you won't have any at all, as it will get in the way. Despite that, you'll certainly be able to squeeze a 2.5" SSD into a corner somewhere, or just stick to using an M.2 SSD on a supporting motherboard.

Both the top and the bottom of the case have dust filters. Two USB 3.0 ports and the standard pair of HD audio jacks handle front I/O connectivity.

All things considered, you can build a relatively powerful and compact gaming system in this chassis; you'll just have to ease up on your storage needs.

Xigmatek did not reveal pricing or availability, although we don't expect this case to cost all that much. AsSub-$60 price tag would be appropriate.

Follow Niels Broekhuijsen @NBroekhuijsen. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Editor's Note: While Computex took place last week, and all of the news announcements are behind us, we're still sorting through hundreds of in-person meetings and demonstrations, picking out just a few more of the most interesting items we saw up close.

In November 2013, we jokingly accused Xigmatek of being a bunch of Martians who design cases from in a hut. Well, at Computex 2014 we met the folks behind the Xigmatek Nebula, and we've now verified that they are not Martians, nor do they work in a hut.

In all seriousness though, while we were visiting Xigmatek's booth we spotted the very pretty Nebula enclosure in several new colors. Originally, it was only available in black anodized aluminum with orange accents, but at the show it was displayed in silver, yellow, blue, red, pink, purple, and white. The white version was not made of aluminum though, but rather out of glossy plastic.

Inside the Nebula there is room for mid-range Mini-ITX systems. Buyers can mount a Mini-ITX board, ATX PSU, graphics cards up to 200 mm long, along with two 3.5" or 2.5" drives. Pre-installed users will find a 1200 RPM 120 mm fan. While this room won't accommodate the most high-end systems, it will let you build quite a nice HTPC, for example.

The aluminum versions are likely to come to the market over the next few months, although the company wasn't sure about the white variant yet. Pricing for the aluminum versions will be in line with the current Nebula.

Follow Niels Broekhuijsen @NBroekhuijsen. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Xigmatek has built a new enclosure – the Odin. The enclosure is placed almost at the top of the company's tier of enclosures, only bested by the Elysium enclosure.

The rather sizable chassis measures a staggering 580 x 495 x 205 mm and is able to hold up to E-ATX motherboards, as well as graphics cards up to 330 mm in length. CPU coolers can tower up to 170 mm in height. The case also offers room for up to three optical drives, as well as up to seven 2.5" or 3.5" devices.

Regarding cooling, the chassis is pre-equipped with a single 120 mm fan, though has room up front for either a 140 mm fan or two 120 mm fans, along with bottom and side room for either a 140 or 120 mm fan, topped off with room for two 140 mm fans up top. Intriguingly, the case's top fans can be sealed off and turned off to engage a 'quiet mode.' The two panels up top can be clicked down or up, respectively turning the fans off or on.

Front I/O connectivity is taken care of by two USB 2.0 ports, two USB 3.0 ports, as well as the standard set of HD audio jacks.

There was no word on pricing nor availability just yet.

Xigmatek has silently launched the MIDGARD III, a new chassis that supports Qi wireless charging, which is integrated and located on the case's top panel. This chassis also sports a newly designed intake from elevated panels, ensuring "maximum airflow and minimizing sound pollution."

"MIDGARD III is ahead of its time, in technology and looks," states the product page. "The main innovative feature is integrated Qi technology meaning when you come home from a long day at work or school, you can come home and charge your mobile cellular device freely and effortlessly without the hassle of using a cord."

According to the specs, the chassis supports ATX, Micro ATX and mini-ITX (with backside hole for CPU cooler) motherboards. The case also measures (W) 260 x (H) 515 x (D) 409 mm, provides three 5.25" bays and six bays for 2.5" and 3.5" hard drives. There are also seven slots on the back for add-on cards, and enough room to mount up to 330 mm cards and a 160 mm CPU cooler.

The chassis comes with a 120 mm fan mounted on the back. However, there are spaces at the top for two fans, one space at the bottom for a 120 mm fan, and two spaces on the front for a 120 mm fan. This case also provides up to 300 mm in length and 50 mm in height for a radiator and cooling. The power supply mounts at the bottom back of the case.

So what is Qi exactly? Developed by the Wireless Power Consortium, it's a wireless charging spec that enables compatible devices to charge their battery without cords. In this case, the user would simply place his Qi-compliant device on top of the PC to receive a charge. The only drawback is that Qi has a power transmission distance of around 1.6 inches.

As far as we know, this is the first PC chassis that provides Qi wireless charging.

Eight Low-Profile Heat Sinks For Your Compact PC

Compact enthusiast-oriented PCs are becoming increasingly popular as hardware vendors improve the efficiency of their components alongside raw performance. In the last year, we've covered complete mini-ITX systems, low-profile memory kits, and small enclosures. We even based an entire System Builder Marathon on the mini-ITX form factor.

One thing we found during that exercise was that it's difficult to match the dimensions of boutique-built boxes with high-end hardware, if only because there aren't many enclosures optimized for tiny spaces and big specs. Always eager to make bold statements of frugality, I came upon ASRock’s M8 mini barebones system, to which I added a number fairly potent parts. I then ran smack up against the reason that Chris paid big bucks for his Tiki: ASRock’s M8 wasn’t designed for high-performance CPU cooling. The best I could do was 4 GHz, and that was only after I reconfigured the barebones machine's intake and exhaust fans, upgraded the CPU cooler, and locked the processor's core voltage at a level below Intel's stock ceiling. Clearly there was room for improvement.

We set our upper limit for cooler size at 4” to cover the largest of slim cases, and eight different heat sink vendors responded with samples. Six of them even fit within the approximate 3” limit of ASRock’s M8. One manufacturer said it thought its submission would qualify, but might not fit our test motherboard (even though we were sure it would). Several others asked us for a few additional millimeters of headroom, though that would have resulted in a vicious cycle. It was important to us that we keep this a comparison of truly low-profile coolers to address the growing compact computing market.

Here are today’s contenders:

Due to distribution issues, the Gabriel CPU cooler’s price is an estimate based on the company’s other products. That doesn’t leave any room for award recognition, but it still lets us get a look at performance in lieu of its final release. Noctua’s NH-L12 is distinct in that it's the largest cooler to qualify for our story.

Thermalright’s special-edition AXP-200R is similarly estimated to cost slightly more than the AXP-200. Both coolers are identical apart from fan color, though we aren't worried about value judgements on a product that sells for at least $64. On the other hand, exceptional performance could open the door to Tom's Hardware Elite recognition, regardless of price.

Designed to support two fans in a push-pull configuration, SilverStone’s NT06-Pro includes only one. The firm instructs users of low-profile cases to mount the fan below its radiator, so that’s how we're testing it. It might even squeeze into ASRock’s M8 in this configuration, though the side panel would probably block airflow through its fins.

Gamer Storm Gabriel

Best of luck getting your hands on the latest heat sinks from DeepCool Industries. Most of the company's products are re-branded as Logisys by online vendors sourcing them from that importer. The sub-brand Gamer Storm is rarely used in price engines. And sometimes even the product name doesn’t appear. For a while, the firm’s older Gamer Storm Assassin was simply branded as Logisys MC8000 in the U.S.

To compound our issues finding this piece of hardware online, our Gabriel sample doesn’t even have a part number. Presumably, that'll get assigned to the retail packaging, which isn't finished yet.

Apart from issues with availability and naming, DeepCool presents a fairly thoughtful and well-executed design in its Gamer Storm Gabriel. We find a copper base with four heat pipes connecting aluminum fins, all protected under a nickel-plated finish.

Our sample came with LGA 115x (1150, 1155, 1156) brackets for Intel’s three most recent generations of mainstream processors, and AMD brackets that fit all four-hole rectangular mounting patterns. We wouldn’t expect a cooler this small to be marketed towards giant LGA 2011 processors, so we’re not disappointed.

Gabriel Installation

The Gamer Storm Gabriel by DeepCool (and likely to be imported by Logisys) doesn’t weigh much, so it doesn’t need much contact pressure. Rather than add a socket support plate, the firm simply attaches this cooler using screws and insulating washers. These protrude through the back of the motherboard to connect standoffs and mounting brackets seen on the previous page.

With 1.1” of clearance for voltage regulators and memory, and around half an inch of offset in two directions, the Gabriel CPU cooler can be rotated to fit most motherboards. Buyers should still measure their boards to assuage any fitment concerns, though.

A low-profile fan clips on to finish the installation, bringing total mounting height to a mere 2.4”. This one would have definitely fit into our ASRock M8 build, though its clips wouldn’t have supported our thicker fan upgrade.

Since the Gabriel is offset in two directions, it shouldn’t be too difficult for most users to find a mounting orientation that supports a second pair of tall DIMMs. If that’s not an option, we’d suggest low-profile memory.

Noctua NH-L12

Designed for semi-slim cases, Noctua’s NH-L12 could become a truly slim cooler by removing its 120 mm top fan. A second option for reduced profile would be to replace its 92 mm bottom fan with the top fan, though doing so would significantly diminish motherboard component and DRAM clearance. Noctua only recommends the first two options (both fans or one 92 mm fan).

In addition to mounting hardware, the NH-L12 includes a fan splitter and two speed-reducing resistor wires. While we prefer to let our motherboards manage fan speed, we’ll entertain ourselves with both high-speed and low-speed mode tests.

Noctua machines its copper base plate to an ultra-fine surface before plating the entire NH-L12 in corrosion-resistant nickel. Spring-loaded cap nuts with Phillips-head tops are also factory installed.

Some processor interfaces have built-in support plates; others don’t. Noctua still supports LGA 775-based motherboards by extending foam support material across most of its cross bracket, and it supports newer Intel platforms by making that center section removable. AMD and LGA 2011 owners have the benefit of direct-mounting Noctua’s brackets to the motherboard's original support mechanisms.

NH-L12 Installation

Noctua’s LGA plate is slotted for Intel’s three consumer-oriented mounting patterns, using push-through bolts as stands for top-side hardware. Note that the LGA plate is notched in two places to clear the screws of Intel’s original support mechanism.

Another option would have been to install the cooler without a plate. To circumvent clearance problems seen in our System Builder Marathon last June, Noctua also includes a special screw and nut set to install the NH-L12 in the same fashion shown in the Gamer Storm Gabriel installation.

Regardless of whether you’re using bolts or screws, the next step is to install black plastic spacers and cross braces.

An exceptional 1.6” of clearence is reduced by around half under the 1”-thick inset bottom fan, though the fan can be slid a little to make more room at one end. Half an inch of offset also allows the cooler to be rotated to clear specific components.

Too thick for our M8 build, we might have retested the NH-L12 without the top fan, except that it’s already being retested with its included speed-reducing resistor wires.

Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Revision B

Is the name “Big Shuriken” a contradiction? While the word may refer to a small bladed weapon, anything smaller than Scythe’s low-profile cooler might have been more-appropriately named Shaken. Then again, the Shuriken is larger than the stock Intel LGA 1150 cooler.

The Big Shuriken 2 Rev. B is even large enough to hold a 120 mm fan above its ultra-thin cooling fins, relying on five double-sided heat pipes to support high thermal loads, purportedly including those of LGA 2011 processors. The installation kit even includes custom screws to utilize LGA 2011’s integral mounting bracket, in addition to Intel’s other consumer-oriented interfaces and the rectangular screw pattern of AMD’s recent mounting brackets.

Scythe puts anti-corrosion nickel plating on its semi-polished copper base, but leaves its copper pipes au naturel.

Threaded collars screw into the Big Shuriken 2 Rev. B’s mounting brackets to allow installation from behind the motherboard on any compatible socket except LGA 2011. Those installations instead require that bolts be secured using a wrench from the side.

Big Shuriken 2 Revision B Installation

Scythe’s socket support plate has holes in every direction to fit around the mounting screws of Intel’s integrated solution. Tabs on two sides of the bracket also support AMD installations.

In spite of its low 2.3” mounting height, the Big Shuriken 2 Rev. B offers 1.6” of clearance for DIMMs and motherboard components. It gets that space through the combination of a thin radiator and slim fan.

The Big Shuriken 2 Rev. B has a snug profile, but still clears the medium-height heat spreaders of our memory modules.

SilenX EFZ-100HA2

Does anyone remember flower-style coolers? Few of us would claim to be old enough, though some may have forgotten about this design. Fortunately, it still has some merit.

Low manufacturing cost of this sheet-aluminum design is probably the biggest benefit of SilenX’s EFZ-100HA2. After all, easier manufacturing leads to a supremely-attractive $15 retail price.

Smashing those fins tightly together allows SilenX to machine a smooth surface upon the EFZ-100HA2’s base. Aluminum rivets hold it all together.

Designed to clip onto AMD’s Socket 462, the manufacturer must have been thrilled when AMD decided to keep those clips for generation-after-generation of AM and FM interfaces. SilenX adds an adapter bracket for LGA 775 and LGA 1156, and must have been similarly thrilled when Intel decided to keep the 1156 hole spacing for LGA 1155 and 1150. Locking pins sit in oval holes to allow the builder to select between LGA 775 and LGA 115x compatibility.

EFZ-100HA2 Installation

White split pins on the Intel LGA adapter fit into mounting holes first, followed by black plastic tacs. This is the only cooler in today’s round-up that doesn’t require motherboard removal.

A look under the motherboard shows how the black plastic tacs wedge between the ears of those split pins to look the adapter in place.

The EFZ-100HA2 now clips onto the Intel LGA adapter in AMD style, using its original Socket 462 spring clip.

Because its fins are narrow and tapered, the EFZ-100HA2 has the best component clearance of any cooler in today’s test. On the other hand, that taper makes it hard for us to define its clearance in either inches or millimeters.

SilenX calls this a 100 mm fan, but its blades are an exact match to several 92 mm x 25 mm fans that we compared. Metric fan sizes are based on frame size, and the blade diameter of this frame-less fan is around 86 mm.

SilverStone Nitrogon NT06-Pro

Forget the word Nitrogon in your product searches, as most vendors refer to SilverStone’s latest low-profile cooler simply as the NT06-Pro. Designed to hold two fans, the single included fan complies with the low-profile requirements of many builders. Today, that includes us.

An intricate mounting kit includes a separate screw set for LGA 2011, cross brackets for Intel and AMD sockets, extension screws and spacers, a socket support plate for all compatible sockets except LGA 2011, and a spacer for boards that don’t have a built-in support plate (LGA 775).

SilverStone sands the NT06-Pro’s copper base to an ultra-smooth finish before plating the entire cooler in corrosion-resistant nickel. Short fins above the base provide access for mounting screws.

The NT06-Pro uses a variant of carriage-bolt design to prevent turning of the mounting screws in its base plate. The plate has holes for LGA 775, 1150/1155/1156, 1366, and the four-hole rectangular pattern used to hold AMD’s specified clip brackets.

Nitrogon NT06-Pro Installation

Carriage-style bolts extend from the included support bracket through the motherboard, and are topped with plastic spacers, cross brackets, and nuts. LGA 2011 mounting instead uses a special set of screws to hold the same cross brackets and nuts.

With its fan out of the way, we can see how the NT06-Pro’s top mounting bracket connects to its cross brackets using spring-loaded cap nuts. Phillips head indentations allow cap nuts to be tightened through heat sink access holes using a screwdriver.

Exactly 1.2” of motherboard component and DIMM clearance remains after installing the included 120 mm x 20 mm fan. SilverStone recommends both updraft and downdraft configurations, so we tested it both ways.

The bottom of the fan sits next to our medium-height modules, preventing the installation of a second set. Memory upgrade options include using shorter modules or rotating the sink away from memory.

Thermalright AXP-200 And AXP-200R

A red-and-black fan color scheme differentiates Thermalright’s AXP-200R from its more pedestrian sibling, and the firm even rates both product's fans at the same speed. Since they employ the same fan motor and design, readers should be confident of identical performance. The AXP-200 sells for $64-$80, and we estimate the special edition version in our lab is at the upper end of that range.

The AXP-200R includes a multi-sized fan adapter plate in addition to its Intel LGA and AMD four-hole mounting kits. Users can substitute the original slim fan for full-sized fans up to 140 mm, as well as Thermalright’s own 150 mm x 26.5 mm unit.

Thermalright polishes its CPU interface better than most competitors, though this does appear to affect flatness slightly near its edge. Nickel plating prevents surface oxidation.

The AXP-200's support plate is drilled for all consumer-oriented Intel and AMD processors, replacing manufacturer-supplied brackets for AMD coolers as far back as Socket 462. Extra holes near its center fit around the screws of Intel’s original support plates, and LGA 2011 users can instead use their original threaded mounts with a set of supplied standoffs.

AXP-200R Installation

Thermalright adds a support ring around the socket, and uses yet another bracket to push its cooler base towards the CPU. Divots on the edge of the ring align to AMD’s bracket hole spacing, and slots in the ring’s corners fit Intel’s LGA interfaces.

Shown on the previous page, carriage-style bolts attached to a socket support plate slide through motherboard holes to be topped with threaded spacers. Insulating washers prevent motherboard damage, and the assembly is topped with the ring-shaped cooler bracket and screws.

LGA 2011 installations instead use a set of supplied standoffs to attach the ring bracket over and around the socket.

Thermalrights AXP-200R does not support under-sink fan installation, but does clear DIMMs and motherboard components up to 1.4” tall. Missing fins at one end of the sink provide screwdriver access to install the final hold-down bracket.

Though its color scheme is ROG-specific, the AXP-200R’s red and black fan looks great with the red memory and black PCB of this non-ROG platform.

Xigmatek Janus

Initially available to U.S. customers from a single exporter in Singapore, Xigmatek’s Janus now sells for $40. A quick comparison of current Xigmatek products leads us to believe the eventual price will be around $30.

That price range gets buyers a dual-fan sink and two coolers: 120 mm x 15 mm on top and 80 mm x 10 mm on the bottom. Two sets of brackets fit all consumer-oriented Intel and AMD sockets from LGA 775 and Socket AM2 forward. Bolt-through installation supports all of those sockets except LGA 2011, for which Xigmatek includes a special set of standoffs.

The Janus we received was polished only half-way, showing its original machining grooves across most of its surface. These grooves are shallow and should fill nicely with paste to provide a fairly good thermal interface, and are protected from oxidation with nickel plating.

Xigmatek's submission uses a carriage-bolt design variation with threaded standoffs and insulating washers to fit onto the board from above. Most installations require users to reach around the back of the board to secure the cooler with nuts, but LGA 2011 instead requires that you reach between the motherboard and cooler with a supplied wrench.

Janus Installation

Screws from the assembled Janus cooler and bracket package stick through the motherboard and are secured with nuts. A set of insulating washers protects the board’s surface. If you own an AMD processor, you'll need to remove your board's cooler retention mechanism to accomplish this task.

The Janus provides 1.2” of clearance for DIMMs and motherboard devices, and is offset by 0.6” towards the side shown so that it can be rotated to clear taller objects. The bottom 80 mm fan needs additional space above the socket, but can be removed if necessary.

At 2.5” tall including its top 120 mm fan, the Janus is exactly the design we expected to represent the low-profile performance market. The fan even lights up for users of windowed cases such as ASRock’s M8.

If you need a second set of DIMMs to use with the Janus, you'll either want lower-profile memory or to rotate the cooler away from the memory slots.

Zalman CNPS8900 Quiet

An advancement of the aforementioned flower-style coolers, Zalman’s CNPS8900 Quiet wraps two heat pipes around copper fins to improve thermal conductivity.

A universal socket support plate uses the LGA 1150/1155/1156 and 1366 plate as a spacer, and includes a piece of plastic to serve the same purpose on other platforms (Intel LGA 775, AMD AM and FM interfaces).

Zalman’s CNPS8900 Quiet is the only cooler in today’s comparison to use a direct-contact heat pipe design. Once hailed by many firms (and several reviewers) as a giant step forward in cooler base design, its proven benefits are typically reduced material cost for the manufacturer and weight. After smashing the contact surface flat, Zalman sands it smooth.

Zalman uses shoulder screws to keep its CNPS8900 Quiet mounting brackets away from the motherboard’s surface, but doesn’t include screws for LGA 2011. Unlike several competitors, the company doesn’t appear eager to push undersized cooling onto oversized processors, and we can understand that sentiment.

CNPS8900 Quiet Installation

T-nuts are placed into support plate mounting holes that correspond to a motherboard’s mounting pattern, and are held in place with plastic retainers. These are barely long enough to reach the top of the board using Intel’s original socket support plate as a spacer.

Shoulder screws secure top brackets to the under-motherboard T-nuts. The CNPS8900 Quiet is too large to allow vertical access to the #2 Phillips heads of these screws, and we found that a #1 screwdriver could more easily be angled into place.

Like the traditional flower-style cooler that’s also in today’s comparison, the CNPS8900 Quiet is small enough to clear nearly any motherboard component and angled in a way that complicates precise clearance measurements.

With only 1.3” of space under the edge, CNPS8900 Quiet users who need to add more memory should probably choose low-profile DIMMs.

Test Settings And Methodology

One point of testing all these coolers is to find one that really allows overclocking in tight spaces. The problem is that cramped PCs are usually warm without even beginning to overclock. Given the problems of small enclosures and the lack of custom-fit solutions (such as the one found in my boss’ Tiki), I picked the O/C settings from our ASRock M8 review.

