Gelid Solutions has sent me over the
Silent Spirit CPU cooler for review, it’s their first foray into the
CPU cooling game and it looks to be a decent performer overall. The
Silent Spirit is a small cooler that’s meant to keep things cool and
quiet at the same time, the cooler features four copper heatpipes
with an angled heatsink design so it should fit in just about any
case and configuration.
How does it compare to the others out
there? Read on to find out…
Gelid
Silent Spirit CPU Cooler Reviewed
Author: Kristofer Brozio
Sponsor:
Gelid Solutions
Tech
Specs,Features or the Basic Info:
Features:
* Quad Sintered Heatpipes
* Unique Fin Architecture
* Special Heatsink Angle Design
* Optimized Air Flow Concept
* Intelligent PWM Fan Control
Curve
* Anti-Vibration Fan Mounts
Applications:
Intel Socket 775 and 1366*:
All Pentium D/ Pentium 4, All
Celeron D, All Pentium Dual-Core/ Extreme,All Core 2 Extreme/ Core
2Quad/ Core 2 Duo
AMD Socket 754/ 939/ 940/ AM2/
AM2+:
All Athlon 64 X2, Athlon 64,
All Athlon 64 FX, Opteron, Sempron, Phenom up to 9850BE
*Additonal clip for 1366 socket
will be launched soon.
All brands and trademarks are
the property of their respective owners.
Design Concept of Silent
Spirit:
a) Fan Structural Design
The top-flow cooler “Silent
Spirit” follows an open frame structure concept whereby both design
and dimensions have been improved to eliminate humming and buzzing
noises while maintaining a compact overall size. The 92mm fan has
been chosen for silent operation and high airflow and comes with an
intelligent PWM control to allow users to set the fan speed in their
BIOS accordingly. In addition the anti-vibration fan mounts are made
of high quality rubber thus guaranteeing a long life span even during
high temperatures.
Specs:
*INCLUDED: Pre-applied GC-1
high performance thermal compound
Air Flow (CFM): 45.8 max
Bearing: Hydro Dynamic Bearing
Cable Length (mm): 250
Cooling Performance (C/W): 0.17
Current (A): 0.23
Dimensions of Cooler (mm): 108
(l) x 100.5 (w) x 125 (h)
Dimensions of Fan (mm): 100.5
(l) x 100.5 (w) x 45 (h)
Dimensions of Heatsink
(mm): 108 (l) x 97 (w) x 88.5 (h)
Fan Speed (RPM): 900 – 2400
Life time MTTF at 40C
(h): 50’000
Noise Level (dBA): 10 – 25.8
Voltage (V): 12
Warranty (years): 5
Weight (g): 370
A
Better Look at Things:
The Gelid Silent Spirit comes
packaged in a nice little box that has all fo the specs and features
listed and other information listed on all four sides.
The Silent Spirit comes with the
LGA775 mounting bracket already installed and the others on the side,
it also comes with a user manual, and a Gelid case badge or sticker.
Here’s the 360 degree view, as you
can see the cooler sits up at angle and it’s got four copper
heatpipes coming up from the base along with a smaller heatsink
attached to the base under the fins.
The Silent Spirit comes with
thermal compound pre-applied so we really can’t get a good look at
the base, but I broke out my Macro lens and tried my best. You can
see from the second picture below that the base isn’t quite smooth
and polished, there are visible machining lines in the base.
Installation,
Testing and Comparison:
Since it’s a rather small CPU
Cooler I had no problems installing it on my motherboard, it’s up at
an angle so that helps to clear anything like large heatsinks or high
sticks of ram.
I installed it on my Gigabyte mATX
G33 motherboard, and I am using a C2D6420 CPU for testing, since it’s
an LGA775 I didn’t have to do anything special to the CPU Cooler to
make I fit as the bracket comes already mounted out of the box.
Ambient room temperature during
testing was 19C (+/- .3C). I used Orthos Stress Prime to get load on
th CPU and used Coretemp to log the temperatures which were then
averaged out to see the results in the charts below.
First up is testing with the fan
of the Silent Spirit connected tot the CPU header:
As you can see it gives us some
decent cooling performance.
Next up would be with the fan
connected to the Molex or running at full speed:
Pretty much the same results, only
about a degree cooler this way. Whether the fan is hooked to the CPU
header or the Molex it’s quiet.
And finally I was curious as to
how the Silent Spirit would perform with no fan at all:
A bit high according to the
comparison but still well within temperature tolerances for this CPU,
so it can be used without the fan if need be, of course just make
sure there’s adequate airflow in the case. I’ve go one 120mm intake
and one 120mm exhaust fan, and there’s the PSU fan as well moving air
around.
Summary
and Comments:
For their first attempt at CPU
Cooling Gelid Solutions has done an admirable job with the Silent
Spirit. It offers silence an good cooling performance in a small
package.
Sure it’s not the best performer
out there today, but it can compete with the best of them,
considering the fan is virtually silent it does an excellent job at
keeping the CPU cool. Other coolers need a fast, loud fan to achieve
the same level of performance that the Silent Spirit does.
DragonSteelMods gives the Silent
Spirit a 4.5 out of 5 score and our Recommended Award as well.
Pros:
-Decent performance
-Small and compact
-Quiet
-Seems well made
Cons:
-None really
I
would like to thank Gelid
Solutions for the chance to review the Silent
Spirit and for their support of DSM.
review#519