With the Dragon Orb series,
Thermaltake are trying to shake off the popular perception of their products
as good looking, but unexciting performers.
The baby of the Dragon Orb range,
this all-aluminium cooler will set you back $USD22.60 delivered from Aus
PC Market. Which isn't bad for something with a 7000RPM fan, but is only
a hair cheaper than the top-scoring ThermoEngine.
For your money, you get an impressive
collection of aluminium pins inside the heat sink, and the usual fancy fins
around the outside. You also get a clip that has three-point fastening on
both sides. So you can install any Dragon Orb on a socket with its middle
hooks broken off.
Apart from its funky appearance
and rescue-your-broken-socket potential, though, there's not a lot to get
excited about in the Dragon Orb 1. It scored 0.74°C/W when I tested it,
which puts it well behind the ThermoEngine, and in the middle of a bunch
of undistinguished but generally rather quieter coolers.
It does look nifty, though.
Here's the after-market version
of the Dragon Orb fan. The "Storm Fan" costs $USD13.40 delivered from Aus
PC Market, which is the same price as a more powerful Y.S. Tech square 60mm
fan. But, of course, you can't just screw the Y.S. Tech fan onto the top
of an Orb.
You're supposed to remove the
existing fan from your Orb before you screw the Storm on. I tried a quickie
test on a Super Orb, leaving both of the Super Orb's fans in place, and
I could hear the internal fans being sped up by the superior air flow from
the Storm. Since I only got 6% more performance out of the Super Orb by
doing this, though, I wasn't filled with the urge to test the Storm on other
Orbs.
Just face it - all of the Orbs
are mid-range coolers. If you want super performance, buy something else.