Another market for compact cooling is found in home theater systems, where stock cooling solutions might be too noisy. Thus, acoustics are an important consideration in today’s analysis.

The cooling capacity versus noise debate brings up a point made by one of our readers in our recent closed-loop cooling finale. Some products achieve their best cooling-to-noise ratio at a fan speed that’s significantly below maximum. Other coolers behave as if they need more powerful fans to reach their full potential. Readers suggested that we retest everything using a common fan arrangement, but that doesn’t work in a low-profile device comparison where many of the test subjects can’t hold a common fan configuration, or would no longer fit within the low-profile theme using standardized fans.

We don’t like playing favorites, but we also don’t like punishing a company for adding the extra capacity of a 3600 RPM fan when the product operates optimally at 1800 RPM. On the other hand, it would be arbitrary to pick our own fan speed and apply it to all products regardless of design factors.

So, I’ve left it to manufacturers to decide what speed to use. If the product includes a two-speed selector, I test both speeds. If it includes a resistor wire, I’ll use it. If it’s an analog controller, I’ll test the top and bottom speed settings. At this time, I cannot find a fairer method to compare cooling to noise other than to rely on the hardware included with the cooler.

Results: Cooling And Fan Speed

Unable to fit into our ASRock M8 project but still barely qualifying as low-profile, Noctua’s NH-L12 leads the cooling charts. Remember that these tests are based on a low CPU core voltage to compensate for reduced cooler capacity.

SilverStone’s NT06-Pro takes second place in the cooling chart, though it wouldn’t have room for air circulation in the M8 chassis. Thermalright’s 2.8”-tall AXP-200R is the best performer to fit that specific enclosure, followed closely by Scythe’s lower-cost Big Shuriken 2 Rev. B.

Adding the included resistor wires to the NH-L12 lowers fan speed significantly, but with only a minor increase in temperature. Higher overclocks might have changed this scenario, but we’re trying to use settings that all of these coolers can support.

Results: Noise And Acoustic Efficiency

Decibels are on a logarithmic scale, so every ten decibels has twice the apparent audio volume. But air is compressible, so sound sources don’t stack up as neatly. Ten times the source energy is needed to double sound pressure, and a drop of 3 dB is similar to reducing the source energy by half. With that understanding, we were pleased to see a 5 dB drop in the NH-L12’s noise level accompany the installation of its included resistor wires.

Zalman’s CNPS8900 Quiet similarly impresses us by making very little noise at full speed, and a look back at the thermal charts shows that its 51° over ambient result is very close to the low-speed NH-L12’s 49° over ambient.

A temperature reduction of 50% is a cooling improvement of 100%. To rate improved cooling with a higher percentage score, we divided the stock Intel baseline cooler’s temperature by the actual temperature of each competing solution. We then divided each cooler’s actual noise level by the reference cooler’s noise level to put noise on a direct scale, since the higher denominator produces a lower dividend.

The SilenX EFZ-100HA2 had a 10° advantage over the bundled Intel cooler, yet it's noisy enough to finish worse than the stock solution in a cooling-to-noise comparison. Zalman’s CNPS8900 Quiet takes top honors at full speed, while Noctua’s NH-L12 edges it out with the included speed-reducing resistor wires installed.

Cooling Value

Intel’s stock cooler is bundled with retail processors, so we naturally can't use its price as a baseline. We instead used the average of all coolers, and find that the $15 SilenX EFZ-100HA2 wins the cooling-to-price comparison. On the other hand, the cheap cooler runs too hot to satisfy any of our needs.

Priced at only $40, Zalman’s CNPS8900 looks like a great value in a cooler that meets most of our thermal requirements, and its value rating is closely followed by the slightly-warmer Gamer Storm Gabriel and Xigmatek Janus coolers.

Zalman’s CNPS8900 Quiet also has the low fan speed to make it a great overall performer, in the balance of cooling, noise, and price.

The Best Cooler For Compact Systems?

Noctua’s NH-L12 is the top performer in all of today’s tests, though attaining that status in our noise measurements requires installing resistor wires that also raises its temperature to third place. It's also the largest cooler in today’s tests, and fits only the most spacious of small enclosures, such as SilverStone's SG08. And we’re sure SilverStone would have something to say about that, following closely behind with its own NT06-Pro.

The rest of the field fits most compact enclosures with heights of less than 3”. The best cooling-to-price ratio among these comes from the SilenX EFZ-100HA2. If this were a comparison of basic replacement parts, SilenX’s low price would make it a top contender. But hot and cheap don't win any favors in the high-end cooling market.

Second in the value charts, Zalman’s CNPS8900 Quiet is best among the sub-3” coolers in our Acoustic Efficiency chart. It also takes second place behind the SilenX EFZ-100HA2 in our cost to benefit analysis. It's barely warmer and barely noisier than Noctua’s much larger NH-L12 in its top-performing low-speed mode, and has the added advantage of fitting most compact enclosures.

Two candidates emerge for our top-honor Elite award, the Zalman CNPS8900 Quiet that fits most "slim" enclosures and Noctua NH-L12 that fits only a few. But there can only be one best. And since one of the two products also qualifies for a value award, I’m bypassing the debate between performance superiority and enclosure compatibility.

The CNPS8900 Quiet combines good cooling performance, low noise, broad case compatibility, and a moderate price to make it the smartest choice for the majority of compact system builders.

Xigmatek has announced a new enclosure, which it describes as being 'Out of this World.' The case, which will be known as the Nebula, is a Mini-ITX enclosure with a very unique design that has been created by some Martians in a hut. Okay, we made that last one up.

The Nebula can fit Mini-ITX motherboards, graphics cards up to 200 mm long (meaning that it will fit the Asus DirectCU Mini graphics cards), full-size ATX power supplies, and CPU coolers up to 80 mm tall. As for storage, it'll be able to hold two 3.5/2.5" drives, though there is no room for optical drives. 

Cooling is handled by a single 120 mm exhaust fan, which can draw its air from the bottom of the enclosure. The fan is a Xigmatek 120 mm XOF PWM controlled unit.

Front I/O connectivity is handled by the usual pair of USB 3.0 ports and HD audio jacks.

39 Thermal Compounds Get Benchmarked And Tested

If you missed part one of this series, take a quick second and check out Thermal Paste Comparison, Part One: Applying Grease And More.

We Are Curious About Two Special Compound Categories

After discussing the theory of conventional thermal pastes in part one, I want to go into a little more detail about liquid metal compounds, and also shed some light on thermal adhesives, both in paste and pad form. Thermal pads are used to mount small heat sinks on RAM chips or MOSFETs.

But let’s start with those liquid metal pastes. While their theoretical thermal conductivity sounds impressive, that one attribute is no guarantee of success. During the course of our testing, we'll be experimenting with a long burn-in phase and comparing the liquid metal compound to Gelid's Extreme paste.

Several years ago, Coollaboratory broke new ground in thermal management by introducing the Liquid Pro liquid metal compound. But while the look (and subsequent application) of Liquid Pro reminded us of a mercury thermometer that didn’t survive a fall, its successor, Liquid Ultra, is better, avoiding some of the first effort's weaknesses. Because Liquid Pro could be so problematic, I'm only presenting Liquid Ultra in the tutorial section. Both compounds show up in our performance charts, though.

Box Contents

In the Liquid Ultra box you get the paste itself, a cleaning swab, two brushes, a sponge, and an instruction manual. That's an impressive-sounding list, but it's really just the bare minimum to use the product, sufficient for a single application. If you want to apply Liquid Ultra a second time, you'll find yourself without the alcohol swab. At least a second brush is included. While we appreciate the inclusion of the coarse sponge, it's barely adequate for removing the compound. Of course, there's a separate cleaning kit available for a hefty price.

Enthusiasts may be torn about this product, and yes, there may even be those who are more courageous than I and use it on graphics cards. However, my personal opinion is that a majority of the people who read this tutorial are new to thermal compounds, and I wouldn’t want to encourage them to mess around with this stuff due to the skill it requires. I also want to point out that you'll probably void your CPU's warranty if you do use Liquid Ultra. After removing the last remnants of it, we discovered that all of the markings etched into the head spreader were gone. If you still want to try this product after reading our tutorial, you can probably expect very good cooling performance, assuming nothing goes wrong.

Surface Cleaning and Roughing

The most important prerequisites for using a liquid metal compound are clean heat sink and spreader surfaces. You can buy the aforementioned kit with the three cleaning liquids, or simply snag some isopropyl alcohol at the drug store. However, stay away from acetone and cleaning naphtha. Even denatured alcohol may contain additives that are detrimental to achieving a clean, degreased surface. Finally, make sure you wait until any remnants of the liquid have evaporated!

If the surface is too smooth, the older Liquid Pro and newer Liquid Ultra may only form loose droplets on your CPU. Thus, in contrast to what you would do for regular thermal pastes, you may consider roughing the heat sink and spreader a little bit. Just remember that you only get enough liquid metal for two tries.

Don't overdo this. If you scrub too hard, the innocent-looking sponge can cause deep grooves. Move in small, graceful circles.

Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra: Application

Applying the compound is tricky, which is why we don't really recommend Liquid Pro. Liquid Ultra is a little more like the pastes you're used to, though still a lot "wetter". Its composition is still a point of concern because it corrodes light metals like aluminum and certain alloys. This could have an adverse effect on thermal conductivity, even causing an insulating layer to form. Copper- and nickel-plated surfaces are alright though, as are heat spreaders.

Once you've roughened up your CPU, you can drip Liquid Ultra on it, spreading it around with an enclosed brush. The amount you'll use varies by CPU size, but plan to use about half of the compound on AMD processors and about a third on Intel's. The video shows that you can even add liquid metal while spreading it out. Depending on the mounting pressure of your cooler, you may want to spread the compound more than the video shows. Just be careful; you don't want this corrosive, conductive material to get squeezed out the sides.

The next video illustrates an alternate method that requires less material. What we want to stress, however, is that it is better to put the liquid metal on a CPU away from its processor interface, thus protecting the motherboard from spills. We're putting the chip on our cleaning sponge to make sure none of its pins get bent.

On one hand, the liquid is spread more evenly and less of it is needed. But on the other, more metal balls form. Since they could cause a short circuit, they need to be collected. This method only works when the surface has been roughened, and it yields (marginally) better results.

Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra: Application Problems And Clean-Up

The pictures below are staged. But their purpose is to warn you what might happen if you're not careful, or if you don't pull the CPU from its interface before applying the liquid. Even if you're being meticulous, small droplets will separate and run away. So, keep a thin, clean brush handy to deal with them. Don’t spread them or wipe them away; instead, lift them up!

If you have never experienced the sinking feeling of spotting a liquid metal droplet between CPU pins, look at the bottom picture. However, the tiny droplets at the PCB’s edge may be even worse because they're barely visible to the naked eye.

Cleaning with Chemical Agents and a Wire Brush

It's one thing to apply liquid metal. Removing it is an entirely different ballgame. Even popping off the heat sink can be a challenge. It's very easy to pull an AMD processor right out of its locked socket if you're not extra careful. Make life a little easier by starting the process while the processor is still hot, and detach the heat sink by gently turning it left and right. If you roughed both the heat sink and spreader, you're going to be met with resistance. You might be best off mounting a smooth heat sink on a roughed spreader. This combination seems to come apart most easily.

The cleaning agent from Coollaboratory's cleaning set works, but it won't get everything off. Thus, you still have to use the wire brush. Scrape, apply more solvent, wipe, rinse, and repeat. As you might guess, this takes some time.

In the end, you'll probably wind up with two scratched-up surfaces. Luckily, I bought two closed-loop liquid coolers, allowing him to continue testing conventional pastes with a smooth sink.

Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra: Performance Measurements

If you want to know if this solution is worth its high price, the best we can do is answer with a non-committal maybe. Enthusiasts requiring an expensive, hard-to-apply thermal compound to lower Tcase by 2 or 3 degrees Kelvin (which could mean as much as 5 degrees Tcore) might want to consider their build goals. After running our own tests, we can state with some confidence that the supposed improvements of 5 to 7 Kelvin Tcase are overoptimistic. If you see that big of a gain, it's because you weren't doing something right with the paste you were using before. In order to create a more fair measurement, I compared one of the best conventional pastes, the GC-Extreme from Gelid Solutions, against Liquid Ultra. One-eighth of an ounce of GC-Extreme may be good for five or more applications; Coollaboratory's Liquid Ultra allows three, at most. Even without the expensive add-on cleaning kit, you're still looking at the difference between less than $2 per use and more than $4. You're also looking at five seconds of application time compared to three minutes or so. And we still haven’t taken increased risk into account.

Measurement Results

While Liquid Ultra isn’t compatible with aluminum coolers, we're lucky in that the Core 2 Quad Q6600's old boxed cooler sports a copper slug.

It is amazing how well conventional thermal paste fares compared to liquid metal. A more familiar paste sports a lower difference between burned in versus not burned in, but at a mere 1°C ΔT, the Liquid Ultra certainly proves itself in the same league. Whether we run the interval test or the 24-hour stress test, only Gelid's paste manages to get slightly better as time passes.

Asked whether the 1.5 °C ΔT, which the Liquid Ultra holds over Gelid's GC-Extreme with a closed-loop cooler, or the 2.7 °C  ΔT, which it does in the boxed cooler test, are worth extra effort and cost, my personal answer is no. But of course, some enthusiasts swear by the liquid metal. Most folks don't need the stuff; it's really for the overclockers functioning at the very top of their game.

Thermal Adhesives: Arctic Silver And Akasa

Thermal adhesives binds surfaces together, acting as a thermal compound in the process. They're available both as pastes and in pad form, and may be necessary for mounting small heat sinks on memory packages or voltage regulation circuitry. Obviously, conventional pastes don't work in those cases, since the weight of a heat sink causes them to slide right off.

Adhesive pastes have better thermal properties than pads, but they are accompanied by a significant drawback: once thermal adhesive paste cures, you cannot remove the heat sink from the component without damaging something. We've seen too many pictures from folks who've torn off RAM packages or cracked MOSFETs in half. You can try a trick to avoid this: mix thermal adhesive with regular thermal paste. We'll discuss this shortly.

Paste: Arctic Silver Alumina Thermal Adhesive

Arctic Silver's Alumina is a classic among thermal adhesive pastes, but heed the above warning: once applied your heat sink won't come off again. But a similar non-adhesive version is also available, and you can mix about two parts of the adhesive with one part regular paste to achieve a compromise. Your sink shouldn't be affected by gravity or vibrations, but it should still come off if you need it to. After popping it off, remnants of the adhesive will remain on both surfaces, which you'll want to clean with a sponge.

Adhesive Pad: Akasa AK-TT12-80 Thermal Adhesive Tape

It is easier to use an adhesive pad, if you don't mind the compromise in thermal conductivity. But for making sure that RAM packages and MOSFETs don’t get too hot, pads are typically good enough. If you ever plan to change or remove the heat sinks you're attaching, use an adhesive pad rather than paste.

Pastes: Akasa And Alpenföhn

Akasa 455

Model 455 is basically the entry-level product from Akasa. However, it is quite thick and thus not suitable for beginners. A low price cannot make up for the paste’s difficult application.

Akasa Pro-Grade 460

This paste barely differs from the Akasa 455, described above. It is not any easier to use, and the results we measured are only slightly better. Since it's also more expensive than the 455 paste, its purchase is questionable.

Akasa Pro-Grade+ 5022

This is another product from Akasa that costs more than the one we just looked at. While the performance measurements we generated are again better than the previous two compounds, and it is somewhat softer, this is still a thick paste. Warm it up a bit, though, and it can be applied more easily, yielding very satisfactory results.

EKL Alpenföhn Schneekanone

Schneekanone translates to Snow Cannon, which sounds like a whimsical name promising icy-cold CPUs. While your processor certainly won't hit temperatures that low, this paste's thermal performance is still pretty good. However, its price is too high and it's not very easy to use. While it is more expensive than the classic Arctic MX-2, it isn’t any better. Fortunately, enthusiasts in the U.S. won't need to worry about this, since EKL's Alpenföhn Schneekanone isn't available here. 

Pastes: Arctic And Arctic Silver

Arctic MX-2

This classic compound started the premium paste frenzy. It is still a good entry-level choice, too. Inexpensive and easy to use, its thermal performance is in the upper mid-range. And for what you pay, MX-2 seems like it's meant to keep competitors out of the lucrative thermal paste market.

Arctic MX-4

While MX-4 is more expensive than the MX-2, it surprises us by offering only barely better results. This paste may have its strengths, but it's not your best option for high-power applications like GPUs. It's also tougher than Arctic's MX-2, making it more difficult to use, and less attractive to novices. The thermal performance we recorded puts MX-4 into the upper mid-range, but it also doesn’t stand out from the crowd. Fortunately, at $1.75 per gram, it is one of the least-expensive pastes.

Arctic Silver 5

Buyer beware: The brand Arctic Silver is not the same as Arctic. This is one of the few pastes on the market that still sports silver as an ingredient. However, it shows its age and does not keep up with the best pastes out there today. Based on its performance, it seems overpriced.

Pastes: be quiet!, Corsair, And Dimastech

be quiet! DC 1

As with a number of other manufacturers, be quiet! merely puts its label on an OEM product. That doesn't necessarily indicate poor quality, so long as the OEM maintains certain standards. And as it turns out, the DC 1 is a solid paste for beginners, ending up in the upper mid-range. Its handling is similar to MX-2, while its performance is a notch better. While we like the product’s quality, we cannot say the same about pricing. Amazon currently offers 3 g for close to $10.

be quiet! (Paste Bundled with be quiet! Heat Sinks)

We're curious about the pastes that heat sink vendors bundle with their coolers. Since cost is always a factor when it comes to value-adds, we want to know whether it makes sense to toss the included stuff and buy aftermarket compound instead.

In this case, we are positively surprised by the freebie. It should be good enough to complement be quiet!'s coolers, which employ high mounting pressure. Under those conditions, the paste comes in a mere 0.6 °C higher than the DC 1, mentioned above.

Corsair (Paste Enclosed With Corsair Coolers)

This time we're looking at thermal paste bundled with Corsair's coolers. The be quiet! and Corsair compounds achieve similar results, though Corsair's paste is perhaps slightly thicker. It's still pretty easy to use though, and we like what we see from our thermal performance results. In this case, it probably wouldn't make much sense to toss the tube and spend good money on something else.

Dimastech HTX-EE

This compound is one of the most difficult to use, and you should only apply it after warming to 110 °F or so. Its performance results are barely better than what you get for free with some heat sinks, though, and so we're left a little disappointed. We're not saying that this is a bad paste, but for the money you can find better options. This stuff is so thick that we were afraid our heat sink's screws would strip their threads as we tightened them.

Pastes: Coollaboratory

Coollaboratory Liquid Pro

This is the grandfather of liquid metal compounds, and it still holds the record for thermal conductivity. Unfortunately, it also requires the greatest degree of skill to apply. Only experienced, gutsy professionals should use it, and even then, it's both expensive and difficult to remove. Liquid Pro cannot be used with aluminum heat sinks, but can be used with copper- and nickel-plated ones.

Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra

This latest offering from Coollaboratory is somewhat easier to use than its predecessor. But that only means it's a little easier to apply than Liquid Pro. Its thermal attributes aren't quite as good as a result of the different composition. However, Liquid Ultra is still better than any conventional paste. At the end of the day, you'll have to decide if one or two degrees of improved cooling performance is worth the effort and risk. Again, you cannot use this stuff with aluminum heat sinks, though it is compatible with copper- and nickel-plated ones.

Coollaboratory Liquid MetalPad

While these pads can be handled and cut to size easily, the devil is in the details. During burn-in, you have to ensure that the Tcase temperature reaches at least 140 °F, which equates to a Tcore of about 80 °C (176 °F). Some AMD CPUs throttle back at 140 °F, and even our FX-8350 had a hard time holding the required temperature long enough for a successful burn-in. Older AMD processors may be on the brink of meltdown at 140 °F. Without a successful burn-in, however, this product's thermal conductivity is worse than the cheapest paste. It took disconnecting all of my fans to burn the pads in. Naturally, doing this involves some risk.

Coollaboratory Liquid Cleaning Set

High prices and tedious clean-up make Coollaboratory's products very hard for the newbie to use. They're great for experts who want to leave zero overclocking headroom unexploited, though you'll probably find this cleaning kit necessary.

Pastes: Cooler Master

Cooler Master IC Value V1

This is the least-expensive paste from Cooler Master. It's really easy to use, but doesn’t work any better than the random no-name compounds we've tested. While the price is right, performance leaves a lot to be desired. We can only recommend this product for experiments like this one. Fortunately, it's pretty hard to find in the U.S., so there's a good chance you'll never encounter it.

Cooler Master IC Essential E1

This mid-range compound from Cooler Master is approximately twice as expensive as the entry-level product, but is it twice as effective? Our results put the two pastes fairly close together; only in the GPU-oriented test are the differences substantial. But even so, this paste is fairly average, the amount you get is paltry (a mere 1.5 g), and the cost per gram is substantial. IC Essential E1 isn't a price/performance winner. It is easy to use, though.

Cooler Master Extreme Fusion X1

This is Cooler Master's high-end offering, which sets out to outclass the company's older pastes. It achieves this goal, finishing a close second to Gelid's GC-Extreme. Just be sure to warm up the paste before you use it.

