Date: August 30th, 2007
Article by: Jackie Mueller (Hardware Reviewer)
Edited by: Nathan Glentworth (Owner / Head Editor)
Product was submitted by: CoolIT
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PRODUCT PICTORIAL AND WALKTHROUGH
The blue LED 60mm fan on the underside is held in place by double sided tape on each corner that provides a secure fit, but I'm a little concerned over the long term stability of it since it's going to be exposed to constant heat. Power comes from a standard 3 pin fan header.
PRODUCT INSTALLATION AND TESTING
Before getting into the details of installation, here's the test system I'll be using:
- Biostar TForce 550 Motherboard
- AMD X2 3600+ Brisbane CPU overclocked to 2.8 GHz
- 2 x 1GB GSkill PC2-6400 RAM (800mhz, 2.0v, 4-4-3-5)
- XFX Geforce 8600 GT PCI-e Video card
- 2 x 80GB WD800JD Hard drives
- Antec Smartpower 500W PSU
With no instructions included I expected setup to be easy, and it definitely was. The entire process takes no more than a few minutes - power off the PC, open up the case and simply clip each end of the aluminum mounting piece to the end of the memory sticks. Remember the ends are angled and the fan can be positioned either way depending on what direction you want the air to flow. I was skeptical of such a simple setup giving a secure fit, but the fan stays clipped to the RAM pretty well and I wouldn't be worried about it falling off if the PC was transported.
The fan covers all four slots completely and blows air directly on the memory sticks. I did not have any clearance issues with this fan in my system even though the DIMM slots are close to the CPU socket. This was mainly due to the fact that I have a small waterblock on the CPU; had I been using a large heatsink that covered any part of the slots the fan probably would not have fit.
There is one option though for setups without much clearance near the memory slots. It is possible to tilt the fan slightly to either side, giving a little bit of extra room.
I used an infrared thermometer to record memory temps since there are no internal sensors to measure it. The thermometer was pointed at the middle of the DIMM, on the outside of the heat spreader. Ambient room temperature was kept at a constant 21C, idle temps were recorded after one hour of the PC sitting at the Windows desktop, and load temps were recorded after two hours of torture testing with Orthos Prime (large FFTs).
So we have a pretty good temperature drop here all around. The load temp with the fan installed is a few degrees lower than the idle temp without the fan! This is quite impressive for $20 and worth it for serious overclockers. Expect some noise to be added to the case though since the small 60mm fan spins at 4200 RPM.
