Thermalright Announces Archon Heatsink

Today, Thermalright announced the Archon heatsink, a new tower CPU cooler. The cooler is thinner than standard tower heatsinks, which Thermalright claims will eliminate compatibility issues with large memory heatspreaders. Boasting compatibility with Intel’s 1156 and 1366 sockets, the Archon also comes with the same AMD bracket system as the Venomous X. Also included is a 140mm TY-140 fan, but users can mount their own 120 or 140mm fan.

Archon with TY-140 Fan (Courtesy Thermalright)
Archon with TY-140 Fan (Courtesy Thermalright)

Archon Without Fan (Courtesy Thermalright)
Archon Without Fan (Courtesy Thermalright)

Specifications (Courtesy Thermalright)

Heatsink Specifications:

  • Dimension: Length 155mm x Width 53mm x Height 170mm
  • Weight: 806g (excluding fan and mounting brackets)
  • Heatpipe: 6mm heatpipe*6 units
  • Copper Base: C1100 Pure copper nickel plated with mirror shine

Archon Tower Heatsink (Courtesy Thermalright)
Archon Tower Heatsink (Courtesy Thermalright)

Archon Mirror Finish (Courtesy Thermalright)
Archon Mirror Finish (Courtesy Thermalright)

Fan Specification:

  • Dimension: L160mm x H140mm x W26.5mm
  • Weight: 140g
  • Fan speed: 900~1300RPM (PWM controlled)
  • Fan noise: 19~21dBA
  • Airflow: 56~73CFM
  • Connector: 4 Pin (PWM Fan connector)

Estimated Performance

This cooler is similar in shape and design to the Venomous X, which is important because it gives a baseline indication of how the Archon will perform. Thermalright claims that despite its slimmer profile, the Archon has 1.6x more surface area than the Venomous X. There is only a 6% weight difference between the Venomous X (755 g) and Archon (806 g), which are both made of the same material. With that in mind, it is safe to assume that performance can be approximated with relative accuracy by comparing the volume of both coolers:

HeatsinkVolume
Venomous X1280 cm3
Archon1397 cm3

With 8% more volume than the Venomous X, the new Archon is a pretty safe bet. Taking a look at muddocktor’s comprehensive Premium Heatsink Shootout, it appears as though the Archon (depending on fan setup of course) will be able to keep up with some of the best air coolers out there.

Thermalright has not released expected retail pricing or an estimated ship date. Once we have a review sample in hand, we should be able to provide an accurate assessment of this cooler’s performance.

mdcomp

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Avatar of xoke
xoke

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Is that the 140mm mounted in the pictures?! Holy cow that is a beast. I'm looking forward to this review, I have to get an air cooler for my 1366 someday.

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Nebulous

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12,347 messages 865 likes

I was about to say the same thing! I've been H20-ed for so long, I wouldn't know what air cooler to get for my setup, lol

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Bobnova

Senior Member

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See where the heatpipes are? That spreads the heat out over the entire aluminum plates, unlike the TRUE and Megahalems that only heat one end.

This thing should be a monster.

EDIT:
I would not assume the performance will be the same, personally.

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muddocktor

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I am earger to test this one out myself. I want to see if spreading the heatpipes out like that will bring better efficiency to high end air. From what I've seen the last 3-4 years, high end air has hit a bit of an efficiency impasse, with only slightly better performance being realized with designs newer than the original TRUE model. I have a feeling though that this one will be another winner.:thup: Especially since Thermalright has addressed the base finish quality control problems they were having until a year or 2 ago.

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bing

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Really interesting how they layout the pipes on making the contact with the fins, it looks this new model has different method than the conventional way that all pipes are having contact/soldered with all fins.

Watch at the gaps pointed by those red arrows, maybe those pipes are making contact at the upper fins, while the blue one is the one that is making contact with the bottom fins.

Really curious to see how this perform against current top dog like Silver Arrow or Noctua D14.

Archon.jpg

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Avatar of xoke
xoke

Member

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Really interesting how they layout the pipes on making the contact with the fins, it looks this new model has different method than the conventional way that all pipes are having contact/soldered with all fins.

Watch at the gaps pointed by those red arrows, maybe those pipes are making contact at the upper fins, while the blue one is the one that is making contact with the bottom fin.

Really curious to see how this perform against current top dog like Silver Arrow or Noctua D14.

View attachment 87297

I didn't even notice that! Good eyes, that makes good sense too, spread the heat dissipation around. I don't know how many times the top of an air cooler is ice cold and the bottom is pretty warm. I cannot wait for the muddoc to get a hold of this thing!

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bing

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I didn't even notice that! Good eyes, that makes good sense too, spread the heat dissipation around. I don't know how many times the top of an air cooler is ice cold and the bottom is pretty warm. I cannot wait for the muddoc to get a hold of this thing!

Exactly, spreading the dissipation points, just guessing, maybe they've discovered the optimal dissipation number of pipes for each fin.

Another things to concern about, this HS is the tallest and widest (length) among other TR high end heatsinks, with this height, this might create problem with tight mid tower size case, especially with a thick side fan mounted.

Comparison :

Archon : Length 155mm x Width 53mm x Height 170mm

Venomous X : Length 127mm x Width 63mm x Height 160mm

Silver Arrow : Length 147mm x Width 123mm x Height 160mm

Archon%20size.jpg

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m0r7if3r

Member, Water Cooling Sticky Reading Enforcement O

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Oh wow...I hadn't noticed it was taller, that could create issues for people.

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MattNo5ss

5up3r m0d3r4t0r

8,808 messages 0 likes

I noticed this cooler on their website yesterday. A couple things I noticed:

- It's thinner than other tower coolers, like the Venomous X, by 10mm. Did Thermalright supply the volume numbers? They say you can use either 140 mm or 120 mm fans, but would a 120 mm cover all of the fins? If not, then the dissipation area of the Archon when using a 120 mm fan would be smaller.

- The spreading of heatpipes seems like a good idea. One issue I see that may arise is how high-performance fans with huge hubs work with the Archon. Personally, I like the majority of the heat being on the ends of the fins so my San Ace fans can dissapate all of it. The heat from the inner heatpipes may not get dissipated well unless using a fan with a small hub.

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xoke

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Oh wow...I hadn't noticed it was taller, that could create issues for people.

Until they get to about 5 feet tall ceiling fan clearance should not be an issue. :sly:

Just kidding...very true...of course the target market for this thing will not be SFF I'd imagine. :D

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