Cooler Master (Paste Bundled With Cooler Master Coolers)

Initially, I suspected that the paste bundled with Cooler Master's heat sinks was the same as be quiet!'s, given almost identical syringes. However, spreading the pastes, which are also the same color, revealed different viscosity. That either means we're dealing with distinct products or the same product from widely varying production lots. Variance does happen, particularly when it comes to inexpensive products.

Be that as it may, Cooler Master's paste sports a higher viscosity and winds up trailing be quiet!'s in the test results. It was still better than some pricey aftermarket compounds, though.

Pastes: Gelid Solutions, Noctua, And Phanteks

Gelid Solutions GC-2

We're going to start with Gelid's most budget-oriented solution. Its thermal results are respectable, landing it in the vicinity of Arctic's MX-2, MX-4, and Arctic Silver 5. But it's also noticeably thicker, making it harder to manipulate at room temperature. Nevertheless, this is a solid product that sells for less than $1/g, making it the price/performance leader.

Gelid Solutions GC-Extreme

GC-Extreme is the best thermal paste in our round-up, maintaining a slim lead over the runner-up as long as you're using a heat sink with high mounting pressure. If this compound was a little softer, it'd be even more ideal and wouldn't require warming before application. Heating it up a bit does pay off though, and we recommend it for overclockers and enthusiasts. Due to its high viscosity, it's perhaps less ideal for beginners.

Noctua NT-H1

This paste is almost a classic by now, and it still gets widely recommended. Rightfully so? Our testing reveals that its price/performance ratio is almost as good as Gelid Solution's GC-2, and its thermal parameters are even better. Noctua's solution ends up in the upper mid-range of our contenders, and a low price makes it hard to pass up unless you're a hardcore overclocker.

Phanteks TH-NDC (Paste Bundled With Phanteks Coolers)

The paste that Phanteks includes with its heat sinks contains nano particles of diamond, approaches the thermal performance of Gelid's GC-Extreme, and can be applied as easily, if not more so. It is somewhat similar to Cooler Master's Extreme Fusion X1, but can be applied even by novices. A big shout-out to Phanteks for bundling TH-NDC with its coolers.

Pastes: Prolimatech

Prolimatech PK-1

If we were judging based on price, we certainly wouldn't call this an entry-level thermal compound. But how does it perform? Nano aluminum sounds pretty compelling, but the benchmark results are what matter to us. The PK-1 paste performs well enough, but doesn't blow us out of chairs. Really, it's the price that kills it. There are better alternatives out there, even if Prolimatech's entry-level solution is generally quite user-friendly.

Prolimatech PK-2

Yes, Prolimatech offers more than one thermal paste. The PK-2 compound in the green box sports better performance than PK-1. While it doesn't appear among the front runners, this paste is still in the upper mid-range.

Prolimatech PK-3

Prolimatech’s highest-end paste is more expensive than its other two models. Perhaps that yellow packaging is intended to suggest gold? This is a good thermal compound, but it's not the best one out there. It's also thick like the GC-Extreme, a product that the PK-3 can approach, but not quite reach. Warm this paste up before using it.

Pastes: Revoltec, Scythe, SilverStone, And Thermalright

Revoltec Thermal Grease Nano

No, this isn’t nail polish for female hardware enthusiasts; it's a liquid paste that's applied with a brush attached to the lid. Unfortunately, Revoltec's Thermal Grease Nano doesn't test particularly well. While it's easy to apply and remove, we measured lackluster thermal properties. Enthusiasts will want to stay away. At least it is inexpensive.

Scythe (Paste Bundled with Scythe Coolers)

Our tests with bundled thermal compounds continue. While Scythe's OEM manufacturer is unknown, at least the plastic bag has Scythe's name on it. The benchmark results come back average. They're not particularly good or bad.

SilverStone (Paste Bundled with SilverStone Coolers)

This is what you'll find when you pop open a heat sink from SilverStone. Although the syringe resembles the bundled pastes from be quiet! and Corsair, we come away with slightly different thermal results. The benchmark numbers aren't amazing. Rather, they fall into a range we'd consider pretty average. I wouldn't feel compelling to spend extra on aftermarket thermal compound, though doing so would yield better performance.

Thermalright Chill Factor III

For some reason, I only received a two-gram tube of this paste; the standard tube includes four grams. We generated some fairly average results with Chill Factor III as well. Consider this compound suitable for average users and beginners.

Pastes: Xigmatek

Xigmatek PTI-G3606

Xigmatek’s entry-level paste is called PTI-G3606, and it sells at a mid-range price. Measured thermal performance is acceptable and its ease of use is even commendable. At the end of the day, this is a solid product at a fair price for mainstream hardware enthusiasts. It's simply not what we'd recommend for more hardcore overclockers.

Xigmatek PTI-G4512

Xigmatek's premium thermal compound doesn't even cost more than its entry-level offering. But the trade-off for better thermal performance is higher viscosity. Before using it, warm this paste up. Although it's not really for beginners, we do get a good price/performance ratio out of the PTI-G4512 from Xigmatek.

Xigmatek (Paste Bundled with Xigmatek Coolers)

This is another paste bundled with a cooler we picked up off the shelf. In our tests, the freebie fares slightly worse than Xigmatek's low-end aftermarket stuff, but not by much. It's an average compound that you shouldn't feel compelled to shy away from.

Pastes: Xilence And Zalman

Xilence X5

According to our team in Germany, it appears that Xilence went out of business. Not that it matters much to our U.S. audience; the company's ZUB-XPTP.X5 thermal grease wasn't readily available here anyway. At least we have benchmark data for the compound in our charts for anyone overseas with it. In short, Xilence's X5 is suitable for entry-level systems. Just don't use it on an overclocked processor or a PC in Dubai.

Zalman ZM-STG1

Unfortunately, this one turned out to be a dud in our testing. Zalman's ZM-STG1 is easy enough to apply with a brush, but its effectiveness is sub-par. We'd consider it a notch above Revoltec’s competing compound, but not much higher. Overall, our measured price/performance ratio is a disaster.

Zalman ZM-STG2

The ZM-STG2 paste is priced comparably, but much better than the company's ZM-STG1. That doesn't make this offering good, per se. Surprisingly, both pastes share similar ingredient lists. The ZM-STG2 simply isn't watered down with too much silicone, and it remains tougher, even after burn-in.

Pastes: Just For Fun

Toothpaste

I made the mistake of buying a premium toothpaste with blue stripes through it. A cheap white paste would have probably fared better. Yes, you can use this stuff as a thermal compound, though its long-term stability is questionable and we wouldn't recommend it for overclocking. If all of the shops around you are closed, though, and you want to play a little Battlefield 4 on a new machine, you could probably get by for a couple of days.

Denture Adhesive

If you don't brush your teeth but do live with your grandma, denture adhesive could stand in for toothpaste during those same couple of days. Again, this is not a long-term solution. But then again, neither were grandma’s teeth (or yours, if you don't grab some toothpaste). Be careful with this adhesive. After burn-in, the cooler may stick to the heat spreader and prove hard to remove.

Results: Closed-Loop Liquid Cooler; High Mounting Pressure

I already described our test setup in Thermal Paste Comparison, Part One: Applying Grease And More. What follows is a performance chart on the liquid-cooled system employing high mounting pressure.

Results: Air Cooler; High Mounting Pressure

Likewise, we covered this configuration in Thermal Paste Comparison, Part One: Applying Grease And More. The following chart represents thermal performance of an air-cooled system employing high mounting pressure.

Results: CPU Air Cooler; Low Mounting Pressure

One last time, we covered this configuration in Thermal Paste Comparison, Part One: Applying Grease And More. This chart reflects our air-cooled machine with lower mounting pressure.

Results: Air-Cooled GPU; Medium Mounting Pressure

Our last bit of testing comes from applying these thermal compounds to GPUs, and the results are significantly different from what we saw cooling our CPUs.

The failure of some pastes may be explained by rapid hardening, and a second test with two additional cycles didn't change the outcome. What do we learn from those failures? While value-added pastes may work well with the CPU coolers they were bundled with, they may not behave well under the higher temperatures generated by powerful GPUs, and shouldn't be used with them.

It's Not As Easy As Picking A Favorite...

In the end, it doesn't necessarily matter how much you paid for your paste, or what thermal conductivity its manufacturer claims on the package. More important is the how: your application method makes or breaks this process.

Some of the pastes we tested remain classics, and are even relatively inexpensive. It only follows, then, that we'd caution you against spending big on a brand new paste that'll only make a temperature difference of 1 to 2 Kelvin. If that sort of delta plays a significant role in your overclock, you're courting disaster. Sufficient airflow through the enclosure should ensure that you're never dependent on a particularly high-performance thermal compound.

More hardcore overclockers tuning their systems competitively, or quiet computing enthusiasts who spin their fans down as low as possible for better acoustics might want to give more thought to their paste of choice. Even a majority of power users, however, should focus on a paste’s ease of use, leaning toward the softer compounds. A flawed application typically impacts thermal performance much more than the difference between pricey and value-oriented pastes ever could.

I don’t want to lift any one thermal compound up onto a pedestal, and I'm no fan of award inflation. Sure, I could drop a couple of favorites, but the assessment would be highly subjective because some folks weigh ease-of-use and performance differently. Moreover, a lot of these pastes perform a lot alike. We can still draw several conclusions from our work, though.

• Novices should gravitate to softer pastes and use the "lentil ball" application method
• Experts can warm up thicker pastes, making them easier to apply
• Softer pastes should be used with coolers that attach via low mounting pressure
• Pastes bundled with most CPU heat sinks are good enough
• Different rules apply for GPUs; you need to pick the compound you use on your graphics card very carefully
• While the legends spoken of liquid metals have a basis in fact, they are exaggerated

That’s it from my side. But let me also point out that our Thermal Compound Charts will be maintained with results from any new products that surface. What will I do with all the partially-used syringes and paste packs? Honestly, I don’t know. There's enough of this stuff around to last a lifetime...

Xikmatek has announced a new chassis, the Aquila. The Aquila is a Micro-ATX chassis in which the motherboard is mounted horizontally, rather than vertically, not unlike a number of Mini-ITX enclosures.

The enclosure can house a large number of high-end parts. Due to its size, it can house graphics cards up to 330 mm long, as well as CPU coolers up to 180 mm tall -- quite an achievement for a compact Micro-ATX enclosure. Moreover, the unit will house one optical drive, as well as two 3.5" drives and another two 2.5" drives. The case also holds full-size ATX power supplies.

Natively, the enclosure can hold either a 120 mm or 140 mm front intake fan, though through a couple of changes users will be able to fit a massive 200 mm intake fan. The top of the enclosure can hold two 140 mm fans (and as such also a 280 mm radiator), and the rear of the case will house another 140 mm exhaust fan. Cooling shouldn't be a concern.

Front I/O connectivity is handled by a pair of USB 3.0 ports as well as an HD microphone and headphone set of jacks.

There was no word on pricing or availability.

Xigmatek has launched the second generation of its Gaia and Loki CPU coolers that feature conventional aluminum fin tower heat sink designs, is compatible with most modern CPU sockets, and aims to provide mid-range (150 W TDP) and light (130 W TDP) performance, respectively.

The Gaia II measures 120 x 50 x 159 mm, weighs 460 g, features three 8 mm exposed copper heat pipes with a 120 mm PWM cooling fan that provides an 800 to 1500 RPM range and a maximum airflow of 56.3 CFM.

Moving on to the Loki II, the CPU cooler features a compact form factor of 92 x 134 x 50 mm, a weight of 130 g and features three 6 mm exposed copper heat pipes and a 92 mm PWM cooling fan that offers a range of 1200 – 2800 RPM and is rated for 52 CFM.

Though Xigmatek hasn’t provided information on pricing or availability at the time of writing, we fully expect the Gaia II and Loki II to retain its predecessor’s retail prices of $30 and $25, respectively.

Though Raijintek may seem to be a new entrant into the competitive world of CPU coolers, the company is a brand new name created by the main part of Cooler Master’s and Xigmatek’s team and so certainly has a wealth of experience in the field. The company, alongside its main distributor Caseking GmbH, has launched three new high-end CPU coolers: the Aidos, Themis and Erebos that are “dedicated to users looking for high quality, performance and efficiency.”

The Adios is a compact size cooler designed to fit most common chipsets and features a non-copper base design (C.D.C – CPU direct contact), patented solder-less-louver fin assembly for extra heat-pipe ventilation, and a “special patented heat-pipe / fine technology to prevent heat-pipe damage risk.” The CPU direct contact design, solder-less-louver fin assembly and heat-pipe / fin technology is featured on the Themis, which is also classified as a compact cooler but includes a larger 120 mm surface area for better heat dispersion.

Raijintek’s flagship cooler is the Erebos, which features a 140 mm surface area, 6 mm heat-pipes with “ultra large dissipating fins” to ensure that CPU heat is withdrawn as efficiently as possible. The cooler includes two 14013 140 mm cooling fans and should be compatible with most modern CPU sockets.

The Adios, Themis and Erebos CPU coolers are currently on sale for €16.90 ($22.27), € 3.90 ($31.49) and €34.90 ($45.98), respectively.  Raijintek has announced that they will be releasing additional products including enclosures and power supply units in the foreseeable future. 

Picking The Right Cooler For Haswell

After hearing about 5 GHz overclocks from pre-production fourth-generation Core processors (that's Haswell, for fans of code names), enthusiasts were despondent to hear that retail parts would be far less friendly. Angelini even went so far as to poll folks with hundreds of retail processors for his launch coverage in The Core i7-4770K Review: Haswell Is Faster; Desktop Enthusiasts Yawn. The consensus was that stability at 4.5 and 4.6 GHz on air was extremely rare, that most enthusiasts should expect to top out at 4.3 GHz or less using 1.2 V, and that heat is the most likely culprit.

Before we get into the details, let's have a quick look at the nine air coolers we'll be testing in today's round-up.

DeepCool’s Assassin and Phantek’s TC14PE return from our LGA 2011 round-up, ready to prove themselves against the more thermally-constrained Haswell package. The Assassin carries the Gamer Storm logo.

Prolimatech sent a pair of fans and alternative clips with its $80 PRO-GNSS-BK, pushing the as-tested configuration to $125.

Thermalright adds a second fan to its Archon SB-E, which now supports smaller LGA and even AMD’s sockets. Zalman updates its previously-reviewed CNPS10X in this Optima-version.

The Equalizer: Our Core i7-4770K Review Sample

One small detail that went largely overlooked in that already-mentioned launch article was voltage. Our source, whose retail processors were topping out in the 4.3 to 4.4 GHz range was only using 1.2 V to maintain low heat levels. After all, he's selling Haswell-based systems that need to remain stable through multiple years of warranty coverage. Meanwhile, I was pushing my press sample harder with 1.3 V. Was he being overly cautious? Was I too aggressive? Could my cooling situation really be that much better? Or might differences in stress testing account for everything?

One of our contacts recommended LinX to test the Hasewell architecture's advanced AVX 2.0 pipeline, suggesting it'd yield temperatures significantly higher than Prime95. Although we didn't see the delta he did, LinX does get somewhat hotter. It's even more taxing than the Intel stress test I used in our first Z87 Express motherboard round-up.

Switching to LinX broke my previous overclocking thermal limit at 1.3 V, forcing a drop to 1.25 V. The reduced voltage in turn dropped my “ragged edge” maximum to 4.6 GHz. Rather than trying to perfect that 4.6 GHz and worry about what might happen to it in the future as the sample started degrading, I informed today's invitees that we would test at 1.25 V and 4.50 GHz.

I also informed invitees that any cooler that allowed our CPU to bump the processor’s 100° Celsius thermal limit would need to be disqualified from this article’s conclusion.

Like the source Chris Angelini queried for his launch article, I could have also used 1.2 V to play it safe and limit my own overclocks to 4.4 GHz. But why would I do that? If I use my old MUX-120 review sample as a starting point, shouldn’t all of today’s top coolers be better?

Gamer Storm Assassin

Depending on where you look, you’ll find the Assassin CPU cooler sold under the DeepCool or Logisys brands, and perhaps as part number MC8000. The one thing both companies share is the Gamer Storm logo on the product and its packaging.

DeepCool didn’t need to specify any changes to the Assassin’s installation kit, since the mid-sized LGA mounting pattern is the same all the way back through the 1156, 1155, and 1150 interfaces. It’s also compatible with older LGA 775 and LGA 1366 boards, as well as the more modern LGA 2011. Its mounting kit is even able to replace the four-bolt bracket on AMD’s Socket AM2 through AM3+.

A decorative plated finish prevents oxidation of the Assassin cooler’s polished copper base, which comprises eight heat pipes to connect its pair of radiators.

The Assassin uses Intel’s LGA support plate as a spacer, preventing contact between its metal parts and any motherboard components, such as what we experienced in our recent System Builder Marathon. Rubber locating clips keep mounting studs in position without any crushing risks.

Assassin Installation

After positioning mounting screws on the cooler support plate (as shown on the previous page), the screws are inserted through motherboard holes (front-left in photo below), topped with plastic spacers (rear-left), topped again with mounting brackets (right), and then secured with nuts (right-rear).

A cross brace secures the Assassin cooler’s base to mounting brackets, using factory-installed spring-loaded screws to assure proper contact pressure.

The Assassin includes enough clips to install three fans and, unlike many competing products, the middle fan can be clipped to both radiators. Doing this reduces flex between the radiators.

Noctua NH-U14S

Unlike its monster-sized D14, Noctua’s NH-U14S uses a single radiator to reduce space, cost, and weight on the motherboard. Those sound like laudable goals as long as performance remains satisfactory, and the company offers an even-smaller NH-U12S for builds in more compact spaces.

A superbly-machined, polished, and plated base are intended to give the NH-U14S the best possible contact with CPU heat spreaders.

Designed specifically for mainstream platforms, the NH-U14S installation kit includes only a single socket support plate that fits Intel’s LGA 1150, 1155, and 1156. A second set of AMD-specific brackets use the motherboard’s integrated support plate.

The LGA support plate fits around Intel’s socket plate and rests upon the board, using a thin insulating sheet to prevent shorts. Though we expect this solution to suffice on microATX and ATX motherboards, contact pressure on nearby components could be a problem for certain mini-ITX-based solutions, as seen in our recent System Builder Marathon.

NH-U14S Installation

Studs on the Intel LGA support plate push through mounting holes from behind the motherboard (front-left, photo below) and are then topped with plastic spacers (front-right). Mounting brackets are next (rear), followed by nuts (rear-right).

A cross brace is factory-installed to the top of the NH-U14S base, as are a pair of spring-loaded hold-down nuts. These engage studs on the mounting brackets, and the springs assure appropriate pressure between the cooler base and CPU heat spreader.

Noctua also installs the NH-U14S' fan at the factory, though we removed it to access the front mounting nut in the above photo. It’s now clipped back into place.

Phanteks PH-TC14PE

The PH-TC14PE returns in red trim for our LGA 1150 cooling comparison, giving us a chance to see how a huge cooler that nearly topped our LGA 2011 charts copes with a tiny-but-hot overclocked Haswell die.

Oxidation-resistant electroplating in the PH-TC14PE’s finely-machined base is nearly translucent to provide optimal contact with the CPU’s heat spreader.

Relying on the original support plate for AMD’s Socket AM2 to AM3+ installation, the cooler’s universal Intel-compatible support plate uses the board’s smaller integrated socket plate as a shim. Thick rubber spacers minimize support plate warping, while preventing short circuits or crush damage on boards that have components near mounting holes.

PH-TC14PE Installation

Screws installed into the PH-TC14PE support plate (previous page) poke through from behind the motherboard (front, photo below). Plastic spacers (left-rear) support mounting brackets (right), which are then secured with screws (right-rear).

Phanteks adds a center screw to its cross bracket so that it won’t fall off when you install and remove the heat sink. Nuts on each end of the bracket engage studs on the mounting brackets, and springs on those nuts assure proper contact pressure between the cooler base and CPU heat spreader.

Phanteks includes enough clips to mount up to three fans, and bundles two fans in the PH-TC14PE’s stock configuration. The cooler base is up high enough to clear DIMMs up to two inches tall, and fans can be moved up or down on the sink for full memory clearance or added voltage regulator ventilation.

Prolimatech Genesis Black

Maker of the famous Megahalems heat sink, Prolimatech decided to change things up for its Genesis design by combining the benefits of both down- and cross-draft cooling. We received the even more exclusive Black version of this design.

Rather than take the typical one-size-fits-most approach, Prolimatech sells its heat sinks without fans. The Genesis includes clips for both 120 and 140 mm third-party fans (standard 25 mm thickness), and Prolimatech even offers a few fan models under its own name.

Most unusual of its fan products is Prolimatech’s 15 mm-thick 140 mm model. The firm sent a pair of these ($20 each), along with the special clips needed to use this nonstandard thickness on the Genesis ($5), adding a total of $45 to the cost of this $80 sink.

Oxide-resistant electroplating assures excellent contact between the Genesis’ finely-machined copper base and your CPU’s integrated heat spreader.

O-rings secure nuts to Prolimatek’s Intel-compatible support plate. The plate uses Intel’s socket backing plate as a spacer, and the nuts have shoulders to prevent pull-through. Though setup requires a little dexterity, the result is a mount that doesn’t create any clearance issues with nearby components.

