CoolerMaster Aero4

[UnseenMenace]

Full Article - Overclockers.Com


From The Article "CoolerMaster Aero4" Joe Citarella - 8/12/03

Fan: Adjustable 1900 to 3500 rpm, 11 to 20 cfm; Size: 83 x 70 x 46 mm.

The good guys at Pham Computer were nice enough to send a sample of CoolerMaster's latest P4 heatsink, the Aero4. Included with it is a rheostat which varies fan speeds from "1900 to 3500 rpm"; it includes both a PCI slot and floppy slot cover mount for convenient adjusting.

NOTE: This Information Is Edited :- Reading The Full Article Is Recomended

1) What is your opinion of the design of this heatsink ?
2) Does heatsink size concern you, could you fit this it in your case easily ?
3) Do you believe that we will need to re-think the heatsink and fan design in order to cool processors of the future, or will we eventually move away from air cooling completely ?
4) Considering the fan speed, what do you think of the performance of this unit ?
5) Do setups like this offer the consumer something, or is it a situation of design over purpose
6) What are the most important considerations for you when buying a heatsink?

 

[L337 M33P]

1) The design is a good one. I think that squirrel cages are much more efficient fans and eliminate the deadspot associated with axial fans. They are comparable in noise and CFM to axials but are capable of much larger pressure heads, allowing more fins to be packed tighter together.

2) There are larger versions of these sorts of heatsinks, and I measured that the Aero 7+ would fit in my case. Ones with the PSU over the CPU will not be able to accomodate it however.

3) Heatsinks are already quite complex with a variety of designs such as skived copper, soldered copper and screw-threaded ones like the Swiftech. However they are still third party heatsinks and the bulk of heatsinks that come with AMD and Intel processors still stick with the aluminium block and piddly fan design. These are inadequate at best and I think new designs must be implemented soon.

4) The fact that the fan speed can be varied cuts down a lot of the noise of the fan at full RPM, but for maximum performance I think it should be mounted on a large heatsink, larger than the one that comes with the Aero 7+. Imagine that on a 900-U

5) The design in itself is good and solid, but is still outperformed but big Thermalright heatsinks with whopping fans on. I think the heatsinks themselves are holding it back, and I think the MCX462 would be a suitable candidate for (modest) squirrel cage fans, not like the one pioneered by the guy in the other thread . It also has the "oooh" factor associated with wacky fans.

6) Price, Performance and weight in that order.

 

[cV]

I once put an aero blower on my MCX462+. At full blast, it performs as well as an 80mm tornado at full blast, without the annoying whine associated with the tornado. Of course, surrounding areas like the MOSFETs are not cooled as well, but a second fan cooling them alleviates that problem.

 

[Maxvla]

i like the design. i'm sure the block could be much much better designed than this one is. give thermalright this fan arrangement and i bet we'd see a new heatsink/fan from them that would top the slk900+tornado combo.

i do however see computers moving towards watercooling exclusively in the next 5 years. dies using smaller than 90nm traces will likely be very tough to air cool. i think this is why we are seeing a few manufacturers lately with watercooling systems (albiet crappy ones, even though they are in their infancy).

 

[sandman001]

I agree with max, I think everything will be watercooled in the next few years. I mean, in the last 10years we've went from no heatsinks and just bare chips, to huge heatsink and water/phase change systems.

 

[Samoyed]

The new fan is good due to decreased sound and no dead spot however the fact that it uses a steel clip that COVERS the dead spot kind of makes this moot. (in the AMD version at least) To be the best it simply has to use mounting screws from the back of the MB. Then that steel clip can be replaced by a few more fins.

I would also like to see them add those goofy heatpipes from the HHC-001 to this HSF. One review showed that when the pipes are diabled, the the temp went up by 2C so they actually have a small effect.

 

[ninthebin]

I own an Aero 7+ so I can straight away comment on three things:

a) that front floppy bay cover for the fan control...wont fit - it has its holes to screw into the usual places your floppy drive will - yet these will be at least an inch too far back for it to fit. The only good thing about that is that it is a tight enough fit with the cases I have tried it on to not cause that much of a problem.

b) the fan control itself from about the lowest to the last maybe 1/6 of a turn will appear to give no audible change - whether it is moving any faster I dont know a review I read said that it can change between the lowest and about 2600rpm without any audible difference, but you definetly hear the difference on the last little bit of the turn

c) these things are loud, on full they are stupidly loud, on low they are loud enough to be annoying if you dont have anything on your pc making enough noise to drown them out, now you may have various things in your PC that are loud, hell your current CPU fan might be the loudest thing ever and this will be a god send, but to me, if I unplug this fan I wouldnt be suprised if im even hearing half the noise I was prior.

dont get me wrong, I like my aero 7+, it was a nice price compared with the SLK-900u, from a review it didnt seem to perform that much lower than it to warrent the price difference. they are reasonable enough to install, the only problem I had there was that it has a rather big clip and I had to remove the PSU to put it on, then put the PSU back in (which is now pushing against the clip, probably should have just bent the thing over a bit, but wanted to get new pc up and going )

on a performance stand point I generall get idle temperates of 35c and full load of 40c, I cant imagine there being a drastic difference between the Aero 4 and 7+

Dan

 

[AMD_Me]

1. I think the heatsink is a semi solid design. It is not the most effecient (think CNPS7000) and it doesnt have a powerful enough fan to make up for it (think SLK-900 with tornado).

2. Would fit in my case if I still had the P4 mounting bracket (lost it and mounting pegs). If the PSU sits over the HSF it would be unusable.

3. We will need to rethink the heatsink fan design. We will use aircooling or phase change (water or pelts will never go mainstream, they are too dangerous, and as such too many warranty claims. Most people can not fill and bleed a system. I think a technology that shows promise is Called Vortex Cooling which uses a Vortex tube to create alternate streams of 100 below ambient and 100 above ambient air, which could be recombined after cooling proc for a minimal heat effect, no more than a standard HSF.

4. Above Average performance considering fan speed, though it is a bit loud.

5. I think this is show over go, design over functionality. I think it is worse in comparison to a good copper silent cooler (CNPS7000)
and at a much higher noise level.

6. Performance. Price to a point, but only when cooler price goes well over $70

 

[cV]

The thing is, the FAN has merit. In high-resistance systems, there is no equal. The problem is that the heatsink that comes with the Aero7+/Aero 4 is not really a high-resistance heatsink, so you will likely see similar performance on it with a standard 70mm TMD fan, without the whine.

Again, on something like the MCX462+, this fan is a godsend.