CoolIT Freezone Elite

Page 7: Results

The QX6800 was run both at idle and overclocked. Temperatures were measured in CoreTemp and SpeedFan at low, medium, and high fan speeds for each combination and CPU setting. The fan speeds and setups in the CoolerMaster were kept identical, and ambient temperatures were consistent throughout the tests. No side panel fans were used on the Stacker.

Blue is for High fan setting, gray for Medium and red for Low.

CoolIt Freezone Elite QX6800 @ 2.93 GHz [°C]

High fan (idle)   21   High fan (load)   28   Medium fan (idle)   33   Medium fan (load)   39   Low fan (idle)   42   Low fan (load)   47

0 12 24 36 48 60

CoolIt Freezone Elite QX6800 @ 3.22 GHz [°C]

High fan (idle)   23   High fan (load)   29   Medium fan (idle)   32   Low fan (idle)   38   Medium fan (load)   41   Low fan (load)   48

0 12 24 36 48 60

CoolIt Freezone Elite QX6800 @ 3.52 GHz [°C]

High fan (idle)   27   High fan (load)   34   Medium fan (idle)   36   Low fan (idle)   39   Medium fan (load)   42   Low fan (load)   50

0 12 24 36 48 60

As you can see, the results across the board are very impressive. The Freezone Elite does an excellent job keeping a Quad Core CPU cool, particularly when used at the high fan setting. At the lowest fan setting, temperatures are still very good but using the medium fan setting offers the best balance between performance and noise reduction, as the high fan setting is definitely noticeable as far as noise is concerned. We see a temperature difference of approximately 6 - 7 °C at the high fan setting, and up to a 10 - 11°C difference at the low fan setting.

When the Quad Core CPU is overclocked to 3.5 ghz, we see that the lowest fan setting starts to struggle with cooling, while the high fan setting still manages to post very impressive numbers. This would seem to indicate there is a thermal limit when the Elite may no longer be efficient in trying to handle the amount of heat being generated by the CPU, particularly under load. We suspect that the Elite will near its limit when a Quad Core CPU is highly overclocked. Where that limit exactly resides may be the subject of debate, no different than the limits posed by a traditional watercooling system. Each enthusiast has a "comfort zone" in which they will continue to push the thermal envelope. According to CoolIT, the Elite is designed for a heat dissipation of 250w, and we believe that is certainly an adequate threshold for most users. Note: We had intended to push the QX6800 beyond 3.5 GHz to see what clock speeds would give us 3DMark and SuperPi stable, but unfortunately we ran into technical difficulties (motherboard) and could not continue our overclocking.