Genesis Black Installation

Double-ended studs (left-rear in photo below) secure the support plate’s nuts (photo forward) to the motherboard, while additional nuts secure mounting brackets (top-right) to the studs.

Secured with ordinary screws, a cross bracket presses the Genesis cooler’s base against the CPU’s integrated heat spreader.

Your choice of fans are then clipped onto the heat sink’s twin radiators. This design allows one of the fans to cool the CPU, DRAM, and motherboard components simultaneously.

Worried about DIMM clearance? We’re not. Tall modules work fine. Rather, the parallel radiator’s primary drawback appears to be that it blocks DIMM access, complicating memory upgrades and diagnostics.

Scythe Ashura SCASR-1000

Sporadic availability has lead to wild price fluctuations in Scythe’s latest products, with the Ashura selling for anywhere between $50 and $80 when we can find it. Hopefully the firm stabilizes formerly-productive partnerships with major U.S. distributors.

The Ashura is, after all, one of the least expensive high-end coolers in today’s round-up, owing that description to its oversized radiator, 140 mm fan, and finely-machined copper base.

Supporting AMD sockets back to AM2 and Intel LGAs back to 775, the Ashura’s Intel support plate rotates to various positions to align mounting holes. Less-than-perfect for boards with mounting-hole crowding, we at least find rubber pads to protect those components from being crushed.

Ashura Installation

As with most coolers that employ standoffs, the Ashura uses insulated washers to prevent motherboard scratches and shorts. Those washers aren’t attached to the standoffs, however, and must be positioned over the holes first (bottom-left of photo below).

The standoffs (bottom-right of photo above) screw into corresponding holes in the under-motherboard support plate and are topped with mounting brackets (top of photo). Screws (top-right) hold the mounting bracket in place.

A cross brace installs over the Ashura’s base, screwing to the mounting brackets to hold the base tightly against the CPU.

The fan can be clipped onto the heat sink at various heights above the motherboard, providing either added DIMM clearance or added airflow under the fins, which can reduce a motheboard’s voltage regulator temperature.

SilverStone Argon AR01

SilverStone targets the Argon AR01 at value seekers, who can find the entire package for $35 at various sites. Though the modest price is matched by moderate specifications, budget-sensitive enthusiasts might find another advantage in an installation kit the lets it fit multiple platforms.

A proponent of direct contact with its heat pipes, SilverStone selected the three-pipe AR01 for this round-up specifically because of the Haswell core’s small heat spreader. Using the company's larger AR03 as an example, the outer pipes on that design don't make contact with the CPU. SilverStone does, however, increase the diameter of its AR01 pipes to 8 mm, up from the AR03’s 6 mm.

SilverStone’s machinists do a great job of leveling the base to maximize contact.

The AR01’s support plate features three holes on the Intel side to line up with LGA 775, 1150/1155/1156, and 1366. It also flips over to replace AMD’s default four-screw support clip system. Both sides use a thin, hard insulation layer to prevent shorts, though we’ve seen places where those wide tabs won’t fit.

Argon AR01 Installation

Insulated washers (bottom-center of photo below) protect the motherboard from bracket standoffs (right side of photo), which are screwed into the motherboard support plate. Mounting brackets top these standoffs, and are secured with nuts (top of photo).

Also secured by thick nuts, a cross brace holds the AR01’s base tightly against the top of the CPU. Cross cuts provide for compatibility with both Phillips and flat-head screwdrivers, in addition to an included wrench.

Synthetic rubber straps then connect the fan to the heat sink, preventing the transmission of vibrations. Unlike the rubber rivets used by some competing brands, SilverStone’s straps snap in from the side for easy removal.

Thermalright Archon SB-E X2

We’ve seen Thermalright’s extra-wide heat sink in a previous review, but the new version includes an updated installation kit in addition to its dual-fan (X2) name change.

The Intel support plate is now separate from the AMD plate, and includes a couple of special features to eliminate any conflicts with nearby motherboard components.

The bolts slide, with only a small portion of the bolt pressing against the board. That eliminates most of the on-board component conflicts experience with many competing products.

The bolts are also topped with insulating plastic washers, which add even more space for components that could be close to the mounting holes.

We still get the quality of a smoothly-machined copper base, which transfers heat to all eight heat pipes regardless of our processor’s small contact area.

Archon SB-E X2 Installation

Intel’s square LGA cooler mounts allow any cooler to be rotated 90°, but AMD’s rectangular bolt pattern doesn’t. Thermalright’s cooler bracket is notched on only two edges for AMD mounting, so the firm adds extra mounting studs to enable the same mounting flexibility on all compatible platforms.

Standoffs with factory-applied insulating washers screw into the support plate under the motherboard, and are then topped with the mounting bracket. The mounting bracket is secured with nuts.

The X2’s revised cross brace includes factory-installed mounting nuts on each end and a pressure-adjusting screw in the center.

After attaching the cross-brace to the mounting bracket, the pressure-adjusting screw is tightened to the specifications outlined in Thermalright’s manual. The lack of any torque indication on the wrench requires builders to use their best judgment.

User-applied adhesive rubber tabs reduce the transmission of fan vibration to the heat-sink’s cooling fins. We had to move these a few times to find the best position.

Xigmatek Dark Knight-Series Night Hawk Frostbourne Edition

If you like Xigmatek’s latest cooler, we wish you the best of luck finding it. After all, the company isn't big on model names, and online vendors are labeling this cooler by various versions of its extra-long name. What we have here today isn’t a failure to communicate, but instead a limited-edition white version of its Dark Knight II.

Xigmatek favors direct contact between its heat pipes and the CPU's heat spreader. It uses three fat pipes to achieve good coverage across the Haswell-based CPU's fairly small spreader. Its sanded finish is far smoother than it appears, and fills nicely with the tiny particles of silver-based thermal compounds.

A universal plastic support plate rotates into various positions to line up with Intel’s three LGA bolt patterns (775, 1150/1155/1156, 1366), and flips over to replace AMD’s four-bolt rectangular retainer. The wide tabs of this design work with most motherboards, though we’ve seen exceptions.

Night Hawk Installation

A fiber washer (bottom of photo below) prevents standoffs (right of photo) from scratching your motherboard as they're screwed into the support plate beneath the board. Mounting brackets top the standoffs and are secured with nuts (top of photo).

Chrome-plated spacers prevent the final set of mounting nuts from gouging an aluminum cross brace. The nuts are cross cut to support both flat-head and Phillips screwdrivers, in addition to an included wrench, and squeeze the base of the cooler tightly against the top of the CPU.

Rubber rivets secure the Night Hawk’s fan to heat sink fins, while preventing the transmission of vibrations.

Zalman CNPS10X Optima

Like one of its competitors, Zalman adds a channel down the center of its CNPS10X Optima heat sink to direct air, rather than let too much of the fan’s pressure escape from the sides. The cooler also features a universal support plate similar to that competitor’s, except for a few minor improvements.

Rather then use plastic, Zalman’s support plate is steel. It still flips over to accommodate Intel and AMD hole patterns, but uses threaded inserts and soft plastic insert holders to minimize motherboard contact and prevent annoying conflicts. Intel’s socket plate acts as a spacer to complete this low-impact design.

Zalman also puts a slightly different spin on the direct touch design concept by using four thin heat pipes instead of three fatter ones. Its base assembly is sanded completely flat, leaving only tiny sanding scratches to fill with thermal compound.

CNPS10X Optima Installation

The top side of the Optima’s base is made in two parts, and sandwiches mounting brackets between them. Screws on the bottom pull down on the plate above.

Shoulders on the mounting screws eliminate the need for standoffs, allowing the CNPS10X Optima to be screwed directly to its support plate.

The Optima’s fan clips into place, with a little flexibility in height adjustment. Raising it allows additional DIMM clearance and lowering it allows more air to pass beneath the bottom fins towards the motherboard’s voltage regulator.

Test Settings And Benchmarks

Asus’ top-overclocking Z87-Pro lays the groundwork for thermal testing, but not without compromise: knowing that CPU throttling would prevent accurate thermal measurement, I decided to prevent that occurrence by reducing core voltage to 1.25V.

LinX 0.6.4 is the new application that generates the most taxing thermals using Intel's diminutive Haswell die. I also warned cooler manufacturers that we'd have to drop them from contention if the CPU reached 100° Celsius, since throttling would prevent accurate readings above that point. For our part, I kept the room temperature below 23° Celsius. I further prevented the case from affecting thermal readings by leaving the motherboard in open air, hanging the board vertically to replicate its position in a chassis.

Lacking any mechanical support for a hanging graphics card, I used integrated graphics during these tests.

Results: Cooling And Fan Speed

The most noticeable feature of our temperature charts is the narrow range of approximately 12° between highest and lowest CPU core temperatures. Dismantled Core i7-4770s suggest that this is due to the interface material Intel uses. At best, this shows that huge improvements in cooling technology are needed to create relatively small drops in temperature.

The results are also the average of all four highest temperatures, and some cores run hotter than others.

Scythe’s Ashura is the hottest cooler to stay under the processor’s 100° limit at a room temperature of 23°. Zalman’s CNPS10X Optima failed the test at just over 21° room temperature, and hours of extra A/C were required to get the room cold enough to finish Argon AR01 and Night Hawk Frostbourne measurements.

We might have blamed Xigmatek’s white paint for the cooler’s inability to cope with a Haswell-based CPU at a mere 1.25 V, if not for the audible cues to fan speed. The slower speed likely corresponds to less airflow, though fin design is also a potential factor.

Noise And Acoustic Efficiency

We saw a fairly wide range of fan speeds, and some coolers even had two fans. Yet, the difference in noise between the quietest and noisiest model is far less than the 10 dB(A) that would indicate doubled volume in the (logarithmic) decibel scale.

The Gamer Storm Assassin and Argon AR01 are roughly 50% noisier than Prolimatech’s as-delivered PRO-GNSS-BK. Since Prolimatech's heat sink requires additional fans though (fans aren't included with the heat sink), the noise we're reporting only represents this specific $125 combined configuration.

The relative scale for cooling-to-noise calculations refers to how each cooler relates to the average of all coolers in today’s test. Dividing the group average by each cooler’s result gives a higher percent score for lower temperatures. Dividing each cooler’s actual noise level by the group average produces a higher percent score for higher noise. Noise, however, is the divisor, and higher divisors produce lower dividends.

The results use a 100% baseline. Since nothing can be more than 100% efficient, we zero out the chart scale by subtracting 100%.

Besides being the quietest product, Prolimatech’s PRO-GNSS-BK configuration is also the third-coolest. That combination gives the firm a significant lead in our cooling-to-noise calculations. Hitting the middle of our cooling scale, a second-place finish in noise measurements gives the Noctua a second-place acoustic efficiency finish. Phanteks and Thermalright are the only two remaining companies to beat the class average.

Cooling Value

We warned companies that any cooler that allowed our CPU to top 100° Celsius at 1.25 V would be disqualified from further contention, and found ourselves lucky that we were even able to get the room cold enough in July to finish testing. Of the coolers that survived our tests, Scythe’s Ashura barely qualified at a 98° maximum in a 23° room.

For many overclockers, that means Scythe’s top-value Ashura presents a worst-case cooling scenario, and that anything less powerful isn’t going to satisfy you if you're overclocking a Haswell-based processor. Noctua’s NH-U14S takes a distant second in value, and this $75 part is the cheapest (and hottest) cooler worthy of a full recommendation.

With a 29 decibel noise reading in our lab, Noctua’s NH-U14S climbs a little higher up the value chart when acoustics are considered. The top position of Scythe’s Ashura would qualify it for a value award, if not for the caveat that users must keep the inside of their case below 25° in order to make proper use of a modest 1.25 V overclock.

Which Heat Sink Best Contends With Haswell's Heat Problems?

Here's the bombshell we figured out from today's testing: for overclocking, a quad-core Haswell-based processor at 22 nm requires more cooling than a six-core Sandy Bridge-E CPU at 32 nm, even though its lower power consumption produces less heat. The back-up for this is that two of the coolers from our Sandy Bridge-E cooling round-up re-appeared today with far worse apparent performance. Most overclockers blame Intel’s newer integrated heat spreader and transfer material for this discrepancy. These days, cheap paste replaces solder for connecting the CPU die to the spreader.

Cross-compatibility between LGA 1150, 1155, and 1156 sinks theoretically makes it possible for us to test dozens of heat sinks and fans. Unfortunately, most solutions are too small to cope with the heat issues an overclocked Haswell-based CPU suffers. Since Haswell has the smoothest thermal throttling implementation I’ve yet experienced, I set a simple rule that any cooler that hit its threshold temperature (100° Celsius) would be disqualified from final consideration. That guideline prevented the submission of many samples, and even knocked three of the coolers we tested out of contention. But it left a hole wide open for one cooler to slip through at a maximum core temperature of 75° over ambient. Nobody should be expected to keep the inside of their case cooler than 25°.

With a moderate price and moderate cooling capability, Scythe’s Ashura SCASR-1000 would have received our “Smart Buy” award if we didn’t need to warn you to keep your case below 25° internally. We'll save you the conversion. That's 77° Fahrenheit inside your case, just to run a Core i7-4770K at 1.25 V. And the company might still have won that award if we lowered our overclocking parameters. We don't think it'd be fair to hand out a prize, since we announced the settings we'd be using during the invite phase. However, if your overclocking expectations are lower than 4.5 GHz, we think you'll be pleased with the Ashura.

The top-performing configuration in our review, Prolimatech’s PRO-GNSS-BK with dual PRO-USV14 fans and PRO-USB-ARMG adapter clips would likewise be a contender for our highest-end “Elite” award, if not for its total build price. If I'm an enthusiast looking for the best of the best, which is what wins an Elite award from us, then I'm going to go with liquid cooling rather than spending a total of $125 on those parts, though we have to give Prolimatech credit for an elite collection of cooling components. 

Noctua's NH-U14S isn't the strongest performer qualifying for our stamp of our approval, but it is the least-expensive option able to do what we need it to. Second place on our value charts behind the Ashura, which barely qualifies, the NH-U14S is effective enough to allow a 31° case temperature before our Core i7-4770K at 4.5 GHz started throttling under unusually stressful test loads. In other words, it allows us to get most of our intended performance most of the time.

If that sounds like a half-hearted justification, consider the field and consider our tepid response to Core i7-4770K in the first place. We aren't particularly enthused about Intel's latest effort, but Noctua's NH-U14S makes the best of a difficult situation.

Xigmatek has released a new CPU cooler, and while we have seen it before at Computex, some more official images and details have been announced. The cooler features a rather peculiar design -- quite different from traditional C-type coolers. The main difference is in the addition of a sort of 'second' heat sink. The cooler is known as the Xigmatek Orthrus SD1467.

The cooler features a solid copper base from which protrude a total of seven 6 mm copper heat pipes. The central five heat pipes go to the main aluminum fin stack, while the two flanking heat pipes merge with the second, much smaller fin stack. The larger fin stack carries a 140 mm PWM fan, which spins at speeds between 800 and 1200 RPM, while the smaller fin stack carries an 80 mm PWM fan capable of spinning at speeds up to 2000 RPM.

The entire cooler is covered with a plastic shroud, and the fans, while orange, have white LED lighting.

The unit will be compatible with all modern day AMD and Intel CPU sockets, and is said to work on all motherboard form factors ranging all the way from E-ATX down to Mini-ITX.

Xigmatek gave no word on when the unit would be coming to shelves, nor did it inform the world about its MSRP.

Earlier we showed you Xigmatek's Janus CPU cooler; now Xigmatek is showing off two new C-type CPU coolers at Computex: the Boreas and the Orthrus. 

The Boreas cooler follows the same principle as the Janus cooler, though instead of a small fan below the aluminum fin stack it has a bigger fan. It has five 6 mm copper heat pipes and two 140 mm PWM controlled fans. The fans can spin at speeds between 800 RPM and 1500 RPM, and push up to 38.42 CFM. Including the fans, the unit weighs 950 grams and measures 140 x 140 x 125 mm. 

The Orthrus is a more interesting cooler, as it doesn't really follow the traditional C-type cooler design. Seven 6 mm copper heat pipes protrude from the base, which splits in two directions. The five central heat pipes go up to a large aluminum fin stack, which is cooled by the same 140 mm fan as that on the Boreas cooler. The other two heat pipes go to a smaller aluminum fin stack, which is cooled by a smaller 80 mm PWM fan. This fan can spin at speeds up to 2000 RPM. The entire top of the cooler is covered by a black ABS shroud. Including the fans and the shroud, the unit weighs 875 grams and measures 146 x 200 x 165 mm.

Xigmatek gave no word regarding the availability or pricing of either of the coolers.

Xigmatek has released a new CPU cooler, the Janus. According to Xigmatek, the name Janus comes from the mythological god, Janus, who is the god of beginnings, endings, time, gates, and doors, who is able to look into the future and the past.

The CPU cooler is built on a low profile, yet it still uses two fans. The cooler measures 120 x 110 x 45 mm and weighs 430 grams. Its copper base is polished, and from it stem six 6 mm heat pipes, which bring the heat to the aluminum fin array. On top of this array is a 120 mm fan, and underneath hides an 80 mm fan. The bigger fan rotates at speeds from 800 RPM to 1200 RPM, displaces 38 CFM, and produces a maximum noise level of 22.4 dBA. The smaller fan rotates up to 2000 RPM, moves 13 CFM, and makes up to 19.2 dBA of noise.

Janus works on most modern sockets including the LGA1150 socket. So far, no word has been released on its pricing or availability.

The Xigmatek Assassin is a full-tower enclosure that measures 210 x 500 x 500 mm (W x D x H), is constructed from a combination of SECC steel and ABS, and will be available in black and white variants with an optional acrylic side panel window.

As the title indicates, the Assassin doesn’t lack for space. It supports E-ATX motherboards, features three 5.25” and eight 3.5” tool free drive bays, and eight expansion card bays that support graphics cards up to 320 mm in length.

With regards to cooling and airflow, the motherboard tray features “valved flaps” for cable management, support for 160 mm CPU coolers, and space for up to eight 120 mm cooling fans to be installed (two front intakes, two top exhausts, a bottom intake, and two conveyors on the internal drive cage).

Xigmatek has yet to provide any pricing or availability information.

As the name suggests, the heatpipes in a HDT cooler are placed in the base of the cooler and gaps will normally be present between the base and the heatpipes. This results in a lower surface area of contact when the base touches the CPU which will in turn reduce the cooler's thermal efficiency. To solve this problem Xigmatek's Xi-3 thermal compound was designed specifically for HDT coolers and features smaller, more dense particles. The Xi-3 is rated at 104 Pa·s, specific gravity at 2.5 g/cm³, 9.1 W/mK thermal conductivity and features an anti-bleed composition.

As with most other compounds on the market, the compound is non-electrically conductive and will be sold in a 4 g syringe for a currently unknown price.

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Though "Frostbourne Edition" sounds like something from World of Warcraft, it's actually the latest variant of Xigmatek's popular Dark Knight CPU Cooler with an impressive silver exterior. The cooler measures 120 x 50 x 159 mm, weighs 406 g and includes an XOF-F1251 120 mm PWN fan that spins at between 800 and 1400 RPM and is capable of moving 60 CFM of air at noise output of just under 16 dBA.

The SD1283 is an aluminium alloy fin-tower heatsink with Xigmatek's Stealth ceramic coating for improved heat dissipation and feature three 8 mm U shaped heatpipes that are rated for a maximum TDP of 160 W.

The Dark Knight SD1283 Frostbourne Edition supports nearly all modern AMD and Intel sockets and is expected to hit store shelves at a price of $50.

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Building A PC: What Do We Get For $800?

System Builder Marathon, Q1 2013: The Articles

Here are links to each of the four articles in this quarter’s System Builder Marathon (we’ll update them as each story is published). And remember, these systems are all being given away at the end of the marathon.

To enter the giveaway, please fill out this SurveyGizmo form, and be sure to read the complete rules before entering!

Day 1: The $600 Gaming PC
Day 2: The $800 Enthusiast PC
Day 3: The $1,000 Performance PC
Day 4: Performance And Value, Dissected
Day 5: The $1,600 Alternative PC

Introduction

As Paul let us know yesterday, this quarter's System Builder Marathon is a little different in that we're putting a bigger emphasis on performance per dollar by narrowing our budgets to $600, $800, and $1,000. Thomas has long maintained that there is this point of diminishing returns that shows up right around $800. Above it, and you pay more for every unit of performance you get. Under it, and you're leaving easy gains on the table. By the end of our experiment, we hope to know whether Soderstrom's Theorem is sound enough to become law, or if the line is blurrier than he thinks.

Unfortunately for me, a shifting price target means that my mid-range enthusiast-oriented build loses $200 compared to the $1,000 system I built back in December. As a result, I decided to ditch the SSD. Also, I can no longer afford a powerful GeForce GTX 670 for $370.

The good news is that AMD's Radeon HD 7870 is now available from a couple of different companies with a stripped-down Tahiti GPU, delivering strong graphics performance under $300. Although we're going to miss the snappy boot-up times and almost-instant application launches the solid-state drive enabled, we probably won't be penalized too much in the benchmark results.

We're still expecting great things from this $800 setup. I even have my hopes that it'll give last quarter's pricier $1,000 configuration a run for its money.

