Good review, thank you !
Quick question : I don't see the HR-01 plus in the comparaison charts, any reasons ?

Still eagerly waiting for the time the HR-02 will be tested.
The Arctic Extreme is just wrong. Proof is that the lesser Freezer 7 performs on par, while costing much less and being much smaller. I'm surprised they didn't make it any better over the years though...

It was never tested on the i7 cpu/board.

The AC Freezer stock fan confuses me: you refer to the blades as swept back; which is highly unusual. In this picture:



...I assume we are looking at the exhaust side? The strange thing is the blades themselves appear to be convex on their "pushing" faces and concave on the trailing side? THIS is a bizarre design choice, and it would explain the low CFM that the fan apparently has.

The swept back aspect also contribute to the low volume of air flow -- the air "slips" out to the end of the blade and with the large gap to the frame, much of the air slips off the blade and is not "shifted" -- which is the whole point of a fan. So, if swept back blades are to work well, the gap to the frame must be tiny, OR the tips of the blades must be connected to a cylinder that spins with the blades.

I do not think that is the exhaustside. The fans are swept forward and cutting the air like normal aren't they?

Yes, they are swept forward -- an error by Larry missed by me. Will be fixed shortly.

As Parappaman said, hope you gonna do an HR-02 test someday

Thank you for another great review. I'd previously planned on buying a Mugen 2 for my next rig, but after seeing the result for the TR Ultra 120 today, I'm thinking it may be be the better option. Especially as it will only cost marginally more than the Mugen once the price of a Nexus fan is factored in. And the fact they supply two fan clips makes a push pull configuration that much more inviting.

Was the supplied thermal paste used on the heatsink?

Not sure that the price comparison makes sense, as the Mugen's PWM fan is excellent; there's no need to change it. ( Also, IMO, mounting a fan on a tower HS w/o "proper" clips is so utterly simple...)

We always use the same thermal goop - Arctic Cooling Ceramic.

Arctic Silver Ceramique, or do Arctic Cooling do something not listed on their site?

My bad -- brain fart: I meant Arctic Silver. Ceramique requires very little setting time.

It's also significantly cheaper than AS5 for essentially the same performance. I've lots of AS5 left over, but I don't recommend its purchase over Ceramique these days.

I think I may have worded things wrong. The Mugen costs about £36 and the Ultra 120 + 1 Nexus fan would cost about £38. Sorry about that

Thanks for the info on the thermal paste. Does anyone know if the thermalright goop is any good or should it just be put in a box with all my other computer bits 'n' bobs?

Years later and the good old TRUE can still hang with the best of them it was good investment and excellent piece of engineering on Thermalright's part.

Apparently so -- but then the fan is unusual because the struts are on the intake side? This makes it noisier, usually...

Perhaps Larry was too subtle... There are two glaring problems with the FreezerX. In priority order, imo:

1) The base is concave.
2) The fin spacing is way too tight.

Those weaknesses are what put the product performance at last place. Everything else is trivial.

I'm surprised at how well the Ultra 120 Rev. C performed. I would like to see how Thermalright's latest generation coolers (HR-02, Silver Arrow, Archon) would fare.

A little birdie told me the HR-02 is not really a successful release. You can expect an updated version some time soon.

Did he tell you why?

Except the price, I've only read good things about the HR-02.

That may well be the case... but no one tests them at super low airflow/noise like we do, and that's where we separate the silent performers from the higher speed ones. Let's face it -- lots of tower coolers do quite well with high airflow. It's when we bring the fan speed (and noise) down that we see bigger differences.

I'd like to see the original TRUE tested with the rev C mounting hardware.

Thanks for the review MC.

Since it first arrived I've known the Freezer EXRM was anything but extreme. I consistently get better temps using Freezer 7 Pro on the same machines. I expected rev2 to be better but apparently its not.

Its nice to see TRUE back on top

Thanks, great review, though the Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme Rev.C is hardly new, I've been using one since November 2009.

With the AMD scissor mount, the cooler indeed overhangs the bolts making them hard to reach. But you can twist the heatsink a few degrees clockwise, enough to get a straight shot with a long screwdriver to tighten two diagonally opposed screws. Then twist heatsink a few degrees counterclockwise allowing to reach the other two screws.

Frankly speaking, TR Ultra-120 eXtreme Rev.C is dated and in place of Venomous X. That said, it is still a great tower cooler, originated from Thermalright.

Now, I really regret that I bought the AC Freezer Xtreme.

But in its defence: it is really quiet in my setup with the motherboards PWM-function to control the fan.
And my treble core AMD Athlon II x3 425 at stock speed is only running at ~40 C when playing Football Manager 2011 and Folding@home at the same time (constant, near 100 % load)

And, it doesn't require one to remove the motherboard to install it. Good for the newbie like me