Phanteks PH-TC14PE Review

Testing and Setup:

Testing of this heatsink will involve applying a load simulated by Prime95, using small FFTs in stock and overclocked scenarios, where both idle and load temperatures will be recorded. Load temperatures will be the maximum value displayed in RealTemp after running eight threads in Prime95 for one hour, and idle temperatures will be the minimum recorded value by RealTemp with no computer usage during a period of one hour. The temperature values for each of the four cores will be averaged and displayed in the graphs below. The ambient temperature is held at a constant 23 °C throughout testing of the Phanteks PH-TC14PE as well as the comparison units. All the data shown in the graphs below is in degrees Celsius. The included thermal paste from Phanteks will be used during testing and thermal pastes on other heatsinks from their respective manufacturers will be used. The fans on each cooler will be run at full speed for these tests.

Testing Setup:

• Processor: Intel Core i7 920 - Stock and @ 3.44ghz, 1.27v
• Cooling: Phanteks PH-TC14PE
• Motherboard: MSI X58 Platinum SLI
• Memory: Mushkin Blackline PC3 16000 9-9-9-24 1600MHz
• Video Card: XFX HD6970 2GB
• Power Supply: Mushkin 1000 watt Joule Modular power supply
• Hard Drive: 1 x Seagate 1TB SATA
• Optical Drive: Lite-On DVD-RW
• OS: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
• Case: Corsair Graphite Series 600T

Comparison Heatsinks:

• Stock Intel heatsink
• Cooler Master Hyper 612 PWM
• NZXT Havik 140
• Corsair H60
• Noctua NH-D14
• Noctua NH-U12P SE

When the results from the first test I ran (Overclocked Load) started to take shape, I could only describe the look on my face as "WOW". In disbelief of these numbers demolishing the NH-D14, I grabbed my infrared thermometer and checked the floor next to the computer (to verify ambient temperature) — it was right where it was supposed to be. I looked back at the RealTemp display and stared at the temperatures for the next few minutes (after already running for 45 minutes), and they didn't budge. This cooler has thrown up some astounding results and has blown me away. I'll go into more detail on the next page in my conclusion to this review.