Just to show you that we really try to abide by our budgets, I'm listing the prices I paid for the components back when they were ordered. Some of the components might have fluctuated a bit (for example, the memory now costs $11 bucks extra, though we're happy to report that the PowerColor card should be in stock again at Newegg this week for less than $210).

CPU, Motherboard, And Cooler

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K

This is the staple component of our $800 system, and we'd frankly need a lot more money in our budget to even consider a pricier Core i7. Fortunately, this K-series SKU is multiplier-unlocked, giving me a significant differentiator that Paul's $600 box does not enjoy.

Read Customer Reviews of Intel's Core i5-3570K

Selling for $230, the Core i5-3570K might be challenged by AMD's $200 FX-8350 at it stock clock rates in threaded applications (albeit at much higher power consumption. When overclocking is an option, however, this Intel chip is in a league of its own.

Motherboard: ASRock Z77 Pro3

Read Customer Reviews of ASRock's Z77 Pro3

Our smaller budget means we have less flexibility when it comes to platform selection. Thankfully, ASRock sells a number of value-oriented options designed for enthusiasts. The Z77 Pro3 has all of the BIOS settings needed for serious overclocking attempts, but at a reasonable $90 price tag.

It's pure coincidence that this platform is so similar to the Z75-based board Paul chose in yesterday's story; we don't compare notes before making our selections.

CPU Cooler: Rosewill RCX-ZAIO 92

Read Customer Reviews of Rosewill's RCX-ZAIO-92

We reviewed Rosewill's inexpensive RCX-ZAIO-92 back in 2010 (Roundup: Six Sub-$40 Performance CPU Coolers Compared). It performed well in that story, particularly at its low price point. 

Given a lower budget today, we thought it'd be a perfect time to try this third-party solution once again. The RCX-ZAIO-92 only adds $15 to our total cost.

Video Card, Power Supply, And Case

Video Card: PowerColor PCS+ AX7870 Myst Edition

Don't let its name fool you; the GPU in this graphics card is actually a cut-down Tahiti (check out Tahiti LE, Tested: PowerColor's HD7870 PCS+ Myst Edition). That's right, the same one used in AMD's Radeon HD 7900-series cards. 

Previously, the Pitcairn-based Radeon HD 7870 with 1,280 shaders and 1,200 MHz memory was this segment's price/performance leader. But this card, with 1,536 shaders and 1,500 MHz memory, beats it.

Read Customer Reviews of PowerColor's PCS+ AX7870 Myst Edition

At $240 on Newegg, and with stock performance closer to the 1,792-shader Radeon HD 7950, this graphics card allows our $800 enthusiast-oriented PC to remain competitive in the high-end gaming arena.

Power Supply: Antec Neo Eco 520C 520 W

Read Customer Reviews of Antec's Neo Eco 520C

Although we've been favoring Corsair's CX600 in our mid-range builds lately, today's budget cut forces us to look elsewhere. Antec's Neo Eco 520C has an excellent reputation for a low-priced power supply, and our decision to use an Intel CPU should help keep consumption down compared to the FX-8350 we used last time. At $55, this is an exceptional component for the money.

Case: Xigmatek Asgard II

Read Customer Reviews of Xigmatek's Asgard II

The case is another component that we saved a few dollars on in order to remain within our $800 budget. Thankfully, the Asgard II is a very spacious, elegant-looking case that we can live with. There's only a single 120 mm rear fan, the PSU is top-mounted, and the drives are aligned front-to-back. However, considering the $34 retail price, we can't really complain.

Memory, Hard Drives, And Optical Drive

Memory: Crucial Ballistix Tactical 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR3-1600 Memory Kit

Despite our lower budget, you've made it clear that you want to see at least 8 GB in this mid-range build. Crucial's DDR3 kit does the job for a reasonable $53 on Newegg, and with good 8-8-8-24 timings at 1,600 MT/s, too.

Read Customer Reviews of Crucial's BLE2KIT4GD31608DE1TX0 8 GB Kit

Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda ST500DM002 500 GB

Read Customer Reviews of Seagate's ST500DM002 500 GB Hard Drive

With no money for an SSD boot drive, today's system relies on a 500 GB Seagate Barracuda.

It's true that 500 GB isn't very large by today's standards. At least the 7,200 RPM spindle and 16 MB data cache help on the performance side, though. Make no mistake: the reason we went for this disk was its $60 price tag.

Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224BB DVD-ROM

Read Customer Reviews of Samsung's SH-224BB DVD-ROM

To put it simply, we chose the DVD-R drive with the lowest price. On the day we placed our order, Samsung's SH224BB earned that distinction for $18.

System Assembly And Overclocking

We were pleasantly surprised with Xigmatek's Asgard II case. The tool-less drive mounts work well, and the spacious interior provides ample room for a clean installation. For a budget-oriented chassis, it actually feels well-built, too. Our biggest complaint about this enclosure is that it appears to have been dropped during shipping, requiring us to push out a few creases.

With that said, Paul has used this case several times in the System Builder Marathon, and was happy with it in the past. It's good enough for me and my less-full wallet today.

The good news is that we didn't have any issues with the case, unlike Paul's experience yesterday. The orange-on-black color scheme inside is attractive enough, and we almost wish we had picked the orange-trimmed version to match.

Overclocking

Overclocking the Core i5-3550K is straightforward enough, and ASRock's Z77 Pro3 gives us all of the settings we need to do it properly. We did give the BIOS' auto-overclocking feature a try, but it failed to boot at 4.6 GHz. And while the automatically-configured 4.4 GHz setting did load up into Windows, one thread failed during a Prime95 stress test.

This forced us to tackle the overclock manually. Even with incremental voltage increases, the system wouldn't boot at 4.6 GHz. A 0.1 V bump to the processor yielded a stable 4.5 GHz. However, certain benchmarks returned lower performance than what I was getting at stock frequencies. So, I dropped the overclock to 4.4 GHz with a +0.085 V offset and got the speed-up I was expecting.

As for the memory overclock, I simply triggered the memory kit's XMP profile, which increased the frequency to DDR3-1600 with 8-8-8-24 timings.

I then swapped over to my graphics card. Not sure what to expect from AMD's Tahiti LE GPU, I was surprised to see the chip take 1,275 MHz and a memory frequency of 1,650 MHz. Unfortunately, those settings triggered some throttling during our benchmarks, requiring that I step back to a 1,150 MHz core clock and 1,575 MHz memory. Still, when you consider PowerColor's card ships at 975 MHz, our GPU overclock is respectable.

Test System And Benchmarks

And here are the benchmark details:

Results: Synthetics

I'd expect 3DMark 11 to be one of the most interesting benchmarks in our suite due to its ability to measure aggregate performance, an isolated graphics score, a CPU metric in its Physics suite, and a Combined result.

Even when we overclock it, this quarter's Tahiti LE-based Radeon HD 7870 cannot overcome the GeForce GTX 670's graphics performance. This is where losing $200 seems to hurt the most.

At stock clock rates, the Core i5-3570K doesn't do particularly well against the FX-8350 in Futuremark's Physics sub-test. Once we overclock it, however, the Core i5 sails past last quarter's result, helping our $800 configuration record its first victory against the previous $1,000 setup.

Intel's processors tend to do well in PCMark, so it comes as little surprise when our current $800 build edges out our FX-based effort in the Overall and Productivity tests. Meanwhile, last quarter's SSD earns that machine a vastly superior storage result.

Results: Media Encoding

Both LAME and iTunes are used to convert audio files from one format to another, and neither test is threaded. Consequently, Intel's Core i5-3570K does notably better than AMD's FX-8350 thanks to better performance per clock cycle. Access to unconstrained overclocking propels the Ivy Bridge-based chip even further ahead in both benchmarks.

Unlike the audio transcoding workloads, our video-oriented conversions, HandBrake and TotalCode Studio, are heavily-threaded. These demonstrate an advantage for AMD's module-based architecture at stock clock rates. But Intel's i5-3570K has much more room for overclocking, and manages a slight win in both categories when tweaked.

Results: Rendering And Productivity

As with our video transcoding tests, rendering software is notorious for exploiting the benefits of multi-core processors. Thus, it comes as no surprise to see  taking advantage of multiple threads, so it comes as no surprise that 3ds Max and Blender perform very well on AMD's four-module FX flagship. Once again, though, Intel's overclocked Core i5 catches up.

Likewise, ABBYY FineReader and Visual Studio 2010 make effective use of multiple cores. And as before, the Core i5 trails AMD's FX at stock clock rates, and passes it once we factor in overclocking.

Results: Adobe Creative Suite

As you already know, we run two scripted Photoshop benchmarks: one that is threaded and runs on our CPUs and another that leverages OpenCL acceleration to tax our graphics cards. They're completely different workloads, which is why performance varies so much.

In the CPU-oriented test, last quarter's FX comes out ahead at stock clock rates. Then, both processors tie when we overclock. The OpenCL-based benchmark shows a huge advantage favoring AMD's Radeon HD 7870 over the GeForce GTX 670.

Meanwhile, we know that Adobe's Acrobat X is single-threaded. Naturally, then, our PDF document creation workload favors the Core i5 stock and overclocked.

Premiere Pro's media encoder is threaded, and our results from that benchmark consequently look a lot like the other content creation apps we've already tested.

After Effects has always seemed very sensitive to memory allocation, and AMD's ability to operate on eight threads in parallel might actually be hurting it in our AE benchmark. The Intel platform gets more memory per core, and consequently turns in notably better scores at stock and overclocked settings.

Results: Compression Tools

Corel's WinZip 17 is the product of much retooling. The company heard complaints that its engine wasn't threaded, went back, and optimized for multiple CPU cores. Moreover, it also put in the time to enable OpenCL support. At first, this only worked on AMD GPUs. But the latest version allows OpenCL support on any platform with the requisite drivers.

In our CPU-only test, we'd expect AMD's four-module design, capable of handling eight threads at a time, to turn in a lead. It doesn't, though, and Intel's Core i5 wins at stock and overclocked frequencies. 

The OpenCL-based results are much closer together, though the Intel/AMD combination comes out on top again.

WinRAR shows both systems performing similarly at stock clocks, though the Intel box pulls away once it's overclocked.

7-Zip sees a benefit from the FX-8350 that must be related to its ability to operate on eight threads at a time.

Results: Battlefield 3 And The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Battlefield 3

Battlefield 3's single-player campaign is typically limited by graphics performance. Given the dissimilar graphics cards we're using, it's actually really surprising to see our results so close together at this title's Medium quality preset. Once we step up to the more demanding Ultra settings, though, Nvidia's GeForce GTX 670 assumes a lead.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Unlike Battlefield, Skyrim tends to be limited by processor performance rather than the graphics card.

At the High detail preset, this quarter's Intel-based build takes a notable lead. Using the Ultra preset with 8x MSAA, that advantage is maintained until 2560x1600, where the bottleneck shifts to the GPU.

Results: F1 2012 And Far Cry 3

F1 2012

DiRT Showdown was replaced by F1 2012 last quarter, which is newer and circumvents some of the performance issues we saw in the previous title.

Like Skyrim, this is another CPU-limited game. Intel's Core i5 exhibits a significant average frame rate advantage until we test at 2560x1600, where graphics demands shift the load back onto our graphics cards.

Far Cry 3

Far Cry 3 is a new addition to the game test suite. This demanding game demonstrates a CPU bottleneck at the High quality setting. However, under the influence of the Ultra preset with 4x MSAA enabled, we're decidedly GPU-limited.

Power And Temperature

At this point, the power consumption chart we see below should have been expected. We're already well-acquainted with the Ivy Bridge architecture's efficient nature compared to anything we've seen AMD achieve with Piledriver. But it really hits home when you consider that we used a 520 W power supply in an $800 build, and barely topped 350 W of consumption with our CPU and GPU overclocked. I don't think I'd be comfortable using the same PSU on last quarter's build, which approached 500 W when we overclocked it.

The thermal results come in fairly close to each other, though Intel's CPU does heat up quickly when we apply more voltage and a higher multiplier to it. Rosewill's RCX-ZAIO-92does a great job at stock clock rates. However, it's quickly overwhelmed when the Core i5 is pushed to 4.4 GHz (it makes sense now that Thomas said, "Though it was somewhat hot and noisy on our Core i7 test system, we could recommend the Rosewill unit specifically to Core i3 overclockers with extremely tight budgets" in his review of this sink).

Considering the FX-8350's high power usage, the $1,000 build’s Xigmatek's Loki heat sink does quite well in comparison.

When Does $800 Buy You More Than $1000?

When we compare this quarter's $800 machine with last quarter's pricier configuration, we come away with differences that are so familiar they now seem cliche. The FX-8350 does really well in threaded software, but cannot overclock as well on air. Thus, when it's put up against an overclockable Intel chip (even a quad-core model without Hyper-Threading), the FX falls behind. Compounding the performance story, FX-8350 uses more power every step of the way. None of that is news, though. We've seen it happen time and time again.

As such, our mid-range CPU recommendations remain the same. If you're not overclocking and you don't care about power consumption, the FX remains a solid option in an affordable workstation tasked with running content creation or media-oriented applications. Unfortunately, for the market AMD is targeting, overclocking is popular. If you're down to tweak and tune, Intel's Core i5 can be made to run faster, even while using less power. Overclocked or not, though, the Ivy Bridge-based chip is faster in lightly-threaded workloads.

How about gaming, though? Let's zero in on performance at 1920x1080 for a moment:

These results fall fairly close together, considering they're completely dissimilar platforms. The high detail settings and 1920x1080 resolution help put an emphasis on graphics performance. Remember, though, that the AMD processor benefits from Nvidia's GeForce GTX 670, while Intel's Core i5 plays host to a slower Radeon HD 7870 powered by AMD's Tahiti LE GPU. This quarter's machine achieves better performance with Core i5 working its magic to push that Radeon card out in front of the GeForce. Overclocked, the combination really shines.

What did dropping our budget teach us? Nothing that we couldn't have guessed before we started: losing the SSD only quantifiably hurt our storage benchmarks, less money for graphics hurt our gaming performance a bit, and Intel's Core i5, overclocked, is the way to go if you can afford it. We'll have a lot more context tomorrow when Thomas hits us with a $1,000 work of art. Stay tuned!

Gunning For Gold At $600

System Builder Marathon, Q1 2013: The Articles

Here are links to each of the four articles in this quarter’s System Builder Marathon (we’ll update them as each story is published). And remember, these systems are all being given away at the end of the marathon.

To enter the giveaway, please fill out this SurveyGizmo form, and be sure to read the complete rules before entering!

Day 1: The $600 Gaming PC
Day 2: The $800 Enthusiast PC
Day 3: The $1,000 Performance PC
Day 4: Performance And Value, Dissected
Day 5: The $1,600 Alternative PC

Introduction

We ended 2012 with the best $500 System Builder Marathon gaming PC this series has ever seen, an accomplishment credited mostly to the impressive performance of AMD's Radeon HD 7850 graphics card. Also, the efficient and affordable Intel Pentium G850 ate up just $70 of our budget, allowing us to include 8 GB of RAM, a higher-end motherboard, and a nicer case.

That was our third $500 rig in a row built specifically to enable fluid gaming at 1920x1080 though, and our continued reliance on a dual-core CPU pretty much assured it'd trail far behind Don's $1,000 enthusiast-oriented build when we tabulated overall value. After all, 60% of our performance weighting comes from applications, and most of the tests in our suite are heavily threaded.

This quarter, we're trying something different and grouping our budgets more closely together. The idea is to see just how much value we can extract from our hardware at $600, $800, and $1,000 price points. Through a tighter competition that any system builder can win with a slight edge on the others, we're looking for that sweet spot where the performance you get from every dollar you spend can be considered optimal.

Given the stellar performance and massive overclocking potential of our last Pitcairn-based GPU, there was simply no need to sink more than $165 into graphics. So, we're again sticking with AMD's 1 GB Radeon HD 7850.

We also know that, in order to generate the best performance possible at $600, we need a more potent processor. Priced at $180, Intel's Core i5-3350P is the highest-end CPU we can afford, and it gives me my best shot at a gold medal in overall system value.

Unfortunately, memory prices are back up after last quarter's System Builder Marathon, forcing us back down to 4 GB of capacity. The savings allows us to grab a faster dual-channel kit, though, and a more enthusiast-oriented platform. We're hoping the tradeoff lets us tap into more of the Core i5's performance potential.

Just before we ordered our parts, the memory kit went up $3, putting us right at $600. However, there's also a $10 promo code on the hard drive that we aren't factoring into our pricing table. Through a few minor fluctuations between then and now, this machine's overall cost is up an additional $5.

CPU And Cooler

Processor: Intel Core i5-3350P

Intel's Core i5-3350P gives us the benefit of Ivy Bridge without the integrated graphics engine we wouldn't have used anyway. This chip's four physical cores operate at 3.1 GHz by default, though they spin up to 3.3 GHz via Turbo Boost. We plan to push those clock rates as high as possible by capitalizing on the processor's limited overclocking headroom.

Read Customer Reviews of Intel's Core i5-3350P

CPU Cooler: Intel Retail Boxed Heat Sink and Fan

From this angle, the boxed cooler you get with Intel's Core i5-3350P looks identical to the one bundled with last quarter's Pentium G850. Both share low-profile orb-style aluminum fins, a low-speed 0.28 A PWM-controlled fan, and push-pin mounting brackets.

The difference between them is an integrated copper slug on the bottom of the Core i5's heat sink. The Pentium's solution is all-aluminum. Although we wouldn't consider this bundled add-on anything special, it's quiet and plenty capable of keeping up with our 69 W CPU, which doesn't support the overclocking headroom of a K-series processor anyway.

Motherboard And Memory

Motherboard: ASRock Z75 Pro3

Based on the not very well-known Intel Z75 Express chipset, ASRock's Z75 Pro3 introduces some enthusiast-class functionality at a price point that fits within our budget. In essence, this platform is identical to the company's Z77 Pro3, minus support for Intel's Smart Response Technology and $13.

Most important to us is that, armed with a Z75 Express PCH, it should be able to bolster our processor frequency and memory data rate.

Read Customer Reviews of ASRock's Z75 Pro3

Both this Pro3-series board and the one based on Z77 Express include one 16-lane PCIe 3.0-capable slot, one PCI Express x16 slot limited to x4 transfers at second-gen signaling rates, a PCI Express x1 slot, and two PCI slots.

Four DIMM slots support up to 32 GB of DDR3 memory in a dual-channel configuration, with overclocking as high as 2,800 MT/s. Other on-board features include a pair of SATA 6Gb/s connectors, four SATA 3Gb/s connectors, and internal headers for two USB 3.0 and six USB 2.0 ports. Rear I/O connectivity includes two more USB 3.0 ports, four USB 2.0 ports, a PS/2 port, Ethernet, display outputs, and audio jacks.

Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL 4 GB (2 x 2 GB) DDR3-1600 Kit

Read Customer Reviews of G.Skill's F3-12800CL9D-4GBRL 4 GB Kit

Oh happy day. No longer limited to capped memory data rates by entry-level motherboards and CPUs, we avoided the basic DDR3-1333 RAM we're so used to buying. Instead, we spent a bit more on a 4 GB G.Skill Ripjaws DDR3-1600 kit, rated at CAS 9 latencies and 1.5 V.

Graphics Card And Hard Drive

Graphics Card: HIS H785F1G2M Radeon HD 7850 1 GB

The affordable Radeon HD 7850 delivers amazing performance in a compact form factor that only requires one six-pin power connector. As expected, AMD's Pitcairn GPU gives us 1,024 shaders, an 860 MHz core clock rate, and 1 GB of GDDR5 memory operating at 1,200 MHz (4,800 MT/s).

Read Customer Reviews of HIS' H785F1G2M Radeon HD 7850 1 GB

This HIS card includes plenty of connectivity: one dual-link DVI-I connector, HDMI, and two mini-DisplayPort outputs. A CrossFire bridge, DVI-to-VGA adapter, and driver disc all come included with the most affordable Radeon HD 7850 at our disposal.

Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda ST500DM002 500 GB

Read Customer Reviews of Seagate's ST500DM002 500 GB

Seagate's 500 GB ST500DM002 gives us plenty of capacity, a 7,200 RPM spindle, 16 MB of data cache ,and a 6Gb/s SATA interface. We're not particularly thrilled about a limited two-year warranty, though.

Case, Power Supply, And Optical Drive

Case: Xigmatek Asgard II B/B CPC-T45UC-U01 ATX Mid Tower

Off we went in search of an affordable mid-tower case with at least one 120 mm exhaust fan. If what we found looks somewhat familiar, that's because we've used Xigmatek's Asgard II on three prior occasions.

This case employs 0.8 mm SECC steel construction with an aluminum front bezel, along with the black painted interior that many builders favor nowadays. A single 120 mm PWM-controlled exhaust fan comes installed, and you're afforded room for up to three additional coolers.

Read Customer Reviews of Xigmatek's Asgard II CPC-T45UC-U01 Case

Xigmatek addresses varying personal tastes by selling this chassis with three different bezel highlight colors. This is the second time we’ve chosen the all-black version. However, we've also used the silver and orange models in Marathons past.

Power Supply: Antec Neo Eco 400C 400 W

Read Customer Reviews of Antec's Neo Eco 400C 400 W

Although AMD recommends a 500 W power supply with its Radeon HD 7850, the card only comes equipped with a single six-pin power lead. Moreover, at idle, we expect this combination of parts to sip power.

