Anartik.com’s Blog

Scythe LGA1366 adapters are finally on the way (after being delayed many weeks) and should be available sometime next week. There is a VTMS and Non-VTMS version. The real distinction is that VTMS is 2 piece and non is 1 piece. Each item lists what coolers it supports. Between the two they cover all Scythe coolers and the Reeven core contact. While these types of push pin mounts work and have been in use by Scythe for sometime I’m a little disapointed they have not gone to bolt thru kits for better stability (at the expense of ease of installation with push pin i.e. no mobo removal required). They just recently started offering CPU stabilizer kits (bolt thru kits) for 775 and AM2 and I would hope they release one soon for LGA1366. Also be sure to take a look at the new Mugen 2 which offers a rather unique universal bolt thru kit that fits LGA775, LGA1366 and AM2 all in one installation kit.

This is a new series I will periodically do where I pick an item and do a pricing snapshot. The first item is the Thermalright LGA1366 bolt thru kit for the Ultra series. IMO this has been an item many shops have gouged people on. That of course often happens with new items on the market and a reseller is the first to have a new item in short supply (now abundant). Of course it does not do a lot in furthering customer relations. This product is somewhat unique in that it allows the reuse of a previous generation heatsink at minimal cost which a lot of shops probably don’t like because the mainstay of a cooling shop is usually the burst of sales from coolers for a new CPU platform. It is what it is though; some will reuse and some will buy a new cooler.

Just to be clear the reseller price on this item has not changed since day one. I base my pricing on the cost of the item and a fair markup (not 200-400%). Below is today’s snapshot for pricing on this item. I won’t point anyone out but some sites have just recently dropped from a pricing level of $15-16. This is a listing of shops readily found in Yahoo search selling in the US. You will note some well known sites conspicuously missing but either they don’t carry the item or don’t carry Thermalright at all.

CrazyPC	10.99
Jab-Tech	9.95
CoolerGuys	11.00
Sidewinder	9.95
PCToys	14.95
FrozenCPU	9.99
AcousticPC	10.00
Central Computers	12.95
QuietPC	9.95
Anartik	8.95
Performance-pcs	12.95
Memory Express	12.99

I have been waiting sometime for a die shrunk, dual core 280 and I have to say I am a little disappointed in Nvidia. On the surface it looks like Nvidia’s single minded objective was to win back the single fastest video card title from ATI and the hell with the consumer. From the various test results I have read the 295 is indeed now the fastest single card beating the 4870 X2 pretty much across the board. What peeves me is they did not make a true dual core 280 or 285. In a nutshell they put downclocked 285 series processors on what amounts to a GTX260 architecture with 2 x 448 bit memory buses for a total of 1792MB memory (instead of 2 x 512 and 2048mb). In other words they did just what they had to do to beat ATI. Granted you can overclock (or buy overclocked) but the memory limitations remain and I would have to suspect the GTX285 parts are binned and better quality than the GTX295 parts. There has been a lot of mention that they reduced power consumption which comes from the die shrink but a lot comes from the clock reductions. It’s also a shame Nvidia is sticking with DDR3 vs. DDR5.

You can buy the GTX295 for around $500 which will give you the fastest single card but GTX280 or GTX285 in SLI will provide better performance at a premium. If you are limited by lack of support for SLI (X38/X48 etc) the GTX 295 is a pretty good option. For my part I will probably go with a single GTX 285 and maybe get a second when I ever get around to moving to I7 and X58. If you are looking for real price/performance look for deals on the GTX280. Retailers will no doubt scramble to dump old stock. Deals on the 4870 X2 are also worth looking in to as prices decline.

At some point you finally have to make the jump and upgrade and can’t always just wait for what’s next. I have already seen references to waiting on what’s next from Nvidia. If you have older hardware now’s a pretty good time to upgrade. I certainly would not lay out any cash if I already had a GTX280, GTX260’s or a 4870X2. I also would not expect Nvidia to be in any hurry to offer anything better until ATI makes the next move.

I was looking for this to happen since LGA1366 debuted and it finally did… Intel finally cut prices on LGA775 processors. Most notable (at least to me) is the cut in the price of the Yorkfield Q9650 3ghz Quad which has dropped from $550 to $339.99 with free shipping at the current cheapest online retailer. This Quad has great OC potential with a multiplier of 9 which should yield a stable minimum of 9*450FSB = 4.05ghz and 4.14ghz is also well within reason with proper cooling. Although an I7 would bring you a Quad with 8 threads the Q9650 sports good price performance and most of all provides a viable upgrade path for current LGA775 systems. Like I have noted before desktop applications and games are still few and far between to take full advantage of 4 threads let alone 8. By the time that functionality is fully realized pretty much all current hardware will be obsolete anyway. It really does not pay to buy hardware based on promises of future tech. The I7 is however better suited for servers and high end workstations where many applications are run at once or have specialty software designed for true parallelism i.e. rendering or video encoding.

Note: I believe the reason for the price cuts is not just about the I7 or posturing against the Phenom II. Intel is releasing the S series of Quads which feature reduced power at a significant premium. I don’t see any mention of a Q9650S but the Q9550, Q9400 and Q8200 drop from 95-65 watts. I don’t believe there will be any value for enthusiasts in the S series though.

I took a look today to see what the price would be for an I7 upgrade to my system. Today’s price is running about $1039 + shipping for an Asus P6T, 6gb Corsair DDR3 1600, and a I7 2.93ghz. Of course you could easily spend more with my current board of choice the Asus P6T6 Revolution at around $360. Upgrade paths are always on my mind but I think I will finally upgrade my 8800GTX first with a GTX285.

