Serpent northbridge cooler Author: cantstraferight -- Posted: 2007-11-15
Today I will be reviewing the Serpent northbridge cooler from evercool
First impressions
When I saw the serpent I was instantly reminded of the buffalo CPU cool I reviewed a few months ago. You can find its review here
The serpent has a copper base with 2 heat pipes that lead up to the fins. These are then cooled by the 60mm fan. The fan is optional so you have the choice between silent with less powerful cooling or cooler but more noisy. The fan lights up red when on and depending on what other lights you have in your case (or personal taste) this can be good or bad.
Whats in the box
The cooler
Metal clip
2 pins
Thermal past
Instructions
Installation
I was originally going to install this on my main computer but unfortunately it appears its northbrige cooler does not come off. So i instead had to use it on my seconder computer
There are two different ways to install the cooler depending on your motherboard. The first involves a clip that holds the cooler in place and the second uses 2 pins that goes through the cooler and the motherboard. I used the second method.
The cooler was fairly easy to install as long as the motherboard is in the case. I had problems at first as I couldn't get the pins through as the motherboard was on a table and the ends of the pins couldn't go through.
Noise level
Without the fan its silent
With the fan its so quite that I cant hear it over the noise of the other components
Performance
With the old cooler the northbridge reached 40 degree Celsius.
The serpent without the fan lowered that to 35 degree Celsius and with the fan that lowered again to 30 degrees Celsius. So overall that 10 degrees lower than stock if the noise of the fan isn't a problem.
Pros and cons
Pros
Much better than stock cooler
Two ways of installing the cooler
Easy to install
Choice of fan or fan less
Cons
very fragile
Overview
Overall its a good cooler. Its a better than the stock coolers on most motherboards. It also gives you choices like if you want to use the fan or not, which you don\'t see in many coolers. The cooler may be fragile but as long as your not constantly removing the cooler from computer to computer this shouldn't be a problem.
If you have problems with your northbridge overheating or if you just want to add a little extra cooling to your northbridge I can highly recommend the serpent.
