GigaByte 3D Cooler Pro mini-review

[ElementalDragon]

Ok. kinda figured i'd make my own little mini-review about this. GigaByte's 3D Cooler Pro is what i'd consider to be a pretty nice cooler. if nobody here has seen/heard of it, HERE is the link to their official info page. It uses 4 heatpipes, which are cooled down by a fan embedded in between the heatsink fins, that blows air out to the side, which also cools off other things nearby. Picked mine up from a local computer show for $50 US. The fan speed adjuster can be turned up from a the low speed of 2,000 rpm's, all the way up to 4,000 rpm's. At 2,000 rpm's, it generates 20db of noise, while it generates 40db of noise at 4,000. I currently have the fan at max, during the time i was typing this, and the CPU temp is around 36 degrees Celcius, while the case temp is around 25 degrees Celcius. My only guess at the reason it isn't cooler, is because the only cooling from the fan that might directly contact the part of the HSF over the CPU, is after it is flowing around the case.

On the back of the box, it says that the max speed is recommended for Overclocking. probably due to the fact that more air is cooling off the heatpipes more rapidly, thus keeping the CPU cool. After turning it back down to the lowest speed, my CPU temp is at around 39 degrees Celcius, while the case is still remaining at 25 degrees Celcius.

If anyone wants me to tell them more about it, please ask me what you want to know, since i'm can't think of anything i'm forgetting at the moment. If you want pics of it installed, to get an idea of how large it is compared to other stuff, just ask. You probably shouldn't be too surprised how big it is since it does weigh 430g.

 

[Sazar]

nice write-up

btw... your sigs a little on the ginormous side

 

[ElementalDragon]

well......... if you mean the pic.... that's how big ~bk made it, so shame on him. lol

If you mean how big the entire thing is horizontally...... do u want me to un-center everything, and have them both next to each other?

 

[ElementalDragon]

hmm... i actually read the review of the cooler they had on toms hardware, and i think they said it rated at like 68db or so at 4,000 rpm's. let me put it this way (since i don't have my own meter to test it), if anyone here has ever heard some of the Sony Vaio desktop PC's when they boot up and it sounds like every fan in the computer is running at full blast...... it's probably quieter than that. Easily put, if you're not looking for a ultra-quiet PC, and noise doesn't really bother you much, then it's easily bearable. if you ARE looking for a quiet PC.... here's a bit of an example. my pc has 2 case fans, plus the PSU fan, and there's also a little bit of sound from the hard drive, but not a lot. I don't start to hear the whirr of the fan till i crank it up to about 2,500 rpm's, and that's when i'm sittin with my head about a foot away from the case. Is a very good HSF.

was kinda hoping that i might have gotten more than 33 views in 2 days. nobody wants to see a pic or 2 of it already installed and stuff?

 

[dreamliner77]

pics!!!

 

[ElementalDragon]

K. Here are 4 pics. 2 with side of case off turned off, 2 with side of case off turned on. would have been better pics.... but my camera kinda sux.

 

[Electronic Punk]

whoah, tis blue!

 

[ElementalDragon]

yes........ what, were you expecting it to be Canary Yellow maybe?

 

[Sazar]

aaargh.. the mess.. the mess...

my eyes... my eyes..

 

[ElementalDragon]

Ok, Sazar, if you can give me any pointers on how keep my wires more.... how do i say..... out of the way of everything else, you do that. i can't help the fact that my PSU has a schidtload of wires. quite a few more than i need actually.

 

[Electronic Punk]

I removed my Cool Drive this evening along with my old 80 gig SATA drive and then tidied up my wires even more!

The reason I was pointing out it was blue, is because I have a Blue cold cathode and 5 blue coolermaster neon fans, tho I just did remove my blue cooldrive!

 

[breezie]

lol, twist ties are your friend- use them =P

here's mine!

 

[ElementalDragon]

yes.... twist ties..... as well as NEATLY WRAPPED PSU WIRES!! lucky bastage.

 

[Electronic Punk]

Ok, here are a few shots I just rattled off.

 

[dreamliner77]

ED;

get some round IDE cables, twist ties, and cable snakeskin to go over the PSU wires.

 

[Son Goku]

That is a bit messy, though I can't say much. I've got both a fairly large LVD SCSI cable (for a Ultra 160 and a u2w Cheetah) running up my case, and then a seperate 50-pin SCSI cable for my CD/DVD drives. Didn't think there was much that could be done with that before, as well Ultra160 SCSI cables require a special twist. It seems they now have rounded cables for it.

Breezie, what I wonder is what you used to wrap up some of them wires as such. It looks like there's more then twist ties going on in your case

What I think I'll look at is this PSU saz linked before

http://www.frozencpu.com/cgi-bin/frozencpu/psu-94.html?id=jIuvzrpc

Detachable cables could help in another way too. Lets just say I have a CD changer dieing on me, but I can't manage to get the fricken power connector off of there, in this tight space, without trying to force it (probably not the best thing). If my cables disconnected, I could remove the drive, and then detach the power connector with it out of computer...

 

[ElementalDragon]

that psu is pretty sexeh

 

[dreamliner77]

Son, I think this is what you're looking for: http://www.connectworld.net/cgi-bin/iec/02MPartSnake.html

also available at most electronics stores.

 

[breezie]

i hid my wires in the back, lol... i use one those mounting things... blah i dunno what you call it but you can mount a bunch of wires so they stick to the wall instead of just flopping down~

 

[ElementalDragon]

*glares evily at sazar for transforming this thread.*