Thermaltake BigTyp 14 Pro

It's big, mean, loud, and it doesn't play well with others, but it gets the job done

At five inches high, 6.14 inches square at the top, and weighing a few ounces shy of two pounds, the Thermaltake BigTyp 14 Pro is among the biggest and heaviest coolers we’ve tested—although it’s not as big as Cooler Master’s V10, reviewed last month.

The BigTyp 14 Pro contains six heat pipes routed through aluminum fins mounted perpendicular to the motherboard and is topped with a plastic shroud and 14cm variable-speed fan, which blows hot air straight down instead of through the back of the case, like with most performance coolers. Two retention clips screw into the base and are fastened with nuts on the underside of the motherboard, just like with the Cooler Master V10. Installing the BigTyp 14 Pro is easier than the V10—it’s smaller and lighter, it won’t bump up against crucial components like RAM, and the nuts can be screwed in with a Phillips screwdriver as opposed to a hex wrench. But there’s no room for a 12cm rear fan with the BigTyp installed.

The Thermaltake BigTyp 14 Pro is big enough to cause problems with some cases.

The support brace that reinforces our Cooler Master ATCS 840’s removable motherboard tray and backplate got in the way of the BigTyp’s plastic shroud. We’re not sure who to blame for this: Cooler Master for putting a brace so close to the top left of the motherboard, or Thermaltake for creating such an enormous cooler? Regardless, the cooler should install fine in most other chassis. (We ended up Dremeling out a corner of the cooler’s shroud to make it fit.)

At low fan speeds, the BigTyp 14 Pro outperforms our stock cooler, and at top howling speeds it’s a match for our favorite, the Zalman CNPS 9900. But even at $20 cheaper than the Zalman, the BigTyp won’t be taking the top slot. It’s too big and it messes up internal airflow by requiring removal of the 12cm back fan and routing its hot air straight down onto the mobo instead of onto the back of the case.

Thermaltake BigTyp 14 Pro

Big Red

Performs well at maximum settings.

Big Business

Large design interferes with some cases; loud; fan disrupts case airflow.

Thermaltake

Benchmarks

	BigTyp 14 Pro (low)	Zalman CNPS 9900	Stock Cooler
Idle (C)	33.25 (high: 30 )	31.75	45.75
100% Burn (C)	63.75 (high: 47.25)	47	70.25

Best scores are bolded. Idle temperatures were measured after an hour of inactivity; load temperatures were measured after an hour’s worth of CPU Burn-In (four instances). Test system consists of a stock-clock Q6700 processor on an EVGA 680i motherboard.