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Thermalright IFX-14

David Murphy — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 14:05:00 -0600

Installing Thermalright’s beefy IFX-14 CPU cooler is incredibly complex. Assembling the troublesome amalgam of parts, pieces, screws, and brackets made us long for the snap-lock mechanism of standard Intel coolers. That said, the IFX-14 delivers massive cooling when it’s up and running. But there’s a caveat: It doesn’t include any fans. Thus, its performance depends on the type of fan you attach to one or two sides of the device. Our benchmarks are based on the use of two generic 12cm fans we pulled from a box in the Lab.

Hit the jump for the full review!

Keep Your PC/Xbox/PS3/AppleTV From Overheating in a Closed Cabinet

Will Smith — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 12:00:00 -0500

We love to have tons of cool electronics hooked up to the big living room TV -- who doesn’t? But, if you’re like us, your significant other is less keen on seeing all that awesome black plastic and shiny metal, and you probably did the same thing we did: Went out and bought an overpriced, crappy piece of mass-produced furniture that has doors. Doors! And what do those doors do? They create hot pockets of electronics-killing heat that will shorten the life of our precious gear. All to keep the wife happy.

Fear not, heat haters. We put the Maximum PC brain trust to work in assembling a quick, quiet, and easy cooling solution for, well, just about any cabinet you’re willing to cut a hole in. We tested our solution with two of the hottest pieces of hardware we could find: an Xbox 360 and an AppleTV. With both boxed turned on, and with the door closed, the internal temperature of the cabinet quickly hit 130F. But after we mounted our heat-triggered fan, we saw the internal temperatures hovering a scant degree or two above room temperature. Want to find out how we did it? Hit the jump!

Zalman CNPS9300 AT

David Murphy — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 11:00:00 -0500

We did not expect this. When we first got our hands on Zalman’s CNPS9300 AT, we assumed the company had pulled a “Honey, I Shrunk the CPU Cooler” on its flagship product, the bulky CNPS9700. That’s certainly true if you consider the tale of the tape: The CNPS9300 is 80 percent smaller than its big brother, and its total thermal dissipation area has been nearly halved, from 5,490cm² to 2,583cm².

Logic only dictates that this cooler should perform far worse than the Zalman CNPS9700. But the built-for-silence CNPS9300 AT nearly matches its big brother’s performance—as well as that of our top cooler, Thermaltake’s DuOrb (reviewed July 2008).

How can such things be? Answers after the jump.

Multi-function Modding

Chris Adcock — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 16:24:06 -0600

LED fans and cold cathodes are neat and all, but if you are going for a bit of bolt-a-bling, why not go with something functional as well? How about a multi-function panel?

New Fan? Which Way Should It Blow?

Chris Adcock — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 20:29:48 -0500

So you’re just about to bolt on an additional fan to cool your UberMach 3000 rig. Is it an innie or an outie?

OCZ Tempest

Josh Norem — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 17:12:14 -0500

This month, memory-maker OCZ wades into the hotly contested CPU cooling arena with its blingy Tempest cooler. Though the Tempest has the signature OCZ flair, we were let down by its midrange performance and loud operation.

Click Read More for more.

Thermaltake Blue Orb II

Josh Norem — Mon, 19 Jun 2006 12:16:07 -0500

We gave the Golden Orb II a mediocre 7 verdict back in October 2005, but the Blue Orb II is bigger and much, much better. It’s a massive cooler that squats over the CPU socket like a sumo wrestler, taking up every square millimeter of space.

Click Read More for more.

ThermalTakeTyphoon Mini

Josh Norem — Thu, 08 Jun 2006 14:37:38 -0500

This cooler’s predecessor is the Big Typhoon—a great cooler, as long as your PC doesn’t have a side door. You see, that cooler is so damn big that it extends almost all the way to the door of most cases, depriving the cooler of a source of fresh air. Thermaltake recognized the issue and thus the Mini Typhoon was born.

Click Read More for more.