This Cooler Will Keep Your M.2 SSD as Cool as a Cucumber

Icy Box IB-M2HSF-705
Icy Box IB-M2HSF-705 (Image credit: Amazon U.K.)

Are you worried that your M.2 SSD is running too hot? Well, RaidSonic (via momomo_us) has released the Icy Box IB-M2HSF-705, a new cooler that's designed to keep even the best SSDs in check.

The IB-M2HSF-705 is RaidSonic's second M.2 SSD cooler under the Icy Box brand. The IB-M2HSF-702 may be too thick for many users' needs, so the new IB-M2HSF-705 could be a more appealing and less invasive option. Like its predecessor, the IB-M2HSF-705 is tailored toward M.2 SSDs with a length of 80mm. The cooler has a cooling capacity of 23W, which is overkill for most M.2 SSDs. According to the manufacturer, the IB-M2HSF-705 can reduce your drive's temperatures by up to 40% compared to passive M.2 heatsinks. That's only 10% lower than the IB-M2HSF-702.

Checking with dimensions of 75x30x50mm, the IB-M2HSF-705 arrives with an aluminum heatsink that consists of 22 cooling fins that are 0.5mm thick with 2mm air gaps between them. Unlike the previous IB-M2HSF-702 with twin 4mm copper heat pipes, the IB-M2HSF-705 relies on a single 6mm copper heat pipe. This design allows the IB-M2HSF-705 to support swivel adjustments so you can find the best position for the cooler and avoid eating up space for your graphics cards in compact cases.

The copper heat pipe makes direct contact with the M.2 SSD, so there should be excellent heat dissipation. To improve the cooling capacity further, Icy Box includes a thermal pad with a thermal conductivity of 1.5 W/mK and can withstand operating temperatures between -20 and 180 degrees Celsius.

A 30mm cooling fan dissipates the heat from the IB-M2HSF-705's heatsink. The fan comes with PWM support, so you'd want to ensure that your motherboard has a 4-pin fan connector near the M.2 slot. The cooling fan can hit 8,500 RPM and provide airflow up to 4.87 m³/h (2.87 CFM). Unfortunately, Icy Box didn't share the fan's air pressure, which is more critical when cooling heatsinks.

The IB-M2HSF-705 has already gone up on Amazon U.K.; however, the price isn't available at the moment. For comparison, the IB-M2HSF-702 retails for $29.99, so the IB-M2HSF-705 should have a similar, if not lower, price tag.

Zhiye Liu
RAM Reviewer and News Editor

Zhiye Liu is a Freelance News Writer at Tom’s Hardware US. Although he loves everything that’s hardware, he has a soft spot for CPUs, GPUs, and RAM.

  • Dr3ams
    Great...another fan in my case.
    Reply
  • evdjj3j
    Doesn't cooling NAND decrease the lifespan.
    Reply
  • Phaaze88
    evdjj3j said:
    Doesn't cooling NAND decrease the lifespan.
    As long as you're not purposefully keeping it below 30C I doubt it's anything to worry about.
    Besides, one should have a backup for their data lying around...

    The Gen4 NVMes - the ASIC controllers, to be more precise - are what benefit from a cooler like this.
    Reply
  • Lord Tyrion
    Dr3ams said:
    Great...another fan in my case.
    Agreed and pushing hot air into the centre of your case. Got both my NVMe's on cheap Barrow waterblocks from China and they are extremely cool under load. Although Corsair have just brought out the Corsair Hydro X Series XM2 which looks excellent
    Reply
  • TechLurker
    If one was to strap almost every M2 SSD with this or similar heatsinks like this, many ATX or larger motherboards could do their best impression of the early 2000s motherboards; that had a ton of copper heatsink cities growing out of the N/S-bridge chipsets. Just that now, they're all growing out of the M2 slots instead.
    Reply