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Titan Vanessa L-Type


Date
: 08/2/05 – 09:18:52 PM

Author
:

Category
: Cooling

Page 1 : Index

Manufacturer
: Titan Computer Co. Ltd.

Price
: $69.99 MSRP

Titan Computer Co. has been growing since day one, way back in 1995, and doesn't appear to be stopping anytime soon. Titans headquarters are in Taiwan and their two factories in China total 20,000 square meters of floor space and 1200 employees. Titan only has one focus: solve your PC cooling problems. They offer such thermal products as VGA coolers, Hard Drive coolers, D.C. Fans and of course CPU coolers among other things. Primarily known throughout Europe and Asia, Titan is trying to gain more market share here in North America and the marketing strategies for their latest products show it. One of those new products is what we will be looking at today here at Overclockers Online.

The Vanessa L-Type is a copper based, single heatpipe designed CPU cooler and is the bigger sister of the highly successful Vanessa S-Type. The L-Type is compatible with the 4 most common and newest CPU mounts on the market and it comes with everything you need to be up and running right out of the box. I will be seeing how it compares to the stock retail boxed HSF that accompanies AMD64 939 processors.

Page 2 : Package

This box is huge and I love it because it is actually necessary. The reason for the large box is because the cooler needs the room; the Titan Vanessa L-Type is a 'big boned' cooler to say the least.

The Vanessa L-Type comes in a very attractive and eye catching package. The top of the box gives us the first look at the character that is Vanessa, a mythical looking fairy like female. A small Titan logo is in the upper left hand corner and believe it or not, there are only a total of two appearances made by the Titan logo on the entire exterior of the box. On most packages the company logo is plastered all over, but this is not the case with the Vanessa L-Type. Titan has instead taken the time to develop a recognizable logo and character to brand the Vanessa coolers with, as they have with other new products such as the Bianca and Serina. We also get our first look at the cooler itself beside the logo and an insight into some of the features the Vanessa L-Type offers. I have highlighted and enlarged those features so you can see exactly what it says.

We again can see the use of the Vanessa logo, with the same small image of the cooler itself on one of the long sides of the box. I really like how Titan incorporates their CPU coolers with a name and a recognizable character that is representative of the design. It makes the Vanessa L-Type stand out from the pack and is a great marketing strategy.

The opposite length-wise side of the box provides us with a better view of what this cooler looks like. It includes photos of the underside of the large 25mm heatpipe, the fan, included CPU mounts, the fan controller and also a good look at the butterfly inspired cooling fins.

At this end, Titan has given the buyer another 4 angles to view the cooler that is inside. As a frequent purchaser of computer hardware, I appreciate the fact that there is a photo of almost everything inside the package. This approach really lets you see what the Vanessa looks like without having to open the package. When you think about it, what better way to advertise the Vanessa than by simply showing potential customers photos of it? The cooler is a work of art and sells itself. The opposing side has no images or data of any kind.

At this point, we really do not know much about the Vanessa L-Type aside from the fact that it is very esthetically pleasing and a few of the main build features. That will all change when you flip the box over.

I have enhanced the Specifications section, not to show you the details as you will see those on the next page, but more for the large yellow box. I quote, 'a little bit big', that is one way to state it. I sure hope that the size equals performance. If so, the Vanessa will certainly do its advertised job as an excellent CPU cooler. The specifications area provides all the information you would want about the fan that the cooler utilizes. Above that section is a list of features, most of which have been mentioned elsewhere on the box. The last feature in the list, 'Easy Installation', caught my eye. I feel a very important feature in any CPU cooler is its ease of installation, Titan has just made the claim, I will see if it is true soon enough. There is a lot of information on the bottom of the box including the mountable processors. Titan has done well in the package design with both flash, and substance.

Now, let's step away from visuals of this striking cooler for one minute and look into the full list of specifications and features.

Page 3 : Specifications

Titan does not have much to say about the Vanessa, the information below was taken from their website.

I am surprised to see as little info as I did when visiting the Titan web site but what is there really to say about a CPU cooler? A whole pile of technical info is important to the geek in all of us but Titan has very efficiently conveyed any pertinent information across to us with a few notable exceptions such as the weight of the unit. The only technical specifications to be found on the site were for the 120mm fan that comes mounted with the Vanessa L-Type. This is the same chart as seen on the rear of the box, only this time you can clearly read the information.

It appears to be a very competent fan and should run quiet enough, even at full capacity. The one mentionable aspect of the fan is that it is 100% plastic. The shroud and the fins are both plastic, covered with a metallic paint to give the illusion of being made out of metal. A metal fan would have been nice, but the plastic fan helps save a few grams of weight. I weighed the cooling unit with fan and grill attached to find it weighing in at just over 800 grams, definitely in the heavy weight division.

