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Nexus PHT-3600


Date
: 10/1/03 – 11:41:16 AM

Author
:

Category
: Cooling

Page 1 : Introduction

Manufacturer: Quiet PC
Price: $29.95

Introduction

Numerous amounts of heatsinks have been reviewed here at O² over the past three years, some of them being really hardcore and aimed towards performance, while others being more modest and built to guarantee a silent pc. The heatsink I'm investigating today is one of the latter category and is designed to keep things quiet. Up till now, the only silent heatsinks out there were the Zalman flower heatsinks, Intel's own heatsink, and up to a certain level the Swiftech one. The heatsink that is in the spotlight today is none of the above as it is a new product from one of the most renomated "silent pc" stores out there: Quiet PC. They are specialized in products that silence your computer (we checked out a truckload of their stuff last year) and today they have a new heatsink in their gamma: the
Nexus PHT-3600 SkiveTek® for Intel® Pentium® 4
. Sick of listening to the noise from your rig? Perhaps the Nexus is what you have been waiting for …

Page 2 : Specifications

Specifications

Let's hit it off with a quick view at the specs, copied directly from the Quiet PC website:

Heat sink specifications:

- Full aluminum heat sink
- SkiveTek®technology
- Weight: 385 gram with fan
- No tools required for installation
- Pre-applied premium thermal interface material

Fan specifications:

- Dimensions: 70x70x25 mm
- Rotation speed: 2400 RPM (+/-10%)
- Noise Level: 19 dB(A)

Having a closer look at the heatsink, you can see that it is entirely made out of aluminum and not copper which is common for most high performance heatsinks. This will cost you a few degrees in cooling but it does help to keep the pricetag low. The Nexus is made using the SkiveTek® technology … I can hear you saying "What's that?" … Here's a quick word of explanation:

SkiveTek® is one of the worlds most advanced technologies. It is a new concept and permits the production of heat sinks with a precise and super fine detail previously considered impossible. SkiveTek® represents a process of shaping materials to produce lightweight, high fin density thermal solutions. Base plate and fins are constructed out of one piece of 99.5% pure aluminum by cutting the material in thin layers, bending the fins in place. No bonding, welding, soldering or adhesive is involved; the joint between fin and base is continuous aluminum.

The heatsink base is coated with a fine layer of thermal paste, but I decided to take it off and apply Artic Alumina which will conduct heat better away from the CPU core. The installation mechanism is easy to use and won't require any tools at all … but that's mainly thanks to Intel's good heatsink retention mechanism.

The entire heatsink is cut from one piece of aluminum which means the contact between the base and the fins is perfect. There are a lot of fins and they are very thin, increasing the surface area for better heat to air transfer.

Of course a heatsink isn't going to do much cooling without a fan sticking on it! From the factory, the Nexus is fitted with a 70x70x25mm fan pushing around 2400RPM while only producing 19dB delivering up to 21CFM! And those numbers are at full force because if you have a sub 3.06GHz CPU, you can hook up the included noise reduction cable which will provide the fan with only 10V instead of the usual 12V, lowering the RPM's to 1930RPM and cutting down even more noise …

The specifications are clear, lets see how the installtion and performance are going!

Page 3 : Installing & Testing

Installing & Testing

As I already mentioned before, the Nexus is pretty easy to install thanks to the great P4 retention mechanism. If you don't want to replace the TIM that is already pre-installed, you just put the heatsink on the CPU, secure it, and connect the fan. Easy as that :).

I decided to use the speed reduction wire for every day use because I really dig silence. That doesn't mean the fan is loud without it, far from it, but less noise is better … period.

I installed the Nexus onto my P4 1.8A running @ 1.8GHz and overclocked to 2.8GHz. Testing was done with both at stock voltage and both with and without the speed reduction cable. At all times the system was 100% stable, but with the speed reduction cable, the temperatures were approximately 3-4 degrees Celsius higher. That's the price you have to pay for less noise.

Page 4 : Conclusion

Conclusion

QuietPC has a sweet new product in their gamma of quiet cooling solutions. The Nexus does what it is supposed to do: deliver good cooling performance at a very low noise level. Of course this heatsink is no competition for the hardcore overclockers heatsinks out there, but those often sound like a jet engine … The way I see it, the Nexus is a solid replacement for Intel's stock heatsink, but delivering more silence and better performance! If you want a good performing heatsink without going mad about the buzzing noise from the fans, this baby is what you have been waiting for! And for $29.95, things are not so complicated either ;).

Update:

QuietPC mailed me the following information:

"The retail packaged units have changed slightly from the product sample that was sent to you. They do not have the thermal compound installed on the base covered by a clear plastic cover that was held in place with cellophane tape. The retail packaged coolers come bare with a separate package of thermal compound inside the box. This allows the technician to apply the thermal compound only as needed when the cooler is actually being installed on the processor."