jmke

It becomes evident that there's a point of diminishing returns for every CPU cooler, and when over-cooled the results collide closely together. Although the 2.66GHz Intel Core i7-920 processor does a decent job of separating the crowd, there's still only about 7°C between the fifteen coolers we tested. Tt's a good bet that any one of these well-designed products will cool an overclocked system extremely well, but these days only the very best will do. Much like the Thermal Interface Material testing we have done for our upcoming follow-up article, high-performance products are all beginning to perform at nearly the same levels. Eventually, I expect to see the same technology used in all cooling products with the difference being the application. This is where experience comes in handy, and we've shared some of this with you in our Best Thermal Paste Application Methods article. Remember, less is more when it comes to thermal paste, and soon CPU coolers may offer the same paradigm.

So far, the Prolimatech Megahalems has dominated both the stock and high-output fan tests, which certainly doesn't make two products tied for second-place very happy. The Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme and Xigmatek Thor's Hammer S126384 are neck and neck with each other, but still a few degrees behind the Megahalems cooler. Titan's FINRIR also makes it into the top of the list again, with the all-copper prototype of the HDT-S1284 coming in right behind it. Some coolers didn't move in relation to the previous tests, and keep the same order in the lineup.

http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.ph...85&Item id=62

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