Thor's Hammer: XIGMATEK's Weapon for the God of Thunder and Lightning







Hi guys, Today I bring you review of a Xigmatek Thor's Hammer CPU cooler. Xigmatek's focus is on air cooling, where they have no less than 13 CPU coolers. But with so many claims of innovation and great cooling capability, Is there anything actually unique out there ? Well now we are going to look at the Xigmatek Thor's Hammer and check if it can really Hammer the heat.







[BREAK=Packaging and Contents]



Packaging and Contents :







The cooler comes in a very attractive shiny packing, the box is eye catching with its holographic finish and the box art.







The front of the box shows a glimpse of the cooler and the heat pipes. The double layer heat pipe arrangement is visible on the base which is mentioned on the box.







Back of the box shows the specifications and compatibility.

[BREAK=Specifications & Package Contents]



Specifications & Package Contents :



Specifications :







Compatibility :



All Intel Socket 775 CPU

1. Intel Core 2 Extreme / Quad / Duo
   
2. Intel Pentium® Extreme Edition / D
   
3. Intel Celeron® D

All Intel Socket 1366 CPU

1. Intel Core i7

All AMD Socket K8 754 / 939 / 940 CPU

1. Athlon 64 / FX / X2
   
2. Opteron
   
3. Sempron

All AMD Socket AM2-940 CPU

1. Phenom, Phenom II X3 X4
   
2. Athlon 64 / FX / X2
   
3. Opteron

Package Contents :

• 1 x LGA 775 / 1366 back plate
  
• 2 x LGA 775/1366 cooler clips
  
• 2 x Small screws for clips
  
• 1 x AMD mounting clip
  
• 4 x Spring loaded screws
  
• 1 x Small spanner
  
• 8 x Anti- Vibration rubber fan plugs ( for 2 fans )
  
• 1 x User manual

Unfortunately no fan is bundled with this cooler.



[BREAK=The Heatsink]



The Heatsink :



After taking out the heatsink, it looked amazing and monstrous. The design is amazing and the fin arrangement is good. The fins arrangement is such that surface area for heat loss is maximum while not making the heatsink much taller, still its 16cm (H) x 12cm (W) x 9cm (D), the heatsink is heavy, 800gm without fan.







Unlike most other heatsinks, here are no heat pipes visible at top, which gives it better look when installed in cabinets with transparent side panel.











The heatsink is black, its nickel coated so it will not rust. Quality is amazing and the fins are thick and do not bend easily.











This heatsink introduces dual layer heatpipe design, The heatsink has 7 heatpipes, out of these 4-8mm are in contact with the processor and remaining 3-6mm are soldered on the upper layer of the base. The base is extended and connected to 3 small fins also.











On the side there are grooves for the anti vibration fan plugs, after attaching the plugs to the fan, it's very easy to install the fan on the heatsink, this is a nice feature unlike the annoying usual wire fan clips on other heatsinks .







Finishing of the base is good, there was some changes made to the base of the cooler recently by Xigmatek, The bottom surface of cooler is grinded flat after that dark nickel-plated.



This should give better performance as there will be better contact with the processor.







All the heat pipes come in good contact with the processor, after taking out the heatsink, the thermal paste was spread all over the base evenly.

Though it seems that when installed over socket 775 processor, some part of the heat pipes at edge might not come in contact with the processor.



So lets check out the test setup and procedure.

[BREAK=Test system and methods ]



Test system and method :



The following system was used for the testing :



• Intel Core i7 920 D0 @ 4 GHz (1.3v)

• Arctic MX-2 Thermal Paste

• Gigabyte X58-UD5

• OCZ Platinum 6 GB DDR3 1600 CL7

• Corsair TX 750W

• EVGA GTX 295

• Cooler Master HAF 932

• 5 x Xigmatek XLF 1254 Intake + 4 x Exhaust + Front Intake Stock 230mm Fan.

• Scythe Kaze Ultra 133 CFM Fan on heatsink + Scythe Kaze Jyuni 110 CFM second fan.

• Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme

• Sunbeamtech Core Contact Freezer 120mm

• OCZ Vendetta 2



Test procedure :



• For measuring the load temperature, Intel Burn test (linx) was used to stress the processor, after running 20 passes (nearly 6 min) maximum temperature during the load was taken using RealTemp. All fans were directly connected to the PSU so that they run at max speed.



• After the load system was left idle for 5 min's and the lowest temperature was taken using RealTemp.



• This procedure was done 3 times and average was taken as the final result.



• Room Temperature was 28-29 C during the testing.



[BREAK=Installation]



Installation :

• To install the heat sink, first double side adhesive is applied on the backplate on one side according to the socket, Then backplate is put behind the motherboard.

• Now the two clips are screwed to the each side of base of the heatsink.

• Now comes the tricky part, when you screw the heatsink on the motherboard, 2 screws are easy to put, but due to the width of the cooler, the remaining 2 screws come below the heatsink, so screwdriver can't reach there.

• A small spanner is included for this purpose but even with that its hard to screw and even more difficult when there is big northbridge heatsink.

It took around 20 min's to install the cooler, would have been easier if little bigger spanner was included. The mounting is solid and the heatsink does not move at all.







Installing the fan is very simple here, I fixed the rubber plugs on the fan and then fixed them on the side of the heatsink, much better method than the wire fan clips.







Finally heatsink installed and ready to hammer







[BREAK=Performance Testing]



Performance Testing :



We pitted the Xigmatek Thor's Hammer against Sunbeamtech Core Contact Freezer, OCZ Vendetta 2 and the Thermalright Ultra Extreme 120 which is one of the best performance air coolers in the market since long time.



Here are the results :







I was impressed by the performance, Thor's Hammer gave better load temperatures than TRUE, almost 1-2 C lower, the SCCF gave 5 C higher, idle temperature on both coolers were same while SCCF and OCZ Vendetta 2 were 1 C higher.



Note : The SCCF and OCZ Vendetta 2 were installed using Thermalright 1366 retention kit.







When testing with 2 fans, TRUE's performance increased by 1°C while the Thor's Hammer's performance increased by almost 2°C, this was surprising as TRUE is known to scale well with dual fan, as we already used 133CFM fan, the improvement was less.



Thor's Hammer has more space between the fins which might be the reason for better performance with 2 fans. The SCCF and OCZ Vendetta 2 do not have option for 2 fans.



[BREAK=Conclusion]



Conclusion :



The cooler's performance was impressive, beating the TRUE even though by 1-2 C is amazing, for those who want performance along with looks, This cooler is the one to get, no doubt its one of the best looking heatsink in the market.



It was more silent in comparison to the other 3 coolers I tested with same fan, because of the fin design and more spacing between them.



The fan mounting method using the anti vibration plugs is of the best thing I liked about this.



The only flaw I found was issues during installation as screw driver does not reach the 2 screws. Also it would great if there was a decent fan included.



For someone who is upgrading to Intel Core i7 platform this would be a great choice, there is no point in getting TRUE anymore considering price (Rs. 2800 + i7 retention bracket) and nowhere near to Thor in looks.



This heatsink in India costs Rs. 3350 which is almost same or less than US (newegg.com) price of $ 65 + ship, but definitely worth the performance offered by it.



Pros :



• Awesome looks

• Impressive performance

• Fan installation is very easy

• Low noise

• Good built quality and design



Cons :



• No fan included

• Installation is little bit tricky due to size.



Overall I would rate it 4.5/5 .







Product source :Mediahome



Manufacturer product page :Xigmatek S126384



Please Digg this review here - Xigmatek Thor's Hammer S126384 Review - TechEnclave

Originally Posted by Dark Star

Very nice and detailed review Keep up the good work



Another good cooler with hard installation Anyway I will be aiming at TRUE since all the competitors have some flaws in them ..



Phenom II are not 940pins CPU, they are AM3 with 938 pins.. and the price mentioned in MH thread in 3500 not 3300.



Dugged and put the review to portal

darky the cost of shipping the cooler is pretty high. volumetric weight