According to Matbe, there are two new coolers from Arctic Cooling: The Freezer 64 PRO and the Freezer 7 PRO. The first one is designed for the Athlon 64 while the other one is made for the Pentium 4 (LGA775). Both should be available in October. These coolers will come with a very interesting warranty: 6 years!

Here's the data sheet for both products. They're supposed to be quiet with respectively 0.8 sones for the Freezer 64 PRO and 0.9 for the Freezer 7 PRO. I'm not very familiar with sones, so I searched for a formula to convert them to dBA. According to the Engineering Update, the correct formula is:

dBA = 33.2 Log10 (sones) + 28
(Accuracy +/- 2dBA)

So the Freezer 64 PRO is around 24.7dBA @ 2200RPM (300-2200 RPM). Not bad for 40CFM!



(Click on a picture for a close-up)

Looks good.

If I compare the Freezer 64 datasheet and pictures to the Freezer 64 Pro datasheet and pictures, then I see that the Pro has:

• a bigger fan
• that is rated at less noise
  (0.8 sone vs 1.0 sone)
• wider but shalower fins
  (so the fan probably blows the air straight through the tower in stead of out the sides)
• attachment clips are rotated 90°
  (so the fan blows toward the rear in stead of the PSU on most A64 mobo's)
• one more heatpipe

Looks nice... I like the fact that they've finally rotated the mounting clips. Hopefully it will be as competitively priced as their current offerings.

Is it me, or do the heat pipes look like smaller, "normal" heat pipes and not the wider, larger ones they use on the current Freezer series? I wonder how well it would do passively or semi-passively....

Interesting

I currently have a Freezer 7 in one of my computers, it's whisper quiet at 800rpm and keeps a 3GHz Prescott at about 45 degrees. Not bad at all, and this new version should be even better.

I am most interested.

What impressed me about the previous generation Freezers is the good weight:surface area ratio. For the cooling power you get, there's no weight penalty.

A google search came up with a few more hits...all just using the press release for info...looks like they have 6 pipes and msrp of $34.

pcmodding

So was the original Freezer 64 any good?

It's identical to the Freezer 4 except for the mounting system. The Freezer 4 has been reviewed, and is a little better than the Zalman 7000.

More info:

http://www.arctic-cooling.com/further_prod2.php?idx=80
http://www.sgoverclockers.com/modules.php?name=Reviews&rop=showcontent&id=39&page=3

Actually with the freezer64 air is sucked in from the sides of the heatsink as the fan blows through. This is based on the Bernouli principle and also my own experiment. If you hold a piece of paper near the sides of the freezer64 while the fan is on the paper gets sucked into the sides of the cooler. If you cover both sides of the heatsink with paper and feel the airflow out the rear of the HS you can really feel a big decrease in the amount of air coming out. The open design was, I think, one of the freezer's great strengths.

One problem I found with the freezer64 is that you don't get seccondary airflow over the chipset heatsink (I replaced the stock with a passive zalman).

Anyway I hope this turns out to be a significant improvement over an already very good heatsink, as the freezer line has so far been very competitively priced compared the the higher end options.

Very creative use of the Bernouili principle, but I doubt that is how it works. If I hold a peace of tissue next to the side of my AC Freezer64 it gets blown away from the cooler and not sucked towards it. And I repeat: the airflow at the sides is stronger than the airflow straight through.

I agree, Tibors, I think the Bernouli principle was not applied correctly here because there was no guiding frame to direct airflow; it works in the Panaflo slotted-frame fans (I forget the name given to this by the marketing boys).

In real system apps, I've found AC's cheaper simpler Ultra HSF to give better results in some cases -- depends a lot on the internal case airflow pattern. So I think the new Freezer Pros are definitely going to be an improvement.

You could be right Tibors, I could be remembering incorectly or thinking of something else. It's my brother's machine so I don't have access to one right now or else I'd check it again for myself.

I am pretty sure though that when I covered up both sides the straight through airflow was reduced. Anyway I can't test that at the moment either.

In any case I think I get some very good results with the freezer64 on my brother's machine with the fan pushing air towards the back case fan but I've heard a few stories of others not getting such good results. I remember one review in particular which showed the freezer at full speed performing worse than a stock heatsink.

I have the both,but no chance to test.........

the 64Pro seems like a winner...and for that price....its even more tempting.

A better review in german. Here it has to stand against the state-of-the-art coolers and not only the stock cooler. Just look at the numbers. The test system is a closed case without a case fan.
Notice the medicore performance at 7V - the author guesses it's because of the tightly packed fins. The fans is quite smooth.

http://www.dirkvader.de/page/Freezer_64_Pro/index.html