One 30 A +12 V rail is plenty; Antec's Neo Eco 400C (rated at 400 W) easily covers this system's requirements with reserve to spare. Features include 80 PLUS certification, active PFC circuitry, a quiet 120 mm fan, and Antec’s three-year warranty.

Optical Drive: Samsung DVD Burner 24x SATA Model SH-224BB/RSBS

Read Customer Reviews of Samsung's SH-224BB/RSBS 24x DVD Burner

More and more of you let us know in the comments section that you no longer require an optical drive. But we're not inclined to ditch our desktop’s burner just yet. Priced at a paltry $16 for a 24x SATA-based writer, that's affordable enough to cover those occasions when an optical drive does prove useful.

Assembling Our Budget-Oriented Box

Given that this is the fourth time we've used Xigmatek's Asgard II in the System Builder Marathon, I consider myself fairly well versed at working around inside of the case. The notes I jotted down from March of 2011 and December of the same year still apply, in case you want to know more.

Unlike those previous builds involving the Asgard II, however, which all went smoothly, one potentially serious issue cropped up this time: only one of the four pre-drilled power supply mounting holes were usable. Swapping in two other power supplies confirmed that the issue was mostly Xigmatek’s fault. At best, two of the mounting holes would take a screw.

The problem seems to stem from the the sheet metal folds above the I/O shield, which function as support for the power supply. By simply expanding three of the enclosure’s screw holes by 1-2 mm with a rotary tool, the problem was quickly worked around. The fix was easy, but Xigmatek's issue is potentially progress-halting if you don't have the right tool.

Overclocking

The Z75 Pro3's UEFI gives us all of the settings we need to maximize this platform's performance. Enabling "Non-K-Series Overclocking" makes available CPU ratios for all cores up to 37x, although the effective limit is 400 MHz above Intel's configured Turbo Boost settings. In other words, the CPU bounces between 3.5 and 3.7 GHz, depending on utilization.

CPU voltage adjustments are naturally available, though our Core i5-3350P didn't require them to run stably at its highest clock rates.

Base clock adjustment was also possible, though I chose not to tamper with the system's stability for, at best, another 150 or 200 MHz. Instead, I focused attention on improving the memory subsystem's performance. Bumped to 1.6,V, the G.Skill Ripjaws-series DDR3-1600 modules were stable at 1,866 MT/s and the same 9-9-9-24 1T timings.

Following impressive gains from last quarter's PowerColor Radeon HD 7850, I was eager to see how far a retail card from HIS could be pushed. Limiting myself to driver-based adjustments, AMD's OverDrive applet would cap the GPU's clock rate at an artificially-low 1,050 MHz. So, I broke out the last story's tool of choice: Asus GPU Tweak. This utility is capable of nudging core voltage up, exposing functional frequency sliders that exceed 1,050 MHz, and maintaining separate 2D and 3D clocks and voltage settings.

Our sample hit 1,160 MHz before I needed more voltage. At that setting, the default fan ramp was still able to keep the GPU from exceeding 65 degrees Celsius. At 1.2 V, the GPU topped out at a stable 1,230 MHz. At that setting a 100% fan duty cycle kept AMD's graphics processor at the same 65 degrees. The cooler was clearly becoming less effective. Nevertheless, this board's GPU had even more headroom than the last one we tested.

Graphics memory testing didn't go as well. Even with the fan set to 100%, and using stock core frequency and voltage, the GDDR5 was unstable 100 MHz higher than default (1,300 MHz). Added to our core overclock, though, the memory would only stabilize at 1,240 MHz. The modules simply weren't being cooled effectively, even with the fan spinning as fast as it'd go. In the end, I left the memory at its factory 1,200 MHz setting.

I then created a custom fan profile in GPU Tweak that spun the fan up to about 60% duty cycle upon entering a game and bounced between 70 to 80% during 3D activity. A few times, when the GPU hit 65 degrees, the profile kicked up to 90%, preventing the temperature from rising any higher.

Test System Configuration And Benchmarks

Results: Synthetics

Stepping up from a dual-core Pentium to a quad-core Core i5 gets us massive gains in 3DMark 11. The Physics and Combined scores more than double, in turn yielding a substantial increase in the Overall 3DMark score.

Even the Graphics score, which is designed to isolate platform performance as much as possible, shows our stock Radeon HD 7850 jumping by nearly 12%.

The $600 rig’s lead in PCMark 7 increases once we take advantage of the Core i5-3350P’s limited overclocking. Because we're forced to rely on a mechanical drive spinning at 7,200 RPM yet again, storage performance remains similarly unimpressive for both machines.

Sandra's Arithmetic module promises great potential performance increases over the Pentium we used last quarter, while the inclusion of AES-NI favors the Core i5 even more when it comes to our Cryptography benchmark. And by ditching the Pentium’s DDR3-1333 limitation, this quarter's configuration enjoys a 20-40% increase in memory bandwidth.

Results: Battlefield 3 And The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Battlefield 3

We already know that the frame rates in Battlefield 3's single-player campaign are almost entirely limited by graphics hardware, and not by today's processors. We're testing that theory here, since we had the additional budget to buy a notably faster CPU, but are still using the same Radeon HD 7850-class graphics card.

There are more taxing areas in this game than our 90-second Fraps test. So, I shoot for an average of about 45 frames per second as a minimum target.

Higher frame rates with anti-aliasing disabled suggest that our Core i5 addresses any platform bottlenecks that might have plagued last quarter's machine. In fact, once we overclock it, the $600 PC bumps up against this game's 200 FPS cap. That's a first for any of our budget-oriented gaming rigs.

The victory means little, though. Even the dual-core Pentium running at 2.9 GHz managed to achieve almost 140 FPS once we overclocked the graphics card complementing it.

Using Ultra detail settings and 4x MSAA, we're able to measure anywhere from three to 10 additional frames per second in Battlefield 3 compared to the Pentium-based box.

Graphics card overclocking still makes way more difference though, catapulting last quarter's $500 machine far ahead of our current setup at its stock settings. Clearly, our extra budget doesn't benefit the single-player campaign's main bottleneck: graphics.

The Elders Scroll V: Skyrim

At these CPU-limited settings, it’s no surprise that stepping up from a Pentium to a Core i5 yields additional performance. With that said, both configurations blow through Skyrim's High quality preset.

The quickest way to spot a platform bottleneck is comparing our two 16:9 resolutions. Intel's Pentium G850 limits average frame rates to about 60 at both 1280x720 and 1920x1080. Tighter memory timings and graphics overclocking add a couple of frames per second, on average.

However, the current machine’s Core i5 is fast enough to register 18 FPS difference between both resolutions using a stock Radeon HD 7850. Using Ultra detail settings 8x MSAA, and 1920x1080, we realize that this card, unconstrained, can only just barely exceed 60 FPS. It turns out that the Pentium G850 wasn't hampering our stock performance by all that much, after all.

The same cannot be said once we apply overclocking, which shifts balance back over to the CPUs. To recap, we overclocked the Core i5 by 400 MHz, managed to eke out more memory bandwidth, and left the graphics card's memory at its stock setting. Despite all of those factors that'd seemingly differentiate the machines, almost all separation between resolutions is erased once we tap the potential of Pitcairn with an almost-42% core overclock.

Results: F1 2012 And Far Cry 3

F1 2012

Last round, we replaced DiRT 3 with F1 2012, another one of Codemasters’ racing titles based on its own Ego Engine 2.0. We immediately noticed lower average frame rates compared to the performance we were used to from DiRT 3.

Although it still yields playable performance, the $500 PC's potential using a High quality preset is cut in half by the dual-core Pentium CPU.

Stepping up to Ultra details and 8x AA knocks our Pentium-based rig down to an average of 45 FPS, with minimum frame rates reportedly as low as 35 at each resolution. We certainly can't call the $500 box unplayable. However, it's a little unnerving to see such a capable graphics card held back to such an extent by a $70 processor.

On the other hand, our $600 machine's minimum frame rates scale more appropriately based on resolution, indicating a GPU bottleneck. At 1920x1080, performance doesn't drop under 62 FPS, jumping up as high as 78 FPS after our overclocking efforts.

Far Cry 3

This quarter, we are adding Ubisoft’s Far Cry 3 to the gaming suite, a DirectX 11 title based on the Dunia Engine 2. In this case, we have both machines equipped with the same Catalyst 13.1 driver package, plus the 12.11 CAP 2 update.

High quality detail settings without anti-aliasing are heavily CPU-limited on the $500 PC. Overclocking that system's graphics card does absolutely nothing to help. Once we swap in a Core i5 and faster memory, the situation reverses, turning into a GPU bottleneck.

We learn a few things once we crank up the detail preset to Ultra, apply 4x MSAA, HDAO, and Enhanced Alpha To Coverage. First, a stock Radeon HD 7850 is only good up to 1280x720, after which it benefits quite a bit from overclocking. Not even an overclocked Radeon HD 7850 is fast enough to handle 1920x1080, though. The Pentium G850 is also hit particularly hard using Ultra quality settings. It's incapable of averaging more than 31 FPS, regardless of the resolution we test.

Our official Far Cry 3 testing stops there. But I feel these charts fail to capture the full picture, so I'm going to spend a little more time talking about the game (after all, I was fortunate enough to spend more than 12 hours playing before shipping off last quarter’s machine to the lucky winner). I know first-hand how Far Cry 3 runs on that rig, and I must stress that it did phenomenally well, despite the Pentium G850 processor. This somewhat contradicts Don Woligrowski’s findings in Gaming Shoot-Out: 18 CPUs And APUs Under $200, Benchmarked, although his test configuration varied greatly from my own.

Frame rates in this title were consistent, with fewer than 10 FPS separating the minimum from maximum. I tend to be sensitive to any lack of smoothness, and yet I found the stock $500 PC easily playable where Fraps was telling me I was seeing just 32 FPS in our demanding test.

I split my time evenly between stock and overclocked settings. Plus, I logged a couple hours of play time on the $600 machine in order to form a subjective opinion of how the experience compares. In the chart below, you can see how the comparison changes once we dial in settings appropriate to our Radeon HD 7850.

This quarter's machine fares the same at stock settings, gaining a few frames per second, on average, once we overclock it. Playing through Far Cry 3, it was hard to tell the difference between both boxes, except during gun fights. The Core i5 maintained its performance, whereas the Pentium occasionally sagged.

Intel's Pentium G850 can deliver a pleasant Far Cry 3 experience. Of course, I'd still prefer to use the overclocked $600 config, which was still playable at 1920x1080 using Ultra settings. Dropping to 2x MSAA made this even better, returning an average of 8 FPS.

Results: Audio And Video

In iTunes and Lame, both of which are single-threaded, Turbo Boost propels the Core i5 even further ahead of last quarter's fixed 2.9 GHz frequency. Because we used a Sandy Bridge-based Pentium, we weren't afforded any overclocking.

HandBrake and TotalCode Studio enjoy an even larger lead thanks to the Core i5's higher clock rate and quad-core architecture.

Results: Adobe Creative Suite

Our Photoshop workload is heavily threaded, so it's really no surprise that the time it takes to complete this workload is slashed by this quarter's Core i5.

We actually run a couple of different tests in Photoshop, though. The second one should see significant speed-up from OpenCL acceleration, and involves a completely different workload. Clearly, overclocking helps our $600 machine shed some time from its score. 

It's possible that OpenCL wasn't turned on last quarter, but at least we have a good point of comparison as we start thinking about next quarter's hardware wish lists.

Premiere Pro CS6 enjoys a massive performance boost from the Core i5's additional processing resources.

Acrobat X, another single-threaded test in our suite, doesn't see as much of a speed-up due to our adoption of a quad-core CPU.

Meanwhile, After Effects falls in the middle. We know it's threaded, but is likely being held back somewhat by our relatively small 4 GB memory kit.

Results: Productivity

All four of these productivity-oriented applications are well-threaded, and our quad-core processor rewards us with gains that range between 84-125% throughout the suite, even before overclocking is considered.

Going down the list, we see that overclocking does help our Core i5 to some degree. However, those massive gains are certainly attributable to four physical cores, no doubt.

Results: Compression

The fact that we use OpenCL acceleration in WinZip 17 helps keep those results pretty close, since the Radeon HD 7850 remains constant throughout testing. However, the CPU-oriented benchmarks are far more affected by our shift from Pentium to Core i5.

We really like that Corel went back and retooled WinZip to better utilize available processing resources. It's now quite a bit more competitive next to WinRAR and 7-Zip, both of which use the quad-core chip to slash the time it takes to compress our 1.3 GB folder of random files.

Power Consumption And Temperatures

As a general rule, we enable power-saving features on our System Builder Marathon rigs. We also tend not to override automatic fan controls for stock-configuration testing.

The result is that we give up cooling performance and tolerate higher temperatures in the interest of a quieter system.

For some reason that we still cannot explain, last quarter's graphics card chewed up an extra 20 W sitting idle on the Windows desktop. Perhaps there was an issue with AMD's early Windows 8 driver? Idle consumption should have been down around 50 W, as it is this time around.

Fully loaded, these gaming-oriented rigs still sip power relative to what we'll likely see during the rest of this quarter's System Builder Marathon. Even if we estimate 85% efficiency, our 400 W power supply is only being asked to output 184 W at peak load.

Although we've never been particularly impressed by the performance of Intel's boxed heat sinks, they do facilitate quiet operation and adequate cooling. 

Thermals aren't much of a worry on either rig. But the important take-away is that last month's graphics card from PowerColor enjoyed more effective cooling. Our custom fan profile never exceeded 50% duty cycle. In order to keep this quarter's board from breaking 65 degrees, HIS' smaller fan spun up as high as 90% on occasion.

Neither card was noisy at stock settings. However, acoustics were less attractive using our overclocked frequencies in demanding 3D games.

Gaming Performance Summary

Given a slightly higher budget, I specifically targeted last quarter's $500 machine's biggest weakness: threaded content creation- and productivity-oriented applications. First and foremost, however, these are supposed to be gaming machines. Do they still satisfy that role well enough?

Our first chart summarizes all tested resolutions and settings, exposing each platform’s limitations at settings we wouldn’t necessarily game at. Huge gains in F1 2012 obscure our results if we only look at average frame rates. So, we instead break down performance gains by game.

More than anything, our focus is on gaming at native resolutions, and we're guessing that most gamers now play at either 1680x1050 or 1920x1080. The following two charts cancel out the low resolutions and settings, focusing purely on the more interesting settings we’d want to use in the real world.

With the exception of F1 2012, Intel's Core i5 processor appears to do very little for gaming performance at these native resolutions. The chip's benefit is easier to see once we factor in graphics overclocking, though.

Did We Accomplish Our Mission?

Intel's Core i5-3350P processor upgrade indeed propels our $600 gaming PC to an entirely new level of performance in our content creation and productivity benchmarks (particularly all of the threaded tests). A limited capacity for overclocking is better than no scalability at all. So, in the end, our extra $100 more than doubles performance in this critical piece of our quantitative analysis.

Because those applications account for 60% of our overall performance weighting, I'm expecting my $600 effort to hold its own really well when it comes to sizing up bang-for-the-buck at the end of this quarter's Marathon. The Day 4 comparison will show whether or not I achieved my true mission.

I've been asked by a few readers why we judge purpose-built gaming machines with so much of an application performance bias. The short answer is that our System Builder Marathon is about more than just gaming. By seeking out the best possible gaming system at the lowest price point possible, I frequently forfeit any chance that my machine might earn the overall value crown. In reality, $500 isn't enough money to do all things well, particularly when half of the budget goes into supporting hardware like storage, power, and a case. Moving forward, though, I’m going to judge these gaming-oriented systems within my own story based on how well they game overall, at their native resolutions, and how they behave in the application suite.

Even after we devalue its dominance in the applications, today's $600 setup picks up 47% more overall performance for a 20% increase in cost.

However, while I confidently declared last quarter's effort the best $500 gaming box I've ever built for this series, I can't say the same about today's $600 configuration. It offers outstanding performance for what I spent, but I suspect that matching up a lower-end CPU with a Radeon HD 7870 based on Tahiti LE might yield an even better experience at 1920x1080.

PSU Manufacturers, Designers, And Labels

Update: 1/23/13: Due to overwhelmingly positive feedback and a number of reader questions about the actual origin of certain power supply brands, we thoroughly revised our Who’s Who of PSUs, originally published in November of 2010 and last refreshed in May of 2011. Since the article is frequently quoted and linked to, we’re updating it rather than publishing the newest entries. As such, much of the content remains unchanged from the previous version.

Today’s revision adds many new manufacturers and brands, though. It also expands the number of models in several product families. Indeed, much has changed since our original article appeared more than two years ago, and we’re happy that readers in our forums and around the Web appear to be better informed and more discriminating when it comes to picking out a new power supply.

At the same time, manufacturers also appear to have re-evaluated some of their practices, and we’ve seen newer models use better components, resulting in higher quality overall.

We want to extend a special thanks to our community, as many of our readers and forum members have contributed much helpful information and valuable data to this analysis.

Several companies also joined in for the first time, volunteering information on their product lines. Sadly, for now it still appears that this is the exception rather than the rule. Many of our emails asking for information were met with silence. On that note, we acknowledge that we’re not infallible. Should you come across any omissions or errors, big or small, we invite you to send us your feedback so we can keep expanding and refining this list, ensuring it remains current and as inclusive as possible.

This article first appeared on November 12, 2010, and has since been added to and updated.

Who’s Who?

Let’s start by dividing the manufacturers into three large groups so we can better understand the database and how these companies are connected:

1. The OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturers)

OEMs manage all of their production internally. They either exclusively design and manufacture their own PSUs (like Enermax) or design and manufacture their own brands, as well as manufacture PSUs designed by other companies (such as FSP, HEC, and SeaSonic). Some of them focus heavily on worldwide exports and provide a range of models, which are then sold under different labels. It's common to find otherwise-identical models marketed under many different names and labels. The industrial areas around Shenzhen, China, are the cradle of the lowest-priced PSUs sold all over the globe.

2. Designers: Without Their Own Production

The second group of companies also develops and designs their own products. However, they have to outsource either some or all of the manufacturing to other companies. One example of this is Be Quiet. Those familiar with the brand noted how Be Quiet P7 models were suddenly much better than the disappointing P6. The answer was simply a manufacturer change, from Topower to FSP. Other examples of designers include SilverStone, Corsair, PC Power & Cooling, and Tagan.

3. The Labels: With or Without Any Technical Involvement

Arguably, this group could be subdivided. Some importers of foreign PSUs that resell models under their own labels have a certain influence over the quality and choice of components, while others simply bring in some very cheap products, change the label, and resell them.

This third group is the most interesting one for price-oriented customers, though also the most uncertain for quality. You're as likely to score a bargain by getting a relabeled high-quality product at a lower price as you are to be disappointed by being too tight-fisted. Some good examples of products to watch are new models from Aerocool, which are essentially the Cougar units from Compucase/HEC with a discounted price and completely restyled exterior.

After many tests and inspections of budget models (by us, our readers, and friendly computer stores), we would advise you to steer your piggy banks clear of the labels Rasurbo, Inter-Tech (Sinan Power, Coba), Tech Solo, LC Power, RaptoxX, Tronje, Xilence, Ultron, World Link, Q-Tec, etc. We were able to identify some of these models without looking at the UL number simply by checking out the installed components. These were almost exclusively the simplest work of such manufacturers as Enhance, World Link, Andyson, Topower, Casing Macron, and Channel Well.

Lack of protection circuits, low efficiency, and bad build quality were major points of criticism. The lowest of the low was a European label called Hardwaremania24, targeted at OEM PCs. While still in standby mode, the PSU heated to about 176 degrees Fahrenheit, spent the next six hours billowing smoke, and finally made what might be described as a trumpeting sound before dying. The host computer was never even turned on. After analyzing the PSU, we found no protection at all save for a single slow fuse.

Firecracker Or Power Plant?

How do you identify a bad power supply before buying it?

• Extremely high wattage claims at comparatively low prices are suspicious. There are simply no decent 750 W power supplies for $50. For every product class based on performance and features, there must be a minimum price. When a product is significantly below that price, be cautious. You can get a "400 W PSU" for $20, and such fire hazards are installed in budget PCs every day by unscrupulous companies that know exactly the risk they're handing off to buyers.

• Check the specifications. For example, if a PSU claims high performance on the 3.3 and 5 V rails while the 12 V rail numbers are low, then you know something is wrong.

• The manufacturer does not specify any combined maximum performance, but instead only shows the maximum load for each rail separately. This is done without specifying how much real power would be available if all rails are used at the same time. Avoid PSUs without this information.

• Be careful with juicy marketing expressions and commercial lingo: Super, Extreme, Gaming, Combat, etc. Using superlatives to describe something quite normal should arouse suspicion and have you double-check specification details.

• Passive rather than active Power Factor Correction (PFC) leads to lower power efficiency.

• Very few or short power connectors and cables might be an issue. A 750 W PSU usually has four PCIe connectors for graphics cards (2 x 6-pin and 2 x 6+2-pin), so think twice if a model only offers two (or at least consider your upgrade options).

• With cheap PSUs, the quality of the cable insulation may be poor, or the cables may not be insulated at all. The power cable grommet may also be insufficiently padded.

