Part 1. Products from Arctic Cooling, Thermalright, Thermaltake, Zalman, and Zerotherm

Part 2. Test results: new-generation coolers

Test Results: "Old School" Coolers

And now let's evaluate representatives of the "old school"—Arctic Cooling Accelero X1, Zalman VF700-Cu, and VF900-Cu LED. Perhaps, it's high time they retire? Or is there life in the old dogs yet? We'll see! :)

Each cooler was tested with the stock thermal interface.

Background noise level: 18 dBA

Well, not bad at all! The third-party cooling systems are again much better than the reference cooler, especially in noise characteristics and thermal modes of video memory. It looks that it's too early to dismiss our old coolers!

Nevertheless, this trio is outscored by the new coolers in overclocking capacity: the VF900-Cu LED feels at ease (783/1782/2150 MHz), but the VF700-Cu and the Accelero X1 are doing worse. The former copes only with 740/1728 MHz (however, memory can operate at 2150 MHz, when the fan rotates at maximum speed), while the latter fails to raise above 740/1728/2000 MHz. In other words, you can overclock the graphics card, only if you have the VF900-Cu.

Part 4. Liquid cooling experiments, Conclusions

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