Thermaltake Blue Orb Chipset Cooler Review
Reviewed by: Bosco
Reviewed on: October 19, 2002
: Thermaltake
: GF City Computers
Price: $9 USD
Introduction
The CPU is not the only item that requires extensive cooling. There are other components that are also in need of active cooling in order to withstand the heat build up that's coming from the other system components, like the chipset of either your motherboard or graphics card. I have here the Blue Orb Chipset Cooler from Thermaltake, a well-known company specializing in cooling products. This cool-looking item works on either your motherboard's chipset, or you can toss it on to your graphics card if necessary.
Specifications
I really like the look of this item, but looks doesn't say much when it comes to performance.
This item comes with thermal compound and a double-sided adhesive tape for easy mounting. It also includes a 3-pin to 4-pin convertor in case you do not have any 3-pin plugs left on your motherboard.
Installation
Installing this item requires that you first remove the heatsink off the chipset that you want to cool first. This can either be a simple or daunting task. If it is on the motherboard, most of the time you will need to press out the clips that hold on to the heatsink. If it is a graphics card, then you will have to pry off the heatsink first.
Once you remove the existing heatsink, you can place the Blue Orb on to the chipset. We chose to cool the motherboard this time, as you can see below.
This thing almost touches the huge copper heatsink on the CPU!
Testing
Test System:
We let this system cook for about 1 hour using SETI@Home, and then the results were recorded.
A 6°C difference is pretty amazing. It does manage to bring the chipset temperature below 40°C.
Conclusion
A pretty neat item, to say the least. Mainstream users will probably find very little use for this cooler, but overclockers will want to get their systems as cool as they can, and this item can help them achieve that. One thing I noticed however, is that the Blue Orb will not fit in all types of motherboards, depending on how close the chipset is to the space designated for a CPU heatsink. If I remember correctly several P4 motherboards will be unable to handle a Blue Orb due to the proximity of the chipset and CPU heatsink.
Pros
Cons