Page 4 : Contents

Upon opening the package we see a very organized interior with everything having a recessed spot to lounge in during shipping in the clear plastic.

There is a clear plastic cover that keeps all contents in their place. The large instructions are neatly folded and wrapped around the corner displaying the Vanessa logo again. We get our first view of the cooler, well the fan anyway, with the butterfly shaped fins hiding in the background.

I pulled everything out of the box and, as you can see, Titan has managed to package almost every piece of hardware in the box shown in the upper left, with the exception of the included screwdriver and fan controller. I will look at all the accessories before getting into the cooler itself.

You might be wondering why Titan has included a Philips head screw driver, but once you look at the instructions you will soon understand why. Due to the design of the Vanessa, an extremely long screw driver with a narrow shaft is required for installation, Titan obviously doesn't expect anyone to have a screwdriver like this so they included one. This allows you to install the Vanessa L-Type right out of the box, a smart move on Titans part. The fan controller is mountable in a 3.5" drive bay or at the rear of the case in an empty PCI slot. The controller has a nice brushed aluminum finish and is shown above with the PCI mount should you go that route.

In this photo, I opened up the instructions to give you a feel of what you are provided with to assist in installation. The contents of the small box to the lower right have also been spread out to reveal what was inside. With universal mounting capabilities including P4 (478 and 775), K7, and K8 sockets, it is understood that there is a lot of mounting hardware tucked into that little box. We are also provided with a small amount of Titan Nano Blue thermal paste. You can see exactly how much in the photo below.

Let's now take a good look at the Vanessa L-Type cooler.

In the long journey that this particular package experienced from Taiwan to Canada with a stop over in the UK due to a shipping mishap that was not Titans fault, some damage did occur. In the exterior photos you may have noticed a few creases in the package but I did not think the damage was going to pour into the box as it looked fairly minor. Unfortunately the cooler itself did result in some misplaced and slightly bent fins.

I have put up two before and after comparisons of the damage. In the before images you can see some of the fin ends bent down or up slightly but the majority of the issue was the fact that the fins were misaligned on the large heatpipe. I ended up spending only 10 minutes with a flat head screwdriver and flat faced pliers to get the after photos. It was not really difficult aligning the fins and giving a quick bend to those that needed it, but then again, I am never one to turn down the opportunity to mess around with something. I simply pulled the fan assembly off and went to work. The results are a cooler that looks as it did when it left the shipping department at Titan. Titan was contacted to see if such a repair would hurt the performance before I touched it and we were assured it would not. The package would obviously benefit from a firmer interior material as the clear plastic is thin and not very sturdy in protecting the cooler. This would help prevent any repairs having to be made by the end user. That said, keep in mind this package went on an extraordinarily long trip all by itself and not in a larger shipment packaged safely with more than one unit.

In this rear view of the Vanessa L-Type, near the bottom, you begin to see how the fan attaches to the cooling fins. There are plastic mounts fixed to the back of the fan that clip onto the grooves of the fins. This is a different design as most coolers have some sort of shroud that covers the fins to mount the fan. I believe this design is the cause of the damage in shipping because if the fan gets pushed down, it will bend the fins it is sitting on. This shroudless mount does help keep weight down and, weighing in at 800+ grams already, this is a hefty cooler so the weight saved by the shroudless design is valuable.

It is this photo that gives us a clear view as to how the fan is mounted to the cooling fins. We can also see the part#TFD-12025H12C. The specifications for the fan we have already gone over so I won't discuss those any further.

A final photo here of the front of the fan with the grill removed, the grill being the only metal part on the fan.

We will now move on to the very important installation of the Vanessa L-Type. Before we even start, I have to mention again that we have been warned on the box that 'this cooler is a little bit big'. Let's see just how big on the next page…

Page 5 : Installation

Earlier I noted that Titan made the claim that installation was easy, it's game time and there is no hiding at this point. The instructions with a photo for every step was a great way to start. A few more details in the written part wouldn't have hurt. Titan instructs the user to 'apply an appropriate amount of thermal grease…and spread evenly' what exactly is an appropriate amount? I know what is, but does everyone else? A simple adjustment to something like 'apply a very thin, even layer to the entire CPU' would have been much better. Other than that the instructions are perfect, even mentioning to tighten the screws evenly when securing the cooler to the mount.

With 4 different processors that can hold the Vanessa L-Type we get 4 different mounts to choose from. Today I will be mounting the cooler on an Asus A8V-E Deluxe sporting an AMD64 3000+ Winchester Socket 939, so the K8 it is.

