Hardware Bistro

Product: Fenrir X'mas Edition
Manufacturer: Titan
Supplied by: Titan
Price: 55USD/RM187
Launch Date: OCT 2009

 

Christmas is around the corner and hence most of the PC makers have started plenty of promotion plans and new products for pushing their sales as well as adding more choices for Christmas gifts. Today let us have a quick look on a pretty attractive Titan Fenrir X'mas Edition; a legend CPU cooler comes with red + black aluminum fins. 

 

Company Profile

TITAN Technology Limited was established in Taiwan by a group of progressive and experienced engineers in their respective fields. Since our establishment with over 16 years of manufacturing experience with high quality cooling devices for various kinds of PCs, we have successfully gained worldwide recognition for our innovative designs.

TITAN is headquartered in Taiwan and has its own two factories, total approximate 20,000 square meters. TITAN is also leading manufacturer of various thermal products such as: CPU Coolers, VGA Coolers, H.D.D coolers, System Blowers, D.C fans, Heatsinks in comprehensive solution of cooling systems in different applications of PC systems.

 

Features

4 x 8mm heatpipes with HDT
12cm giant silent fan
PWM intelligent controller
High density fin design
Universal support

 

CPU Support

For AMD Socket AM2+/AM2/AM3/940/939/754/K8
For Intel LGA 775
For Intel LGA 1366
For Intel LGA 1156

 

Specification

Outline Dimension: 124 x 107 x 156 mm
Fan Dimension: 120 x 120 x 25 mm
Rated Voltage: 12V DC
Rated Current: 0.32 A
Power Consumption: 3.84 W
Rated Speed: 800 ~ 2150 ± 10% RPM
Airflow: 33.20 ~ 78.41 CFM
Static Pressure: 0.02 ~ 0.11 Inch H2O
Noise Level: < 17.2 ~ < 39 dBA
Bearing Type: Z-axis Bearing
Life Time: 60,000 Hours

 

Package & Contents

 

Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition comes with same packaging just like Titan Fenrir; sealed plastic container but we prefer a more user friendly recyclable box. All the specifications and features are written in detail at the back of the packaging container with multi-language.

 

Something interesting about Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition is the award logo as our Hardware Bistro logo was printed on it as well (Thanks Titan). In term of packaging contents, Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition comes with user's manual, thermal compound, 120mm cooling fan, heatsink and plenty of mounting accessories.

 

There are two back mounting plates and one mounting bar for Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition to support both AMD and Intel sockets; including latest sockets as well. Other mounting accessories are packed in several smaller bags for easier identification; very caring consideration from Titan marketing team. 

 

Besides that Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition also comes with a tube of thermal compound, 4-to-3 pin fan adapter, two fan clips and a user's manual. The user's manual is a complete manual which is very useful for both inexperience and experience users but we still prefer Titan to simplify the manual with 1 or 2 sentences per diagram (environmental friendly as well).

 

A Closer Look: Titan Fenrir X'mas Edition

 

The major difference between both Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition and standard Fenrir is the color of the aluminum fins; top and bottom fins of X'mas model comes with red fins while black fins at the middle. Such combination looks fantastic and it should able to attract a group of customers to get this for Christmas gift besides the standard Titan die-hard fans; applause to Titan R&D team for such think out of the box idea.

 

Back to the track, Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition is a tower cooler which is having dimension of 124 x 107 x 156 mm. The performance for such giant cooler is very promising but on the other hand, its compatibility & weight issues are killing certain of customers. Anyway Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition is made by copper heat pipes plus aluminum fins; best combo to deliver great result without burning the pocket.

 

As we mentioned before, all the aluminum fins of Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition are painted either in red or black; this is better color than original aluminum because it can avoid oxidation but it may affect the cooling power as the paint will be another layer of material to slow down the heat dissipation. In term of fan mounting, Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition is using fan clip which is still the best method to mount and secure a 120mm fan on such tower CPU cooler.

 

In order to deliver best cooling performance, 80mm heat pipe and heat pipe direct touch technology (HDT) is integrated on Fenrir X'Mas edition so that the heat can be transferred out to be dissipated more effectively. The cross bar at the bottom of the base is used to secure the cooler on the motherboard by using mounting bracket; for both AMD and Intel sockets.

 

Chromed fan has become an unofficial trademark for Titan because most of the fans for their products are silver chromed and this is same for Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition too. This 120mm cooling fan is a 12V DC fan with 0.32A and its maximum speed/airflow/noise are 2150RPM/78.41CFM/39dBA; quite a powerful but noisy fan (luckily it is a PWM fan).

 

In order to show the clearer images of Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition, here is the complete full installation with the original 120mm cooling fan. With such attractive eye-catching color and design of Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition, it just looks fantastic but it definitely looks bulky too (don't even mention dual 120mm cooling). Let us proceed with its installation without further delay.

 

Installation, Testing & Performance

 

For such bulky CPU cooler, a back plate is definitely required to strengthen the motherboard else it might break the board into 2 pieces. Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition comes with two type of back plates; one for AMD and one for Intel. Besides that washers are needed to avoid the direct contact between the motherboard PCB and the mounting screw; damaging the track of the PCB.

 

Next will be securing Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition on the motherboard with the mounting bracket and some mounting bolts & nuts. Basically the whole installation is pretty simple but it looks complicated if you don't understand it completely; spend some time with this monster then the installation is just a piece of cake. The cooling fan is advisable to install it afterward so that it gives room for user to do all the installation inside the case especially a small case.

 

Test Bed:

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E8300 @ 2.83GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3 (Gigabyte G31M-ES2L)
Heatsink: Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition
Memory: Kingston HyperX 4GB DDR2 8500
Hard Drive: 250GB 7200RPM 8MB Seagate
Graphic Card: Galaxy GeForce GTX260+
Casing: In Win Maelstrom
PSU: Aerocool V12XT-800
Router: TRENDnet TEW-639GR
Optical Drive: HLDS DVD RW +/-
Monitor: Dell 22" Wide Screen LCD
Speaker: Edifier R501
Mouse: SteelSeries Ikari Laser
Mouse Pad: SteelSeries QcK+
HeadSet: SteelSeries 3H
Operating System: Microsoft XP Pro SP2/Vista Home Premium
Ambient Temperature: 27 Degree Celsius

After the all the long explanation and installation, now let us focus back the performance of Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition. As you can see the performance of Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition is totally same with its sister; original Titan Fenrir. This is a pretty good news as we thought such additional painting on the aluminum fins on Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition will slow down the heat dissipation but actually it doesn't. Besides Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition comes with PWM intelligent fan which is playing an important role to gain the balancing between performance and noise.

 

Verdicts

Christmas gift is pretty common for most of the accessories but not really in computer hardware industry especially for desktop area. However with Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition, it has awakened us that Christmas presents aren't just stopping there. With such great performance and value for Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition, it is definitely able to follow its sister's footstep to be another legend in CPU cooler sector. The MSRP for Titan Fenrir X'Mas edition is just 6USD extra than normal Titan Fenrir so it is definitely a good buy; don't miss it for such awesome deal.

 

Pros:

+ Decent performance
+ Four U-shaped 8mm copper heat pipes
+ Heat pipe direct touch (H.D.T.)
+ Support multiple sockets including LGA1366
+ Silent PWM intelligent 120mm fan 

Cons:

- Dual-fans is not supported

 

Thanks to Titan for providing this sample for us to review.

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