• Be careful if there are few or no indications of protection circuitry. If the PSU specification only says OPP (overload protection) or perhaps SCP (short circuit protection), this points towards a normal fuse. If the specification also says OVP (overvoltage protection), this probably means that it is equipped with a simple metal oxide variable resistor. These security measures by themselves are absolutely insufficient and cannot replace any kind of digital safety chip. 

Unfortunately, you can't always tell at first glance whether you're dealing with a high-quality PSU or whether there's nothing but disappointment waiting behind the pleasant facade. Therefore, we decided to open up two budget PSUs representative of what you can find in many of today’s OEM PCs and illustrate the points and features you should be examining.

A First Look At the Inside: Primary Capacitor and PFC

First, look at the storage capacitors in the primary circuit. These act as buffers and help protect the PSU and computer from voltage fluctuations. The electrolyte used in them is key, because it evaporates or dries out through a combination of heat and time. As a general rule, capacitor lifetime is halved for each 10 degrees Centigrade increase in temperature over the specified normal load. Using higher-quality capacitors that can handle 105 degrees instead of 85 degrees (C) should almost double their lifetime, greatly contributing to the PSU's durability.

A PSU equipped with a big choke like in the photo above is a clear indicator of passive Power Factor Correction (PFC). Only more sophisticated active circuitry allows for factors close to the optimum value of 1, while passive components can reach 0.7 to 0.8 at best. The type of power factor correction indirectly suggests the expected efficiency of the power supply. Although PFC and efficiency are casually unrelated, devices with active PFC are also usually more complex and modern, meaning you're more likely to get better efficiency from them.

Protection Circuits

Even without opening the PSU, a data sheet can reveal some of the safety measures taken (or not) by manufacturers. A decent PSU should contain the following safety measures:

• OCP (Over Current Protection): protection against power spikes
• OVP (Over Voltage Protection)
• OPP (Over Power Protection): overload protection, sometimes called OLP 
• OTP (Over Temperature Protection): protection from overheating 
• UVP (Under Voltage Protection) 
• SCP (Short Circuit Protection) 
• NLO (No Load Operation): this isn’t exactly protection in the same sense as the other features, but it allows the PSU to power up and function normally, even with no load.

Without this information, you have to look inside the PSU to find out what you need to know.

We found no protection at all on this unit, except for a simple fuse. Sadly, this PSU is still available on the market under a couple of different labels.

Passive components do not guarantee sufficient protection. Without a digital security chip, the computer hardware is severely exposed to risks.

The security chip PS223 from Silicon Touch is popular, and you should avoid PSUs not using it or similar products, such as the PS332S.

Cables and Short Circuits

You can tell a lot about your PSU by looking at its internal wiring. A lack of heat shrink tubing, carelessly exposed solder joints, and components fastened with a glue gun are symptomatic of cheap and hazardous manufacturing. If unprotected cables are placed next to hot components, a PSU failure is nearly assured.

Boards

A final quality indicator is the circuit board material. Impregnated laminated paper (like the yellow boards in the pictures) is a sure sign of cost cutting. Fibre materials are much more durable and, perhaps more importantly, non-flammable.

How Do You Recognize The Manufacturer?

UL Numbers From Underwriters Laboratories

"Underwriters Laboratories, an independent firm working with product safety certification, has been active in the field of product testing and preparation of safety standards for more than a century. UL evaluates more than 19 000 types of products, components, materials and systems annually. Every year more than 20 billion UL marks are placed on products from 66 000 different manufacturers. The UL Group and its network of service providers include 68 testing and certification labs worldwide, serving customers in 102 countries."--From the About UL page at ul.com

Essentially, this means that all PSUs sold on the North American market must be marked with a UL number. This number should identify the actual manufacturer of a product. However, not every PSU has such a number. UL number omission on a North American product might indicate poor quality.

Step 1: Reading the UL Number

To find the UL number, there's no need to open your PSU or de-solder anything. Simply open your PC and look at the power supply's label. The UL number usually begins with an "E" followed by a string of numbers. See the three examples below.

If your PSU has such a number, you can move onto the next step, finding out what it means.

Online UL Number Query

Now let's find out more about your PSU. Go to the UL Online Certifications Directory and enter the UL number in the UL File Number field. If the number exists in the database, you should immediately see the result. If not, the number is invalid, fake, or the manufacturer no longer exists.

Link: Online Certifications Directory

PSU Makers: 0-9 And A-B

Companies: 2The Max Asia Pacific, 3Y Power Technology, Ablecom, ABS, AcBel, A.C.Ryan, Achme, A-Data, AeroCool, Ahanix, AHCOF, Aikou, Akasa, Amacrox, AMS, Aopen, Andyson, Antec, Aopen, Apevia/Aspire, Apex, Arctic Cooling, Artesyn/Astec, Astec Int. Ltd., Asus, Athenatech, ATNG, Atrix, Avance, Axle, AXP, Azza, Be Quiet!, Bestec, BFG, Bgears, Boser Technology Inc., Broadway.

PSU Makers: C-D

Companies: C-Young, Casecom, Casing Macron, Channel Well, Chenbro, Chieftec, Chill Innovation, Club 3D, CompUSA, Coba, Codegen, Comix, Conda, Cooler Master, Cooling Well, Coolmax, Cooltek, Corsair, Cresun, DAR, Dbetter, Deer, Dell, Delta, Dongguan Zhangmotou, Dynapower, Dynex.

PSU Makers: E-H

Companies: E-Star International, Eagle Tech, Elwin Technology Ltd., Elec, Emerson Network Power, Enermax, Enhance, Enlight, ePower, Etasis, Etopmay, Flextronics, Fob, Focus, Forepoint, Fortrex, Fortron, Foxconn, Foxlink, Fractal Design, Frisby, Fujitsu Siemens, Glacial Power, Gigabyte, Global Bright Intl., Globalwin, Gold Pal, GrowUp Japan, GPS, Great Wall, GTR, Guizhu, Hama, Hardwaremania24, HC, HEC, Highscreen, High Performance Group, High Performance PC, High Power, Himere, Hiper, Hipro, HP, Huntkey.

PSU Makers: I-M

Companies: ICP, Ikonik, Impervio, Inter-Tech, In Win, IOK, I-Star, Jada, Jeantech, Jet, Jehovah, Jersey, Jiumeng, Jiu-Peng, JOU JYE, JPAC, Just PC, Kaibo, Kaisen, Keega, Key Mouse, KinEagle, Kingwin, Koolance, L & C, LC-Power, Leadman, Leadway, Levicom, Li Shin, Lian-Li, Lite-On, Linkworld, Logisys, Mad Dog, Mapower, Masscool, MaxInPower, Maxtro, Mean Well, MGE/XG, Micor, Minlong, Mitac, MSI, Mushkin, Mutantmods.

PSU Makers: N-R

Companies: NesteQ, Newton, Nexus, Nipron, nMediaPC, North P, NorthQ, NOX Extreme, NZXT, OCZ, Okia, Pangu, PC Power & Cooling, Point of View, Powercase, PowerCooler, Powerex, Powerleap, Powerman, Powertek, Powmax, Procase, Q-Technologie, R-Senda/Rsenda, Raidmax, RaptoxX, Rasurbo, Recom, Revoltec, Rhombutech, Rocketfisch, Rosewill, RSD.

PSU Makers: S-T

Companies: San Hawk, Sansun, Sanyang, Scythe, Seasonic, Seventeam, Sharkoon, Shinlion, Shuttle, Sigma, Shanda, SilenX, Silverpower, Silverstone, Sinan Power, Sino Tech, SinTek, Shanda, Sirfa, Sirtec, Skydigital, SMD, Solytech, Sohoo, Soyo, Sparkle Computer, Sparkle / Sparkle Power, Spec Research, Spire, Startech, Sunbeam, Sun Pro, Sunfone, Sunyo, Super Flower /SFC, Supertalent, Sytrin, Tagan, Taiwan Youngyear, Task, Techsolo, Thermaltake, Thortech, TMC, Tommade, Topmay, Topower, Top-Power, Towin, TS-Power, TTGI, Tuniq, Tyan.

PSU Makers: U-Z

Companies: Ultra, Unitek, Vantec, Win-Tact, Wintech, Wiseframe, XClio, Xigmatek, Xilence, Xion, X-Spice, Yesico, Zalman, Zippy.

Photo Gallery: Who’s Who?

Now we want to use three examples to show what can hide behind a label, and that it is in fact possible to get verified quality at a decent price.

Obligatory Conclusion

We want to stress two things in particular:

A PSU is not necessarily bad because it is cheap. But the lower the price, the more you'll likely have to skimp on safety and performance features. A high-quality PSU contains more expensive components. If you buy cheap, you might have to buy twice--or more.

A PSU is not automatically inferior because it was made by a contractor with which you aren't familiar. These companies make all kinds of products, from luxury brands to pure garbage. Again, it's a question of hitting different production targets. Is the product built for quality or aggressive cost reduction? The responsibility always lies with the buyer to recognize and reject products that are obviously unsuitable.

In the light of the previously presented tables of manufacturers, some quality issues, such as those seen with Be Quiet's P6 series, present an additional aspect to consider. We can also see that companies like Super Flower are often underestimated because they are not seen and accepted as the large manufacturer, which in fact they are.

We thank our readers again for their help.  We will continue to collect new results and regularly update the lists. They are, after all, a rough guide to what goes on behind the scenes in the power supply industry.

The Xigmatek Talon is constructed of ABS plastic material and features an acrylic smoke-black side window, as well as a removable acrylic top panel which gives room for a 140mm or 240mm radiator. However, what makes the Xigmatek Talon's construction truly unique is its 2.5-degree front tilt, which is provided by its raised rear. Xigmatek claims that by raising the rear of the case at the bottom, it will significantly increase airflow from under the chassis. Even if the tilt doesn't provide a notable drop in temperatures, the case still looks impressive.

Once the tool-free side-panels are removed, the interior of the Talon shares a similar lay-out to most mid-tower cases. The case features multiple tray cut-outs, placement for a bottom-mounted PSU and plenty of 2.5-inch, 3.5-inch and 5.25-inch drive bays. Additionally, the case can support graphics cards up to approximately 13-inches in length. As for cooling, the Talon comes equipped with orange-bladed white-LED front 200mm and rear 140mm fans. The case also provides optional fan support for both the top and bottom.

The Talon features plenty of media I/O on the front of the case, with 2x USB 3.0, 2x USB 2.0 and audio jacks behind a hidden hatch.

Pricing on the Xigmatek Talon is not yet known.

_{Contact Us for News Tips, Corrections and Feedback}

Cases For Cost-Conscious Builders

Although they often don't get as much love as they deserve, cases are critical components in any new system build. That's why we've made an effort to not only write up in-depth build-oriented reviews of enclosures, but also photograph them from every possible angle. If you haven't already read In Pictures: Five Mainstream Gaming Cases, Previewed, check that piece out before this one.

When we build our $1000 PCs for the System Builder Marathon, cases in the $80-120 price range dominate the reader-favorite list. When we recently polled the audience on what they'd most like to see in an upcoming round-up, we even had a few folks let us know that they wanted a comparison of everything in that range. Though the constant flow of new hardware makes it impossible to go into that much depth, we promised we'd do what we could.

Given so many potential candidates, we decided to do a series of round-ups with five or six models per story. We then invited more than two dozen companies to send up to three of their most competitive cases, giving them just three unobtrusive requirements:

1. The cases had to be priced between $80 and $120.
2. The cases had to hold full ATX components.
3. The cases had to provide an internal front-panel USB 3.0 connector.

That third requirement was a big problem for many manufacturers. But it was important to us because Tom's Hardware is the site that begged, pleaded, and eventually coerced motherboard companies to agree on an internal header standard, even as the forum that controls those standards dragged its feet.

Case companies have been so slow to embrace this standard that our requirement dropped a field of over 50 products to a collection of only 15. Fifteen products is an easy number to manage, dividing cleanly into a three-part series. We recently published In Pictures: Five Mainstream Gaming Cases, Previewed to show you some of the features found on our first five contenders, and today's review concludes part one of the series.

Three of today’s cases weigh less than 15 pounds, yet all five cases use a steel structure. In other words, the lightest of today’s cases is going to inherently have less rigidity than we might expect of products priced over $80. We’ll try to reserve most of that critique for our conclusion, though.

Building With The Corsair 300R

Corsair’s Carbide Series 300R has enough space for an oversized ATX motherboard up to 11.8” wide, with an empty space between upper and lower bays that allows graphics cards up to 16.3” long to fit into slots one through five.

While most standoffs are threaded to accept screws, Corsair places a stud in the center of the motherboard tray to positively locate the board. This simplifies pushing the board into position when the other screws are installed.

Limiting front-panel connectivity to a pair of USB 3.0 ports helps Corsair to reduce the number of cables. Ditching the old AC'97 audio header in favor of HD Audio connector further cleans up the installation. Anyone still using AC'97 should probably consider upgrading his or her motherboard before splurging on a new case.

Carbide Series 300R hardware includes a variety of screws and standoffs to mount the motherboard, SSDs, and optional fans.

Offset mounting of 2.5” drives is required to make a single tray work in cases that include backplanes (though the 300R has no backplane). A 3.5” drive locator pin must still be removed from its silicone noise dampener to make room for the smaller drive, which is screwed to the bottom of the tray.

Manipulating a latch on each 5.25” bay allows devices to be added and removed without tools. Each drive is secured on only one side, though a tab on the opposite side has a bump which centers on one of the drive’s screw holes.

Our P9X79 WS motherboard is about 0.9” wider than the ATX standard, yet Corsair's case swallows it with room to spare. That extra board width does, however, partially block certain cable holes, requiring the ATX and PCIe power cables to follow an alternative path.

The finished product is stylish yet plain, which are two words that should only be used together when describing an object (Ed.: What, as opposed to someone's significant other?).

Building With The In Win Mana 136

With a structural drive cage that runs from the floor to the optical bays, In Win’s Mana 136 limits maximum card length to 11.5”. There’s still enough room to hold our slightly-oversized motherboard, however.

A USB 2.0 double-row connector feeds only a single port, while the two USB 3.0 ports get the now-standard 19-pin connector. In Win supports both AC'97 and HD Audio from separate connectors on a single lead, similarly providing separate power LED connections on two-pin (standard) and three-pin (Asus) connectors.

Standoffs are pressed-into the Mana 136 motherboard tray, reducing the size of the hardware installation kit. A slot cover is included however, which might appear a little strange until we look at the back panel.

A single piece of sheet metal is intended to hold all cards in place, though each slot also supports a traditional mounting screw. Only one mounting screw is included, though, since all but one of the installed slot covers is a knock-out (the hallmark of less-expensive cases). The chassis doesn’t even include mounting screws, since drive screws of the same size have specially-shaped heads for use with keyhole-style installation slots.

Tabs at the end of those slots grab one screw of each drive. Since the casing of a 3.5” hard drive provides half the structure of the Mana 136’s hard drive mounting system, 2.5” drives are excluded from those bays. Up to two SSDs are instead screwed into eight holes of the bottom panel.

With no top hole to run our eight-pin ATX/EPS 12 V power cable and no space above the motherboard to even place a hole, we ran the CPU power cable around the motherboard’s perimeter. We were also forced to track down a straight SATA data cable for the SSD, since our motherboard only includes right-angle cables.

The quality of In Win’s Mana 136 is found in its sturdy plastic face panel and textured white paint. Blue LED backlighting adds even more flair to this stylish case.

Building With The MSI Stealth

MSI’s Stealth provides 11.9” of motherboard mounting space that opens up to 16.4” at slots two through four. A bracket between upper and lower bays offers two sliding card support brackets. This can be removed if it gets in the way of a single super-long, dual-GPU board that you plan to install, which may require the extra space.

Thin shoulders on two factory-mounted standoffs positively locate the board as you're installing its screws. The remaining hardware comes in one of two bags from the installation kit. MSI also throws in a couple of foam support blocks and an MSI dog tag.

Slides on MSI’s trays allow them to be spread when inserting locating pins into 3.5” drives, unlike competing designs that rely on tray flex to achieve the same thing. SSDs screw into the center, which prevents the tray from being spread.

A swinging pin assembly secures 5.25” drives into external bays.

Although it covers most of the Stealth’s cable access holes, our slightly-oversized motherboard fits fairly well. The photo shows our alternative cable path.

Though the design theme of MSI’s Stealth appears dated, the LED fan does get a little attention from onlookers.

Building With The NZXT Phantom 410

NZXT designed its Phantom 410 with a removable hard drive cage, expanding the case’s normal 11.8” card space to 16.8” in the top five slots. Builders lose four internal bays as a compromise.

With both USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 headers in the mix, NZXT cleans up visible cable clutter by paring back the front-panel audio connector to HD Audio-only. A second bunch of cables connect four of the front-panel fan controller’s six leads to optional fans, while the other two leads are factory-connected to included fans.

NZXT was kind enough to separate all of the Phantom 410’s installation hardware into separate bags.

Hard drives are removed from the reverse (right) side of the Phantom 410.

The Phantom 410 offsets 2.5” drives to one side of the tray. That'd be a necessary concession if the case had backplanes. It doesn't, though. Nevertheless, you still have to take a few seconds to remove the corresponding 3.5” mounting pins from their keyholes prior to screwing the smaller drive in place.

A sliding latch unlocks the 5.25” bays; pulling the latch releases its pins. The Phantom 410 secures external drives on only one side.

An internal fan bracket reduces top-slot card clearance to 10.8”, blocking access to the SATA connectors of our slightly-oversized motherboard. The bracket can be pivoted or removed.

Although removing the fan bracket may have helped our SATA cables fit, the extra width of our motherboard blocked access to needed cable entry holes. We removed the center drive cage to make room for cables to pass through, and didn’t bother to replace the lower cable hole’s grommet when we found that merely bumping it caused it to fall out again.

All cables holes have rolled edges, making the grommets superfluous anyway.

While this editor prefers cases without drive doors, it’s difficult to argue against the look NZXT achieved with the front of its Phantom 410. The upper part of the finished system looks brighter than normal for a different reason…

A multi-colored LED fan adds a little visual excitement, brightens up the look of our installed components, and is lit softly enough to prevent annoying distraction. The lighting can’t be disabled, but turning down the fan speed makes it appear dimmer.

Building With The Xigmatek Midgard II

Xigmatek’s Midgard II provides many of the internal design elements that made us like the NZXT Phantom 410, but leaves out a handful of its competitor's features, like those awkward internal grommets.

The Midgard II doesn’t have an internal fan controller, though a slot-mounted fan controller is included in its installation kit. Instead, the four-pin power connector is used by its top-panel drive dock, which supports 2.5” and 3.5” internal drives, externally.

Xigmatek’s installation kit uniquely includes a slot-panel triple-fan controller and a front-panel replacement cover, which is used for the thin optical drives found in notebooks. The Midgard II hosts only three 5.25” drives, but using a laptop's optical drive in the other external bay lets you use the trio of 5.25” bays for other devices.

The Midgard II compels you to install 2.5” drives in the center of its 3.5” trays so that you can skip the removal of drive-holder pins required on many competing models. The trays of those competing models are designed for use with non-existent backplanes.

Twisting the center knob of each drive latch 90° allows it to be pulled completely away from the drive cage, releasing its pins from the drive. Xigmatek secures drives from both sides with these latches, making the drive less wobbly, but more time-consuming to replace.

Similarities to the NZXT Phantom 410 continue in the Midgard II’s finished installation, with our slightly-oversized motherboard blocking required access holes. We again removed the center drive cage to create a place to route our ATX and PCIe cables.

The Midgard II adds ventilation and features without departing from the understated look that many experienced builders prefer.

Test Settings And Benchmarks

We reused the test platform from Four ATX Cases For High-Capacity Water Cooling, Reviewed, but at an overclocked setting that’s more appropriate for air cooling. It includes Asus’ P9X79 WS and a sacrificial C0-stepping Core i7-3960X.

While we normally choose a cooler for its low noise and high cooling, Coolink’s Corator DS provides the moderately-low temperatures and moderately-high noise needed to properly evaluate the airflow and noise-dampening capabilities of these cases.

Temperature, Noise, And Acoustic Efficiency

The two most closely-matched case designs take first and second place in our thermal tests, with the case that has the most factory-installed fans topping the chart.

While this editor finds drive doors inconvenient, they do occasionally help reduce the overall noise profile of a case. Thicker material also dampens noise, while vent size and location have a profound effect on how much noise escapes.

Similarities in internal design are not proven in noise dampening, as NZXT and Xigmatek take opposite ends of the chart. Corsair’s 300R is the quietest of the three thin cases, and it is also the coolest of those three.

For our cooling to noise comparison, the word relative refers to how each case compares to the average of cases in this review.

Because lower temperatures produce better results, an inverse scale of thermal performance is needed to give better-cooling cases a higher score. The average temperature of all cases is divided by the average temperature of an individual case to calculate its relative cooling.

The bottom number in a division problem is already inverted (a larger denominator produces a smaller fraction), so the average noise level of each case is divided by the average noise level of all cases to produce a direct result for relative noise reduction.

Taking first place in both cooling and noise, NZXT’s Phantom 410 has the most favorable cooling-to-noise ratio. Corsair continues its dominance as the best of the cheaper models, while Xigmatek’s poor noise control drops it to the middle of the pack.

