MINI SUPER ORB: REVIEW

Application: Socket 462 AMD's to 1.5GHZ
Will fit socket 370

The fans are rated at:

Inside fan = .18a , 2.16watt , 5000rpm , 22.98CFM at 28.3DBA .

Outside fan = .21a , 2.52watt , 5500rpm , 17.3CFM at 34DBA .

Testing will be on a socket 370 Celeron 566 @ 850mhz 1.7v overclock.

Current room temp is 19Deg Celsius.

TEST= A round of Quake+3Dmark2000 demo. Side Cover Off.

To the Testing.

At first I thought it smart just to see how the Orb could cope with my standard running setting of 807mhz 1.65v. To say that I was shocked is an understatement.

62Deg Celsius, Ouch. What's cooking Doc. Well just what in the @$#$%^&( was going on here. I took the Orb of and had a look to see if it was sitting on the cpu correctly. Nothing wrong there. Now I had applied what I thought was enough thermal compound , for the fop32 in anyway. Hmmmm. I wasn't ready to give up here so I put on what I would call an excessive amount of thermal compound, can you use too much? Oh well , I rebooted the system, went straight into the bios, to hardware monitoring. It was reading about 33deg C for the cpu, so I thought ok, time to bump the system up to 850mhz, and give this cooler a real work out. Sorry , no go, would not boot at 850mhz. This is where choosing the right cooler becomes important. Mini Super Orb or not, for serious overclocking it cant compete with the likes of the fop32 or better coolers.

Testing at 807mhz 1.65v

This is the most I can squeeze out of my system with the Mini Super Orb.

As you can see the Mini Super Orb maxed out at 34Deg Celsius, this is with a room temp of 19Deg Celsius. The orb cooler certainly seems to like a lot of thermal compound between it and the cpu. I would hate to have been a AMD Duron owner the first time around, I just may have fried my cpu. Its the only good thing I have to say about the celeron, its not that easy to kill. Thank you intell. If you read the WBK38 test you will see that it maxed out at some 23Deg Celsius at 19Deg C room temp. I know what your thinking , but that was with the 3Dmark2000 demo as the test, well I knew that, and here are the 3Dmark2000 results.

If you thought that the 3Dmark2000 demo doesn't stress the system, 36Deg Celsius, thats 2deg C more than Quake. And unfortunately makes it 10Deg C more than my Fop32 at 850mhz. And thats with 2 fans blowing air through the Mini Super Orb . Speaking of the fans .

5232 and 4299rpm . not quite what the promise was . 5000 and 5500 if I remember . 5232 is close enough but 4299 falls short by quite a margin. We all know that Orb coolers are more for looking good than a serious OC'ing cooler, dont we?. Seems that with Perspex windows in side covers, the Orb coolers became all the rage, remember though, just because it looks real cool, dont mean it cools real well. Unfortunately this cooler falls into that category, looks damn good .

Conclusion

The Mini Super Orb is certainly a quality product, that should last a long time, a note about OC'ing here , Thermaltake to the best of my knowledge dont push this product as an OC'ing tool . It was made for normal everyday use on stock MHZ cpu's. Its also a real trick looking cooler, for those who wish to show the internals of their systems off . So if looks are real important to you then the Orb coolers rule, but if overclocking rules your world , then there are many coolers out there that were designed with OC'ers in mind for you to chose from, Orb coolers are not part of that group. Also when putting on the cooler , use lotsa thermal compound, dont go crazy , but if it looks like it might be a bit to much , then it should be ok. So for stock cpu cooling work, the Mini Super Orb should work just fine, and for showing off, it should be equally fine, a fine cooler all round.

( Did i use fine enough in that sentence? )

As a final note , this is one Orb cooler that should fit all systems, it goes on and off with no problems, unlike some orb coolers which need file work to get on, and a pair of pliers to get off. Hehehehe no such problems with the Mini Super Orb , the clip was made with small children in mind, it so easy to manipulate , grandma could do it, reason enough to consider this Orb cooler .

Supplied for testing by: