Thermalright AXP-140 HTPC CPU Cooler Review

Performance Results

Since the PC we are testing this on is used as a dedicated HTPC, we wont be running Prime or Linx or whatever else you feel necessary to try and melt your CPU with. Well simply be running CPU intensive tasks such as over the air HD playback, playing full screen Hulu content, and setting up a My Movies database. These tasks do put a heavy load on the CPU and are real world scenarios.

The heat sink we are comparing it to is the retail Intel heat sink that ships with the Q6600. This is the larger, copper core 65nm version, not the little thing that ships with 45nm CPUs. The fan that we are using on the AXP-140 is a 120mm Aerocool fan, rated at 1500rpm, 23.53dBA, and 52 CFM.

The last major thing of note is the case that we are using, which is a Thermaltake LANBOX Lite. As you can see in this photo, the AXP-140 fit in our system with a 120mm fan strapped on with a bit of room to spare.

Performance Results: You can see that the stock cooler was letting the CPU get quite warm and there was no need to overclock to get more heat as we were nearing 70C under full load with the system running stock. With little air flow available the Intel heat sink was spinning at high RPM and making more noise than we care to hear from an HTPC. The Thermalright AXP-140 was easily able to keep our CPU cool even with little fresh air available to it. With the 120mm fan in place our system was much quieter.

With the system overclocked the AXP-140 still has the heat under control. Running the stock cooler at this speed and temperature would lead to a very loud system.