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Thermalright Ultima 90
Test Machine:
Our test Machine consisted of:
EVGA 780i Motherboard
Intel E8500 CPU
Sapphire ATI 3870 X2
Western Digital 500GB HD
Crucial Ballistic's Tracer DDR2
Thermaltake Mozart Case
Installation:
Installation was relatively easy with the hardest part being the installation of the motherboard backplane bracket. We would ideally like to see more heatsinks use the factory installed backplane and more motherboards come with backplanes designed to be compatible with a wider array of heatsinks and not just the OEM models. As you can see below the Ultima 90 has a wider than usual stance though we ran into no issues with fit on our motherboard. If you have capacitors or motherboard heatsinks that run closer to your socket than what you see in the images below you might want to contact Thermalright or your motherboard manufacturer to see if the Ultima 90 will fit for you. Hold down is via two spring loaded screws once the retaining brackets are in place. It should be noted that the Ultima 90 does not come with a fan so you will need to provide your own. As we mentioned earlier the Ultima 90 can be used with either a 90mm or a 120mm fan. We suggest the use of a 120mm as it will be more quiet and probably move almost as much air as the 90mm.
Click on the thumbnails for a larger image.
Testing:
Heastink Type | OEM |
Ultima 90 |
Idle Temperature | 45C |
38C |
Load Temperature | 52C |
42C |
What we found most interesting was not that the Ultima 90 was so much more efficient than the OEM but that the difference between idle and load temperatures was only 4C in our testing. Much of this is due to the E8500 which just plan runs cooler, but clearly the Ultima 90 is a very efficient cooler. We additionally ran tests with no fan attached to the Ultima 90 and only utilized the case fans for airflow.
Heastink Type | OEM |
Ultima 90 |
Idle Temperature | 45C |
41C |
Load Temperature | 52C |
45C |
As you can see the temperature maintained by the Ultima 90 is still quite good. It should be noted that we have 5 silent 120mm fans running inside our Thermaltake Mozart case so we were still getting quite a bit of airflow across the heatsink.
Conclusion:
We were very impressed with the Thermalright Ultima 90, its no nonsense functional design and excellent performance has made it a great choice for any cooling needs for today's processors. The fact that no fan has been included can be seen as both a plus and a minus in that it allows you to select the fan thats right for you but also requires you to either have or go purchase an additional fan. On the other hand it does keep the price of the Thermalright Ultima 90 down and allow those consumers who already have a fan to use the one they have.