You will notice right away that there is no backing plate and not a lot to the mount, that means that the stock backing plate will be utilized. A quick check of the instructions and not only will the stock back plate be used but also the stock retention unit. Usually the most difficult part of any aftermarket cooler installation just became amazingly simple. In fact all we have to do is remove the screws in the retainer, place the K8 mount on the retainer, and use the provided screws to secure the mount and retainer again. This means removal of the motherboard is not necessary, it doesn't get any easier than that.

I cleaned and prepped the CPU with the included Nano Blue thermal paste. I decided to install the cooler while the motherboard was still mounted in a case, just to make sure it was as easy as I thought it would be. So I removed the retention screws after prepping the CPU and installed the mount with the included screws, so far so good.

On the left, we can see the 4 screws that will be what secures the cooler to the mount. This is where the long screwdriver comes in. On the right, the screws are at the bottom of the endless holes for the screwdriver to reach down to, you can see they are lined up almost perfect. When installing the cooler while the motherboard is still in the case, it is not possible to see the screws under the fins. It takes a bit of fiddling with the screwdriver to get it in the screw heads, but once you do, it's easy enough. If you've ever handled a screwdriver before it is a piece of cake.

I removed the motherboard for testing and to get a photo of the screwdriver passing through the fins to get to the mounting screws. As mentioned above, the holes in the fins are aligned well with the screw heads so the install goes smoothly.

Before mounting the cooler, I took a photo of the surface of the copper base that will be the front line in drawing the heat from the CPU. The surface is flat, smooth and polished nicely, no lapping will be required to maximize its potential.

With the cooler mounted and ready to go, we can see that it does take up a lot of room in the case. It looks like the fan is touching the Zalman Northbridge cooler that I use but it certainly is not. You may also be looking at the first and second RAM slots thinking they are being blocked by the fins. Once again, close, but not quite.

Although being large, the cooler ends up being about 1/2 an inch shorter than the width of the case. In this case, a generic run of the mill mid-tower, there is plenty of room for the Vanessa L-Type.

Now I may have just gotten lucky that the Vanessa fits perfectly with the hardware I had, but I believe Titan has done a remarkable job in designing the Vanessa L-Type to fit most cases. With the mount for the K8 processor, you have the option of having the Vanessa face any way you wish. In fact with all but the K7 mount you have the option of facing the cooler in any direction. I obviously had to have it facing up or down due to the tall Northbridge cooler, but had I still had the standard 20mm tall Northbridge cooler that came installed on the motherboard, I would have had the option of mounting the cooler either way, up/down or front/back. If you are considering this cooler you will still want to do some measuring to ensure it fits with your hardware and Titan does warn you of this right on the box. They also provide dimensions of the Vanessa L-Type on the website.

Looking at the instructions for the other mounts, they appear to be no more difficult in installing the Vanessa L-Type than the K8 mount. All but one of the mounts, the P4 (socket 775), does not require removal of the motherboard. That is an impressive feat for a cooler of this size and versatility. Titans claim of easy installation more than held up in my opinion. If I was to be simply installing the cooler and not documenting it as I have, 10 minutes or less is all it would take me with no frustration involved. That would be from the time I shut down my machine to the time I was booting it back up. The installation really went that flawlessly and I had not even planned ahead by measuring for which way to mount it, simply holding the cooler in place made it easy enough to figure out.

The last of the installation involves mounting the fan controller that is included. You have two options as you saw in the contents photos, a PCI mount or the attractive brushed aluminum front 3.5" bay mount seen above. Most people looking to mount the controller in a 3.5" bay will need to attach the included arms. I did not actually mount the controller as my case doesn't exactly have a 3.5" bay. I did try the PCI mount and it fits like any PCI card would. All you need is an open PCI slot and youre good to go. Plug the coolers fan lead inline with the controller and then into the motherboards CPU fan connection and you have a functioning fan controller that allows you to regulate the fan speed from approximately 1100 to 2000 RPM.

All we have left to see is how well the Vanessa L-Type works. The next page will give us all the information we need to know.

Page 6 : Performance

For temperature testing the following components were used…

The testing would commence as follows. Upon applying the thermal paste and mounting each cooler, the system was booted and let idle for 5 minutes while monitoring temperatures to ensure the cooler was correctly mounted. At the 5 minute mark, Prime95 was run on Torture Test Blend for 3 hours. This would guarantee that heat saturation for each cooler had occurred. At the end of the 3 hours the temperatures for the CPU and MB were recorded with data supplied by Speedfan. I had also taped a temperature probe to the side of the NB cooler on the base and recorded the temperature at the 3 hour mark from that as well. Prime95 was then stopped and closed and the system sat idle for 1 hour with no activity except any normal Windows services and processes alongside Speedfan. It was then that the temperatures were recorded again using the same methods for the chart below. During the testing period, room temperature remained between 23 and 24 degrees Celsius and there was no additional fans cooling the motherboard.

