Thermalright & planarità basi

[Damiano]

Riporto un piccolo dialogo avuto da un utente con il supporto thermalright per ciò che concerne la planarità delle basi dei prodotti made in thrm.
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I'm very interested in your Ultra-120 Extreme product. My concern, though, is that pretty much everyone I've heard of getting this heatsink says that the base of it, where the heatsink meets the CPU, is never very flat. Many people are displeased with the current build quality of the Ultra-120 Extreme and usually have to manually lap the surface so it's flat.

I'd like to know if Thermalright is actively doing anything to improve the build quality of this otherwise top-tier cooler? The competition (Thermaltake, Zalman, etc) dont seem to have nearly as big of a problem with this issue. And surely Thermalright's reputation could only improve in the enthusiast market if you were to work on your build quality of these heatsinks.

Thank you for your time!

Thermalright's Reply

Hi,

Thermalright has stated and continue to state that the design of the base is meant to be convex, because the heat spreaders on most Intel CPU's is concave, thus matching both at the most important point. The only other company that does this is Swiftech on a few of their CPU water blocks, but they also use a seal around the block that tends to hide this fact.

People are used to the old days when cooler bottoms had to be flat and polished because the application was directly on the core of the CPU, but that is no longer the case today, due to the use of heat spreaders, but most people resist change and still want it the way it was.

As I look at just about every heatsink that hits the market, none of them, at least those that end-users get, consistently match the quality of Thermalright products, but you would expect me to say that, so look for yourself.

Now the real problem that's bothers people is that you can move the heatsink once it is installed and until now that has never been the case, but Thermalright will soon have an accessory that will act as the seal on the Swiftech water block, preventing the ability to move the installed heatsink.

Thermalright Support,

Bob

Reply

Thank you for the quick and personalized response, Bob. I appreciate it greatly, considering I work for a company that responds to emails mainly with canned responses.

I do see the logic behind Thermalrights reason for having the base of the heatsink to be convex. However, in practice, it seems to have been proven that when one laps the base of the heatsink, you seem to get better results, as seen in the following popular example: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1188093

I suppose this could just be a fluke since this users considerable temperature drop occurred when he laped the CPU's heat spreader after the heatsink. But his 2C drop in temperature is quite noticeable. However, I guess I shouldn't argue too much with Thermalright's designers, they probably have a better grasp on thermal dynamics than I do.

I'm also very very pleased to hear that Thermalright is working to fix the flimsy mount of the Ultra-120 Ex. That was one of the main things that was scaring me away from that product.

Again, thank you for your personal attention to this matter. The community as a whole appreciates it.

Thermalright's responce:

Hi,
All our tests showed negative results, that is if we didn't lap the heat spreader as well. Lapping both did show anywhere from .5 to 2C improvement and that had allot to do with the systems the both of them were running in. housekeeping, non-disrupted airflow and ambient air temp had as much bearing as the lapping did, in other words, with good case housekeeping, good to better than average airflow and ambient air temp of no more than say 24C, I was able to achieve the same type of improvement without lapping.

As I said earlier and with lapping of both heatsink and CPU, the user was able to nullify the movement of the heatsink, which I'm sure made him feel better and could have been something that added to his success. Now the devise our engineers have come up with will nullify the movement and I'm sure that once it hits the streets many will be claiming improved performance.

I should have a few samples early this week to test on my new rig, it should be interesting, to say the least!!

Thermalright Support,

Bob

next e-mail:

Can you comment on whether or not this new accessory for the mounting will come with standard with new shipments of the Ultra-120 Ex. or will it only be available for separate purchase?

Thanks!

Reply:

That I can't tell you at this time because I simply don't know.

Thermalright Support,

Bob

[Damiano]

considerazioni:
da questo dialogo escono fuori molteplici notizie fra cui 3 sono di spiccato interesse.
la prima riguarda la planarità delle basi e la thermalright sembra giustificarsi di questo ''difetto'' dicendo che una buona parte dei proci intel ha his o ihs convesi.
un po come arrampicarsi sui vetri col sapone visto che comunque il 120extr non monta solo su 775 e visto che non tutti i 120extr. sono ''affetti'' da questa problematica.
parlerei quindi di mancata presa di posizione e responsabilità per un difetto che esiste ma che non viene riconosciuto o ancora peggio si cerca di giustificare.

il secondo punto invece riguarda la base dove si asserisce che la lappatura su diversi test interni effettuati, porta solo ed esclusivamente ad un perdita di prestazioni mentre se si lappano/rettificano sia processore che heatspreader si ritrova un guadagno prestazionale da 0,5° a 2°.

il terzo punto infine riguarda gli sviluppi e ''riparazioni'' (fix) che riguardano i dissipatori made in thermalright; sembra infatti che si sia avviata una sorta di campagna atta a risolvere le problematiche dovute alla poca pressione sul socket presente solo su alcuni modelli e su alcuni determinati socket/processori.

a voi le considerazioni.

[zampagol]

secondo me se la lappatura è ben fatta porta quasi sempre a un piccolo guadagno prestazione
thermalright al posto di parlare tanto potrebbe risolvere questo problema visto che i dissipatori non li regalano

[I Soliti Sospetti]

Beh... io ho un'altro pc con E8300 e ci ho messo su il mio Ultra 120 eXtreme che avevo sul pc in firma... io l'Ultra l'ho dovuto lappare per forza visto che era così convesso che mi mandava sul E6600 dove ha iniziato a lavorare delle temp assurde.
Fatta la lappatura con non ricordo quanti fogli di carta a partire dalla 800 fino alla 1200 devo dire che i risultati sono eccelsi!!
Ora sul E8300 l'ho appena montato e in passivo e tamb 27° mi da un full di 47° e idle di 36° con 1.14v... insomma credo sia veramente un dissy bestiale!!
Però certo... non si può pagare un dissy 50 euro e doverlo per forza lappare cavolo!!:(
Ora l'IFX che ho preso però non era male come base e mi da temp molto buone infatti il rivenditore dove l'ho preso mi ha detto che era arrivato da un paio di giorni... segno che stanno mettendo mano al problema? Speriamo!

[Damiano]

Sperem;pure i nostri sono tutti planari.
Forse hanno imparato a tirare una riga dritta

[M346]

Ma la concavità delle basi si presenta anche sui dissipatori per vga come l'hr-03?