Home CPU coolers compared in epic 33-way throwdown
News

CPU coolers compared in epic 33-way throwdown

Geoff Gasior
Disclosure
Disclosure
In our content, we occasionally include affiliate links. Should you click on these links, we may earn a commission, though this incurs no additional cost to you. Your use of this website signifies your acceptance of our terms and conditions as well as our privacy policy.

As you may have noticed, we’re big proponents of comparative performance testing here at TR. There’s perhaps no better way to evaluate a product’s strengths and weaknesses than seeing how it stacks up against the competition. With that in mind, I’ve gotta give a shout out to an excellent CPU cooler round-up published by Hardware.Info. The article compares the cooling performance, noise levels, and overall efficiency of 33 different heatsinks from a range of manufacturers.

The lab geek in me is particularly impressed with the test rig used for the comparison. Hardware.Info strapped each cooler to a CPU simulator that purportedly replicated the exact heat signatures of Ivy Bridge and Sandy Bridge-E processors. Each cooler was asked to dissipate 65, 95, and 125W, and the LGA2011-compatible units were also given 130 and 160W loads. Testing was conducted with the fans running at a full-tilt 12V speed and a slower 7V level.

There’s far too much data to summarize succinctly, so I encourage you to check out the full article. A few interesting things jump out at me, though. The temperature deltas between the best and worst solutions range from 15-29°C, and that’s without a stock cooler thrown into the mix. The differences between the quietest and loudest solutions are also quite wide: 28-32 db, depending on the fan speed. Hardware.Info quantifies the efficiency of each cooler using the product of its temperature and noise level for each configuration, which produces some interesting results.

In the end, a handful of coolers stood out. The Cooler Master TPC-800 (which was tested with a Scythe Gentle Typhoon fan), Cooler Master Hyper 412S, and Be Quiet! Dark Rock Pro 2 earned gold awards, while the Noctua NH-D14, Be Quiet! Dark Rock Advanced C1, DeepCool Deptwin, and Gelid Tranquilo Rev. 2 took home silver.

Latest News

Apple Might Join Hands with Google or OpenAI for Their AI Tech
News

Apple Is Reportedly Planning to Join Hands with Google or OpenAI to License Their AI Tools

YouTube Launches New Tool To Help Label AI-generated Content
News

YouTube Launches a New Tool to Help Creators Label AI-Generated Content

YouTube released a tool that will make creators clearly label the parts of their content that are generated by AI. The initiative was first launched in November in an attempt...

Ripple Dumps 240 Million XRP Tokens Amid 17% Price Decline
Crypto News

Ripple Dumps 240 Million XRP Tokens Amid 17% Price Decline

Popular crypto payment platform Ripple has released 240 million XRP tokens in its latest escrow unlock for March. This comes at a time when XRP’s price has declined significantly. Data from...

Crypto Expert Draws A Links Between Shiba Inu And Ethereum
Crypto News

Crypto Expert Draws Link Between Shiba Inu And Ethereum

The Lucrative FTX Bankruptcy Trade and Ongoing Legal Battle
Crypto News

The Lucrative FTX Bankruptcy Trade and Ongoing Legal Battle

Bitcoin (BTC) Price Set to Enter “Danger Zone” – Time to Back-Off or Bag More Coins?
Crypto News

Bitcoin (BTC) Price Set to Enter “Danger Zone” – Time to Back-Off or Bag More Coins?

SNB to Kick Off Rate Cut Cycle Sooner Than Expected
News

SNB to Kick-Start Rate Cut Cycle Sooner Than Expected