Since I moved on from my Intel P3 years ago I jumped on the AMD band wagon. I went through multiple AMD processors up to my last system with an Athlon X2 4400 (socket 939). Since that time AMD ceased to be a viable alternative for anyone wanting a true performance system. Some AMD loyalists might argue that point but Intel’s devasting performance lead is undeniable. As much as I had come to dislike Intel there was a clear choice for a better chipset and CPU. As such for my last build I went with a E8500(would have bought E8600 but was not out yet) and a X48 motherboard. I have my likes and dislikes but AMD and Intel are not sports teams and I’m no ones “fanboy”. He who sells the best price/performance product gets the sale. For gaming where multi threading, beyond maybe two cores, has not taken hold yet a faster dual core is still the best option. Sure there are some extreme options but the prices are not worth it IMO. I’ve had my eye on the Q9650 3ghz for a while but the price has not moved much and as of today around $550(which I’m not paying). That processor should do 4ghz+ on my system. Anyway more on topic…

I’m very happy to see AMD has made the launch of the 45nm 2.8 ghz 920 and 3ghz 940 Phenom II. They are still clock for clock slower than Intel (3ghz 940 ~= 2.66ghz Q9400) but it is a step in the right direction and something of a return to competition. While there is nothing there to make me run out and buy one it provides a great upgrade option to current AM2+ users and is (finally) supposed to be a great overclocker. It also provides an economical and viable alternative to Intel for those wishing to build a quad core system(at least if Intel does not retaliate and drop prices).

I think most of all I thank AMD for finally doing something to put some competitive price pressure on Intel. I may yet buy that Q9650 and/or eventually jump to I7.

Jim Phillips
anartik.com

The Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme RT is in stock.
Thermalright is now marketing separate models for each of LGA1366/LGA775/AM2. For now we will only be stocking the 1366 RT model and allow the selection of the mounting kit you want with your cooler. When ordering you may select the mounting kit you want included and you may also select a second discounted mounting kit. When purchased with the cooler the AMD and LGA775 mounting kits receive a discount vs. the more expensive 1366 kit. There is also the option to purchase a second fan/holder and Arctic Silver 5 at a discount.
The heatsink itself is identical to the original Ultra 120 Extreme. If you already have one you can buy just the 1366 mounting kit and/or the fan bracket (CPU Accessory section).

We now have the new Scythe Mugen 2 in stock. Scythes Mugen 2 now features universal bolt thru mounting, for LGA1366, LGA775 and AMD. Scythe has traditionally used the push pin system and the bolt thru provides much more secure mounting although at the expense of motherboard removal for a retro fit. We also now have similar kits from Scythe for LGA775 and K8/AM2. Performance is claimed at 10% over the previous venerable Infinity/Mugen. The Mugen 2 comes standard with a 4 pin PWM fan ready for LGA1366 motherboards (or any 3 pin connector w/ loss of PWM speed control).

The Mugen 2 incorporates a base heatsink plus 5 heatsinks(one for each dual heatpipe called MAPS) and can accommodate up to 4×120mm Fans.

Optional fan clips are available for adding 3 additional fans (I don’t recommend more than 2 fans). There is also a new type B clip for Scythe coolers that will accomodate a 38mm thick fan. We are only carrying a few at the moment because Scythe raised the price to resellers ~400% (read as outrageous). As a courtesy these clips will be available at a very low price (expect to find them elsewhere for as much as $8). They also raised the price the same on the old type A clip which we have plenty of. We will sell those at the current price until they are gone.

I’m not really a big proponent of metric and for the most part I don’t use it. However computer fans all come in metric sizes and are sold as such. This is just a little reference for those looking to replace a fan of unknown size. A fan is sold by width and thickness i.e. 120×38mm. If you take a measurement and i.e. it’s 3/8 you just divide the 3 by 8 to get the decimal equivalent which you can then plug in to a metric calculator or find on the chart below.

Here is a good online metric calculator

Common Thickness:
10mm = .3937″
15mm = .59″
20mm = .7874″
25mm = .98425″
38mm = 1.496″

Common Width:
40mm = 1.5748″
50mm = 1.9685″
60mm = 2.3622″
70mm = 2.7559″
80mm = 3.1496″
90mm = 3.5433″
92mm = 3.6221″
100mm = 3.9370″
120mm = 4.7224″
140mm = 5.5118″
250mm = 9.8425″

anartik.com

We now have the Thermalright fan holder for the Ultra (and TRUE) series of heatsinks. The first thing I did last night after getting the store in order was to grab one and install it on my system. Two of the holders (like the original clips) will fit on the cooler for push/pull operation but I am only currently using a single Scythe Slip Stream 110CFM with good result on an E8500 overclocked to 4.3ghz. The whole installation, including removing the old fan clips, took all of a couple minutes. The 25mm fan snapped inside the holder and the holder snaps in place on the U120E. The bracket will not work for 38mm thick fans.

Thermalright has claimed a performance increase due to increased air flow. With the old clips I had always noticed that a lot of air bypasses the closely space fins of the U120E. The new holder forces more air into the cooler and right away I saw about about a 1-2C difference (using RealTemp). I also played several hours straight of COD WAW last night and ran realtemp in the background. The max temp reached for each core was in the mid-low 70’s (C) which was an even bigger improvement than that seen at idle. Hardly a scientific test but anecdotally speaking improved temps from improved airflow are achieved.

Pros: Improved airflow
Quality construction
Reasonable price
Easy installation
Muffles some fan noise

Cons: Won’t hold 120×38mm

Welcome to anartik.com’s blog. Here you will find news from anartik.com and anartik’s comments on various hardware and software. In addition being a programmer by profession you may find information related to the programming profession and definitely the politics of it. You will likely find a variety of information with no limits.