Date: September 19th, 2007
Article by: Joe Anderson (Hardware Reviewer)
Edited by: Nathan Glentworth (Owner / Head Editor)
Product was submitted by: Ai Technology
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PRODUCT INSTALLATION AND TESTING
For this review, I've chosen a DFI Infinity P965-S motherboard coupled with an Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 Allendale processor (overclocked to 2.4 GHz, +0.1 Vcore.) The other components are listed below.
- eVGA 7800GT CO graphics card with stock cooler
- Buffalo Firestix PC2-6400 (1024mb X 2) memory
- Thermaltake Toughpower 750W PSU
- Western Digital Raptor 360 SATA hard drive
- LG DVD-RW drive
The Cool Silver TIM was compared to AS5 on both the OEM HSF and the Thermalright XP-90 (with Zalman 92mm fan.)
After testing the system with AS5 thermal compound, the cooler was removed and, along with the CPU, thoroughly cleaned with alcohol, and the Cool Silver was applied according to the instructions provided on the package. The Cool Silver material has a distinctive look, being much more “silvery” than the gray AS5. It also has a much different texture, being less “sticky.”
For both materials in the test, the computer was allowed to run at full load (using Prime95 torture test on each core) for two hours to partially set the compound. The computer was then allowed to idle for 15 minutes and shut down for one hour. The system was then started and allowed to idle at desktop for one hour and idle temps were recorded with CoreTemp (V. 0.95.) The system was then loaded with Prime95 once again and stressed for one hour. CoreTemp was used to record the load temps. The results follow. Cooler fan speeds were also recorded. Fans were run at full speed (OEM-1800 RPM, Zalman-2600 RPM) and an ambient temperature of 21C was maintained throughout testing. Here are the results:
Well, AIT's claims seem to be justified, although barely. The Cool Silver performs a bit better at idle, while it bests AS5 by 4C at load with the XP-90 cooler. Keep in mind that the results are subject to the accuracy of the monitoring program and the sensors themselves, but I'm declaring The Cool Silver a winner by virtue of the load performance.
As you can see, the Cool Silver showed excellent coverage when the coolers were removed, and the thixotropic properties discussed above seem to have kept the material where it belonged, even with the round base of the OEM cooler.
