Thermaltake Frio Advanced and Frio Extreme Review

Testing:

Testing of these heatsinks 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 Thermaltake Frio Advanced and Frio Extreme as well as the comparison units. All the data shown in the graphs below is in degrees Celsius. The included thermal paste from Thermaltake will be used during testing, and thermal pastes on other heatsinks from their respective manufacturers will be used. Due to the high noise level produced by these coolers, I will gather data for both LOW and HIGH speed operation.

Testing Setup:

• Processor: Intel Core i7 2600K - Stock and @ 4.4GHz
• Motherboard: Gigabyte Z68 AP-D3 Rev 2.0
• Memory: Mushkin Blackline PC3 16000 9-9-9-24 1600MHz
• Video Card: XFX Radeon HD6970
• 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 Obsidian Series 650D

Comparison Heatsinks:

• DEEPCOOL Ice Wind Pro
• Thermaltake Bigwater 760 Plus
• NZXT Havik 120
• Phanteks PH-TC14PE
• Corsair Hydro Series H100
• Noctua NH-D14
• Stock Intel

We see that the difference between low and high speeds made a difference in testing by at least a degree or two in every test. In this group of tests, the Thermaltake Frio Extreme floats towards the high end, ~$100 cooler area and the Thermaltake Frio Advanced hangs around with the other ~$60 coolers. The Thermaltake Frio Extreme does not take the crown in any test, but it stays within a couple of degrees of the current trophy-holders.