Which Chassis Delivers On Value? How About Quality?

NZXT’s Phantom 410 provides the lowest temperatures, lowest noise, and best acoustic efficiency of the five cases in today’s test. If this were simply a matter of performance, we could conclude our project without further description. However, Corsair’s performance is pretty impressive as well, and its price is also rather good.

Thus, anyone looking for the best bang-for-the-buck case will probably jump on Corsair’s 300R. Indeed, we were even able to find the case for $10 less than the $80 floor set for this story's budget range, and using that lower number would have given the case an even higher value score. But we're not really convinced that “mainstream” is the place for Corsair’s 300R. It's flimsy materials and limited number of ports are more closely-matched by several $60 models.

Xigmatek’s Midgard II takes second place in a comparison of performance to price, being the cheapest case in today’s article that really deserves to be called a mainstream gaming-oriented product. That judgement is based solely on material quality and features.

In Win’s Mana 136 looks the part of a mid-range enthusiast chassis, just like Xigmatek's, and it even has the heavy face panel and paint to match. Unfortunately, underneath those accoutrements lies the structure of a $30 budget box.

NZXT gets things right on quality, noise, and cooling, but falls to the back of the pack when it comes to value.

MSI's Stealth edges out the three lightweights on structural quality, but added features such as its SRF rubberized finish, USB charging port and VGA stabilizer brackets can't make us forget that it consistently lags behind when it comes to cooling, noise, and acoustic efficiency.

Value was supposed to be a primary consideration in today’s comparison. However, the highest value score goes to an enclosure built more like cases in a more entry-level class. We're looking for sturdier materials in the $80 to $120 segment. Quality was always supposed to be another important criteria in our round-up. And that’s where a single product really stood out.

Unable to make a clear case for a value award (Ed.: I see what you did there), we're choosing to recognize the case that won everything except the price battle. The only product in this comparison to meet all of our performance and quality demands, NZXT’s Phantom 410 gets our stamp of approval.

LGA 2011: No Boxed Solution, Pick Your Own Instead

It seems strange to us that Intel no longer includes a cooler with its fastest retail CPUs. This is, after all, the same company that seems to insist that we include our original boxed cooler any time we send in one of our purchased processors in for a warranty exchange. Instead, it now suggests that enthusiasts spend extra money on something that resembles Antec’s Kühler H20 620, but actually costs as much as the larger Kühler H20 920: Intel's own BXRTS2011LQ sealed liquid CPU cooling system.

The rationale behind this move does make sense in that the Core i7-3960X and Core i7-3930K are multiplier-unlocked products that specifically target overclocking enthusiasts. Enthusiasts typically won’t settle for anything as underpowered as its RTS2011AC downdraft cooler, and Intel doesn’t think hanging two pounds of copper and aluminum up to six inches from the surface of a motherboard is a great idea. And while that kind of leverage tugging on your expensive motherboard is probably ill-advised under the harsh conditions of shipping a machine cross-country, systems that are handled gently and don't get moved often tolerate the weight of big, heavy coolers without a problem.

We invited every major CPU cooler manufacturer (that's right, all of them) to show off their LGA 2011-compatible heat sinks, and fourteen responded with products ranging from $30 to $99. That takes either a great deal of confidence or a great leap of faith from the budget cooler companies, since everyone participating in this piece knew that we'd be basing our evaluation on overclocking. The wide price range allows us to really test how much we need to spend on cooling, and how much we can benefit from spending more money than necessary.

Following up on our earlier picture story, here’s a brief overview of each cooler’s basic features, grouped by price first and arranged alphabetically. Please pay special attention to each cooler’s base height, which is measured with the intake fan at its highest position, along with thickness and offset. If the fan overhangs your DIMM slots, its base height (plus around 0.3" for the CPU/LGA package) represents your maximum supported DIMM height.

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Since higher fan speeds typically increase cooling capacity at low cost, some of the more expensive models attempt to provide the best balance of cooling and noise. Today’s tests includes both heat and noise measurements, and we’ll even compare heat to noise, heat to price, and heat/noise to price!

Installing Akasa's Venom Voodoo

With glory shots covered in our previous picture story, today’s article focuses on installation, testing, and results. We begin with Akasa’s sharp-looking dual-fan Venom Voodoo.

Akasa’s installation kit covers everything from AMD’s Socket AM2 to Intel’s latest LGA 2011, with screw-in standoffs separating today’s installation from the also-possible LGA 1366.

All the base plates go back in the box thanks to LGA 2011’s integrated cooler support, into which we threaded Akasa’s custom cooler standoffs.

The Intel-style top bracket is still required, and attached to the top of the Venom Voodoo’s base using four screws from the bottom.

We like simple installations, and were pleased to find that the cooler drops straight on at this point. The heat sink’s concave side should face the cooler’s intake fan, while the exhaust fan clips to the other side.

Yellow and black signify danger, which is why it’s frequently used by both bees and construction crews. In this case, the danger might be to your competitors as you show off the power of your overclocked Sandy Bridge-E-based PC!.

Installing Arctic Cooling's Freezer i30

Arctic Cooling’s extremely simplified installation kit eliminates any LGA 1366 support plate in favor of LGA 2011-specific screws.

This could have even been considered a Sandy Bridge-only package if not for the fact that the included LGA 1155 hardware also fits LGA 1156. Even still, we're ignoring both of those interfaces in today’s installation.

Metal spacers fit over the LGA 2011’s integrated screw posts (foreground) before attaching each of the Freezer i30’s two adapter brackets (background).

With its fan removed, the Freezer i30’s integrated cross bracket screws onto its adapter brackets.

Plugging in the fan’s motherboard lead and clipping it to the heat sink completes Arctic Cooling’s Freezer i30 installation.

Installing Cooler Master's Hyper 212 Evo

Cooler Master didn’t have a retail package available when it sent this Hyper 212 Evo sample, but instead included just the cooler, an LGA 2011 installation bracket, and a small tube of thermal paste.

The bracket folds to allow easy insertion between the heat sink’s base and fins.

The unfolded bracket simply screws into Intel’s integrated LGA 2011 support plate. A steel pin in the base’s aluminum top plate engages groves on the bracket to keep the cooler from twisting.

Plugging in the fan and clipping it to the cooler completes the installation of Cooler Master’s Hyper 212 Evo.

Installing Coolink's Corator DS

The Corator DS we received is an LGA 2011-specific model, containing nothing more than a set of nuts and standoffs to connect its universal-pattern Intel LGA brackets.

Standoffs screw into the LGA 2011 interface's included threads (foreground), and the cross brackets are then screwed onto them (background).

The Corator DS’ factory-mounted bracket then screws onto the cross brackets from the kit. What appear to be spring-loaded screws are actually threaded tubes, with a hexagonal cap and a #2 Phillips socket atop each.

The Corator DS’ single fan clips between its twin radiators, and plugging it into the motherboard power header completes the installation process.

Installing Corsair's Air Series A70

Corsair’s installation kit resembles Akasa’s, but with two key differences. First, a clip-style bracket is used for AMD interface compatibility.

The second difference is far more pertinent to our installation: there are no special standoffs for use with Intel’s LGA 2011 integrated mounting plate. Instead, Corsair relies on a little-discussed feature of the LGA 2011 design to support this product:

LGA 2011 motherboards still have LGA 1366 mounting holes. These holes are covered by the factory-installed gasket, but we can see the gasket peeking through the holes in the photo above. These holes are likely intended to prevent damage from overly-long mounting screws when using the integrated support plate.

Corsair told us to simply pop the bracket’s hold-down screws through the gasket, but these screws weren’t sharp enough to go through easily. We instead poked slits in the LGA 2011 gasket using a pocket knife, and inserted the mounting screws through those slits.

The screws now stand atop the LGA 2011 interface the same way they did on our LGA 1366 motherboards.

As with Akasa, Corsair’s mounting bracket bolts atop the A70’s base using screws from its underside.

Nuts apply tension between the cooler’s bracket and support plate using those protruding screws.

Plugging the fans into their motherboard headers and clipping them onto the heat sink completes the A70's installation.

Installing Deepcool's (Gamerstorm) Assassin

Deepcool's Gamerstorm brand brings us the Assassin, which is also distributed by Logisys. Although you can find this cooler by searching any of those names, we found the deepcool-us.com server more reliable than gamerstorm.cn.

The Assassin installation kit includes a support plate for Intel’s LGA 1155, 1156, and 1366, plus AMD’s Sockets AM2 and AM3. LGA 2011 users can throw the big plate back into the box, though, as separate screws and spacers allow the upper brackets to be screwed directly to their motherboard’s integrated support plate.

The split plastic spacers are too thick to fit properly, but a little wiggling achieves the approximate position (foreground). Each cross-bracket is then screwed onto the spacers (background).

The Assassin heat sink’s hold-down is then attached to the cross brackets using spring-loaded screws. This process is slightly more cumbersome than competing solutions because the hold-down bracket isn’t attached to the cooler.

Plugging the fans into motherboard headers and clipping them onto the sink completes the Gamerstorm Assassin installation.

Installing Enermax's ETS-T40

Enermax's ETS-T40 fits Intel’s four-bolt LGA interfaces and replaces AMD’s four-bolt brackets. Four special standoffs add LGA 2011 to the support list.

Either set of cross braces (background) can be fit atop the LGA 2011 standoffs (foreground). Threaded studs on both sets of brackets engage clamping bolts for the top bracket.

Two pins in the top bracket position it precisely atop the ETS-T40’s base. We found that the two nuts that tighten this bracket cannot be completely tightened, though the space between it and the cross brackets is minimal.

Plugging the fan’s PWM connector into the motherboard’s header and clipping it onto the cooler’s face completes the installation of Enermax’s ETS-T40.

Installing Gelid's GX-7

Gelid had not yet added the LGA 2011 installation kit to its GX-7 at the time we asked for review samples, but instead sent its $5 accessory kit for our installation.

Two brackets attach to the GX-7’s base using included screws.

Spring-loaded screws then apply even tension to the brackets, using LGA 2011’s integrated cooler support plate.

Connecting the fan to a motherboard and clipping it to the heatsink completes the Gelid GX-7 installation.

Installing Noctua's NH-D14

The SE2011 (Special Edition 2011) version of Noctua’s NH-D14 contains only the parts need to support Intel’s latest processor interface.

Universal-pattern Intel brackets mate to LGA 2011-exlusive studs using included nuts.

Spring-loaded nuts assure even pressure as the NH-D14’s integrated clamping bracket screws onto each bracket’s studs.

Connecting the fans to our motherboard’s PWM headers and clipping them to the sink completes the installation of Noctua’s NH-D14 SE2011.

Installing Phantek's PH-TC14PE

Phanteks adds a diverse installation kit for Intel’s older LGAs and AMD’s four-bolt sockets, but LGA 2011 installation is made far easier through the use of its integrated support plate.

Four standoffs (foreground) space two cross brackets (background) above the socket, with threaded studs on each cross bracket made to engage the cooler’s hold-down strap.

Bolting the PH-TC14PE’s hold-down strap to the base keeps it from flopping around when installing the heat sink. Spring-loaded nuts at the end of that strap provide even pressure across the base as they're screwed onto cross brackets.

Plugging the fan leads into motherboard headers and clipping them onto the radiators completes the installation process for Phantek’s PH-TC14PE.

Note that both fans are 140 mm (5.5 inches) and can be clipped at several heights. DIMM clearance required us to raise the fan around ½” from center. Depending on the height of your DIMMs, this option may extend the fan beyond the closing point of your case’s side panel.

Also note that the fan clips touch metal components on the back of our video card. We tilted the card slightly to eliminate potential short circuits, but you might not have this option in a chassis.

Installing SilenX's EFZ-120HA5

SilenX's installation kit includes a top bracket that fits all popular desktop CPU sockets (LGA 775 to 2011, AMD Socket 939 to AM3+), a base plate that supports most popular performance-oriented processor interfaces (except for LGA 2011), and an extra set of mounting screws for LGA 2011’s integrated cooler support plate.

SilenX's universal top bracket screws to the sides of the cooler with its ears pointing towards the bottom, as shown.

The EFZ-120HA5’s top bracket is then attached directly to the LGA 2011 cooler support holes using spring-loaded screws. This is the point where everyone who doesn’t have LGA 2011 can start crying about all of the extra steps they're forced to endure.

The most difficult-to-install part of the EVA-120HA5 kit is its fan. First, four T-shaped rubber tacks must be pulled through the fan's mounting holes (on its back side). The top of the T must then be slid into groves on the heat sink.

Unfortunately, the fan’s hole spacing is slightly wider than the heat sink’s height, leaving each T dangling precariously, as only half of its length is supported by fins. The Ts are soft, the fins are rough, so the lightweight fan isn’t likely to shift. But getting it centered takes a couple of minutes.

With its fan’s power lead plugged into our motherboard’s header, SilenX's EFZ-120HA5 installation is complete.

Installing Thermalright's Archon SB-E

The Archon SB-E includes the cooler and AMD/Intel universal installation kit from Thermalright’s Archon Rev.A, plus an LGA 2011-specific standoff set.

While other platforms get to this point using long nuts and a separate support plate, LGA 2011 standoffs screw directly to the motherboard’s integrated cooler mount.

The Archon SB-E’s top bracket is installed onto standoffs using small screws.

Self-adhesive vibration dampening pads are most easily stuck to the cooler before attaching it to the motherboard.

The cooler is then clamped down to the hold-down plate using an included strap.

Note that the strap only centers the CPU cooler front-to-back, leaving around ¼” of side-to-side adjustability.

The fan’s lead is then plugged into the motherboard, and the fan itself clipped to the heatsink. Note that the fan cannot be rotated 90° because its hole pattern is rectangular rather than square. No matter how far we slide the base, the Archon SB-E always hangs past our top video card slot. Thus, we were forced to test the cooler with our graphics card in slot position three, which means that it wasn’t tested in a standard configuration. We’ll make sure to mention this as we discuss our thermal findings.

Installing Xigmatek's Venus XP-SD1266

Xigmatek uses the same bracket set as Enermax, though these are packed a little differently. Bushings for the aluminum pressure plate, for example, were found beside the plate rather than inside of it, and there’s no included wrench for the tension nuts.

Xigmatek labels its Intel and AMD brackets, though the AMD brackets are also drilled to fit Intel socket hole spacing.

This is how Enermax's installation would have appeared at the half-way point, had we used the other bracket set (minus the Xigmatek and Intel labels, of course). Cross brackets are mounted to LGA 2011-specific standoffs using thumb nuts.

With no wrench to play with, we tightened Xigmatek’s tension nuts using an electric screwdriver. The results are the same, with a slight space found between the cross brackets and the pressure plate when both nuts are fully tightened.

Like SilenX, Xigmatek uses rubber tacks to hold its Venus XP-SD1266 fan and heat sink together. Xigmatek’s design is better in a couple ways, including the fact that the sink is actually tall enough to hold the fan. The tacks are also slotted and hooked on from the sides, rather than forced in from above and below.

Installing Zalman's CNPS12X

Zalman’s CNPS12X installation kit supports AMD’s Sockets AM2 through AM3+, in addition to Intel’s desktop LGA 775 through LGA 2011. LGA 2011-specific standoffs let you get rid of the irksome support plate in favor of the interface's integrated mounts.

Standoffs are threaded in first (foreground), followed by cross brackets and thumb screws (background).

At the edge of a factory-installed pressure bracket, factory-installed spring screws engage holes on the cross brackets to provide even pressure against the CPU.

Ah, but wait…isn’t that backwards? Zalman designed the CNPS12X with ¼” offset to clear the top of your case, your power supply, or whatever else is above your motherboard. Unfortunately, that causes the cooler to overlap our motherboard’s main graphics card slot.

We were left to either put our graphics card in the wrong slot and partially discredit the results (as we will with one other cooler) or mount it in such a way that some of the air pushed through it would already be warmed by our graphics card and power supply. Choosing the latter means that the test results represent a performance floor, by which we know it performs "at least this well."

A final installation issue that affected our build was that the CNPS12X overlapped our second DIMM slot and was just low enough to the motherboard that the fan tips barely touched our 1.55” DIMMs. Though we were able to make things work with a little adjustment, the solution wasn't long-term enough that we'd recommend this cooler to anyone with modules even a hair taller than 1.50”.

Test Settings And Benchmarks

Zalman’s ZM-STG2 thermal paste is used in this test not to favor its cooler, but because Zalman has long been our thermal paste provider. It works equally well with other cooler brands, and settling on a single substance reduces variability in testing.

Our CPU and voltage regulator pull around 300 W at full load at this O/C, using an old C0 stepping Core i7-3960X at 4.60 GHz and 1.40 V. We used this specific processor because it’s the one we can most easily afford to lose (due to heat damage) after long bouts of overclocking.

Twelve threads of Prime95 provide 100% load. We were forced to test noise at extremely close distances to stay within our meter’s calibration range.

Benchmark Results: Cooling And Fan Speed

Noctua and Zalman are in a dead heat at the top of our CPU temperature chart, and its here where many readers will remind us that Zalman’s cooler was mounted backwards (where its intake air might have been slightly warmer).

We’d give Zalman the benefit of the doubt if the fitment issue wasn't such a concern. Besides, some builders (and some cooler manufacturers) prefer to see chassis exhaust fans mounted as an extra intake, though we can only suggest doing that with cases that have extremely good top-panel exhaust.

SilenX’s temperature here has to be recorded as an estimate as a result of processor throttling. You see, the displayed temperature is an average for all cores, and this processor begins throttling at 90° C. Without the ability to achieve lower (and less realistic) ambient temperatures, we simply couldn’t keep the warmest core below its throttle point.

After gauging the amount of time it took to reach throttle temperature at various ambient temperatures, we looked at our rough time to ambient temperature curve and estimated that this cooler could only keep our system at full speed with a room temperature below -4° C.

Enermax's ETS-T40 similarly required an unrealistically-low ambient temperature of 20° C at these overclocked settings. We say unrealistic because we never cool our offices below 22° C in the summer, and even our coolest cases are slightly warmer inside. Yet, we can say with certainty that the ETS-T40 is at least good enough to use with this processor at a lower frequency, since it barely crossed the borderline while using a fairly high 1.40 V core voltage and a full CPU load.

Thermalright offers the lowest fan speed, so we expect it to give off the least amount of noise. Yet, the same product manages to achieve respectable cooling performance in the middle of the pack thanks to its fan’s enormous size. Unfortunately, those same larger dimensions forced us to move our graphics card to a different slot. Proper fitment is an important variable, so this small configuration change negates any possibility for a cooling-to-noise award. As with SilenX, Thermalright’s cooling performance is simply an estimation.

Benchmark Results: Noise And Acoustic Efficiency

Single-fan coolers have the lowest noise at any given speed, since each doubling of identical sound sources adds an extra 3 db to the reading (in audio theory). That same theory explains why Arctic Cooling and SilenX’s mid-speed individual fans take second and third place in silence, ahead of Zalman’s three low-speed fans.

We’d consider anything below 30 db in open air to be quiet, mostly because we use quiet cases to cut back on ambient noise even more. True seekers of silence might settle for nothing less than Thermalright’s Archon, however, even though it doesn’t fit our motherboard properly.

The Archon SB-E is so quiet, in fact, that it tops our Acoustic Efficiency charts, in spite of its mid-pack thermal performance. At the other end of the chart, the SilenX EFZ-120HA5’s cooling performance can't compensate for its second-place noise level.

Which LGA 2011 Cooler Would We Buy?

The top three cooling performers, in order, are Noctua and Zalman, followed by Phanteks. The three coolers with the highest cooling-to-noise ratio are from Thermalright, Zalman, and Noctua. Wouldn’t it be nice if one of these companies could also top our cooling-to-price chart?

Alas, the least-expensive models take that prize. All three of the best cooling-per-dollar contenders use mid-speed fans, and only Corsair needs a pair of fans to achieve this value rating.

If we exclude Enermax from this overclocking-oriented cooler comparison due to its relatively low thermal performance, we’re left with the 31 db Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo battling Corsair’s A70. A temperature difference of only 1° C certainly makes it hard to argue against Cooler Master’s lower noise level, yet price parity will probably push many enthusiasts to take that 1° to the bank.

It’s at this point where we must wonder what would happen if we compare acoustic efficiency to price.

Cooler Master wins this time, and by a wider margin. If we were basing this review on Intel’s upcoming Core i7-3820, we might even hand out a value award and be done with the story.

But we’re not using a low-cost processor, and prices on Intel’s six-core models justify higher standards of cooling and noise. Putting cost aside, we like the low temperature and noise of Zalman’s CNPS12X. But it also doesn’t fit our motherboard in the desired orientation, or even provide proper memory clearance for our 1.55” tall DIMMs. Instead of using the CNPS12X backwards or trying to remove its fans and face them the other way, and then installing shorter memory that we didn’t even want, we’re forced to consider Noctua’s second-place performer as a perennial champion ever since its took the performance lead two years ago.

The problem with “Best of” awards is that the best often changes before we can even get a review published. Determining that something's the best also means we have to test all of its competition. If we trust that Noctua’s competitors put forth their best efforts for this comparison, two years of performance leadership make the NH-D14 deserving of our highest honor.

But how valuable is this award, really? The NH-D14 just earned this editor’s very first “Best of Tom's Hardware” in the award's four-year history!