As expected, the Titan Vanessa L-Type handily outperforms the stock unit at maximum and even minimum fan speeds. Under load, a difference of 8 degrees is not amazing, but it is still substantial. What is most impressive is the performance of the cooler at the lowest fan setting and at idle. With only a 2 or 3 degree difference under load or at idle between the fan running at 2000RPM and 1100RPM, the Vanessa L-Type has the option of being a very effective cooler with very little to no noise. At 1350RPM or less the fan is indistinguishable from the video card fan on the Sapphire X700 Pro, which is almost silent, and the fan is certainly quieter than the stock AMD unit at that speed. With any other fans in the case, you would be hard pressed to hear the Vanessa L-Type at all. At full blast the fan is hardly what I would consider loud, but you do hear the air it is pushing as it tries to fight it's way through the fins. It is at this speed that it does become louder than the stock AMD fan but the noise it produces is lower pitch therefore less noticeable and more importantly, less annoying.

The fact that the Vanessa L-Type cools so well at such a low fan speed and the lack of a real difference in cooling between 2000RPM and 1100RPM, indicates that the 25mm heatpipe and large cooling fins do an extraordinary job cooling the CPU on their own. Keep in mind that the testing was done on a desk with absolutely no fresh air being swept across the motherboard. I believe that when put in a case with decent airflow, the Vanessa L-Type would increase its ability to cool at 1100RPM thus making it even more impressive as a quiet cooling solution. It looks like Titans large single heatpipe design is a big success and will likely be repeated in future cooling solutions.

The bonus that I found with this particular setup is the Northbridge numbers. You will remember the close proximity that the coolers fan had to the Zalman Northbridge heatsink from the installation photos. Being that close, the fan draws a substantial amount of fresh air over the passive Zalman cooler and at 2000RPM it lowers the temperature by 17 degrees at load over the AMD HSF. This obviously isn't something every user will see but if your motherboard has the Northbridge close to the CPU like the A8V-E Deluxe or other VIA chipsets, it would be worth it to pick up a Zalman and save yourself some noise by having the Vanessa do two jobs at once.

Page 7 : Conclusion

While not being the best performing cooler on the market, the Titan Vanessa L-Type definitely is one of the easiest to install and does a fine job cooling making the stock AMD HSF look far inferior. The large single heatpipe and massive fins allow it to cool extremely well with the fan turned down low enough to become invisible in a typical air-cooled system. The CPU cooling ability is fantastic and when gaming the noise level would be more than acceptable and will not interfere with you listening for bushes rustling or footsteps in Far Cry or the like. It does lack in its ability to cool surrounding components on the motherboard although it worked better than could have been imagined in the test setup with the Zalman Northbridge cooler. That said, not everyone using this cooler will have this setup and will not benefit as much because the Vanessa L-Type doesn't force any air down onto the motherboard. All the air coming from the fan pushes directly out the sides, back, or top of the cooler which does not benefit the motherboard or chipset in any way.

The overall size was not a factor in the test setup and Titan has done well in designing the mounts for the various sockets to accommodate a large number of systems. It is, however, inevitable that the Vanessa L-Type will not fit in some systems. Titan does not hide this and warns its customers right on the box, what more can you ask for than that? The one thing Titan does hide is the weight of the unit. I weighed the cooler and it does weigh more than most manufacturers suggested maximum for motherboards at over 800 grams but is not the heaviest out there. That said, the cooler mounts extremely securely and does not appear to pose any dangers to the motherboard. I would still not recommend moving your case around with it installed.

If you are looking for a unique CPU cooler that performs very well and has the ability to run un-detected, the Vanessa L-Type is for you, as long as you have the space to accommodate. If your system lacks of good airflow and you are looking for a cooler to help out in keeping your motherboard and chipset cool, then you will want to look elsewhere. That is unless you have a similar setup to the system used for testing as the Vanessa L-Type turned my passive Northbridge cooler into an active one and drastically dropped the temperatures that it had been running at. I will be keeping the Vanessa L-Type in this system as not a single cooler I have tried does all that this one does for me. I must admit I was skeptical of the design at first but the numbers don't lie and Titan has won me over. I look forward to their next offering in this department.

Advantages:

• Extremely simple and easy installation
• Very capable CPU cooling
• Included fan controller for virtually silent performance
• Universal mounting system

  Disadvantages:

• Very limited motherboard component cooling
• Large and heavy
• Hard to find for purchase in North America

  Overclockers Online would like to thank Titan for providing us with the Vanessa L-Type to review.