Xigmatek Praeton LD963 Slim Low Profile CPU Cooler Heatsink

Comment:
I bought this with, Arctic Silver Ceramique 2 Premium High Density Tri Linear Ceramic Thermal Compound 25 Gram Syringe, to use in my new build. I bought an FX 6300 CPU and it came with a terrible heatsink so I wanted something cheap but far more effective. A budget PC has priority component costs and heatsink was near the bottom of my list. It took a while to get it all installed onto my motherboard and I used the ceramic paste with it. My case uses 3 120mm fans and with this heatsink/fan my idle CPU temp has gradually dropped so far to 7celcius.I really do like this fan. It uses the 4 pin PWM and so far, I honestly cant hear it running even though I see it working through the window panel of my PC.

Comment:
When I look at a cooler I look at the contact surface. Which on this cooler is shown to be 4 heatpipes. Copper across the entire IHS makes for good heat removal. When I received this cooler, it had 3 heatpipes. With plenty of aluminum in between.(Aluminum is a poor conductor of heat compared to copper) So I am quite disappointed. Had I known this I would have gotten a different cooler. Waste of IC diamond too. I didnt currently have a cooler, so I used this one and crossed my fingers for decent temps. My pad modded q6600 gets to 86C. Not the temps I was looking for.

Comment:
I'm a fan of low profile coolers. I'm not a fan of huge tower coolers. There is no argument whatsoever that the big towers are superior when it comes to cooling, but that is almost intuitively obvious. (Note: this cooler does not support Intel socket 1150.)I bought one of these on sale, on spec, for about 20 bucks. Pretty cheap for any aftermarket cooler these days. I thought I would use it to replace the stock Intel cooler in one of my older machines. So that was really going to be its only competition.Bottom line: It's a small cooler with a slim fan, so for optimum cooling it runs at high rpm under load and tends to be noisy. However, it does outperform the stock cooler. If you are looking for an inexpensive, low profile cooler to replace a stock cooler, and you can get it on sale, then this isn't a bad buy.Additional notes: Replacing the fan could be problematic, as the fan clips require a low profile fan, and a 92 mm at that.The fan wires are actually enclosed in a braided sleeve!The small size should ensure that there is no interference with ram modules/heatspreaders.The bolts and nuts used to secure the heatsink assembly to the motherboard have plastic washers to prevent shorts.The mounting bolts use thumbscrew heads, so finger tightening is the only option as there are no screw sockets.

Comment:
Great for htpc.