Hardware Bistro

Product: Baram
Manufacturer: Thermolab
Supplied by: Thermolab
Price: 52USD/RM180
Launch Date: NA

 

We have seen quite number of heatpipe coolers and today we will introduce you a new thermal cooling company; Thermolab. Thermolab is a Korean company and their latest CPU cooler; Baram is a tower CPU cooler with 5 heatpipes which is the most heat pipes cooler that we have ever seen so far. Let us find out more about this interesting cooler and see how it performs against other competitors. 

 

Company Profile

Thermolab is a Korea company that focus on cooling products such as Nano Silencer, Macro Silencer and their latest Baram which is a heat pipe cooler used for CPU, designed in an optimal aerothermodynamics structure.

Thermolab started their business in year 2003 with their registered patent of slim type heat exchanger and reciprocate pump. As the following years, Thermolab has developed and produced such great products such as high efficient louver fin heatpipe cooler, Nano Silencer, Micro Silencer, TL5-H thermal grease, UMPC thermal solution and etc.

 

Features

- With the efficient heat pipe arrangement, maximized the thermal distribution effects

- Optimum fin structure to minimize air resistance intaken

- Optimized fin pitch for axial Fan

- The air tunnel formed inside the stack-heatsink fins accelerates the airflow

 

Applicable CPU

- Socket Standards: Intel Socket 775, AMD Socket AM2+/AM2
- Thermal Design Power of CPU: Max 250 Watt

 

Specifications

Components

 

Package & Content

 

Thermolab Baram is packed in a simple packaging box without any fancy stuff including its features and specifications. The way of the Thermolab packaging looks very similar with one of the famous thermal cooling manufacturer; have you figured it out? You may wonder what is Baram stands for and basically it means "air flow" in Korean which is stated on the packaging box together with its supported socket information.

 

Inside the packaging box of Thermolab Baram, there isn't any foam to protect the heatsink but the Baram cooler was arrived on our doorstep safely. Besides the Baram heatsink cooler, the rest of the accessories are thermal grease, four fan wire clips, user's manual, installation components for Intel Socket 775 and AMD AM2+/AM2.

 

The user's manual of Thermolab Baram is a small booklet which contains its specifications, features, installation steps, precautions and etc in both English and Korean. The user's manual shows all the installation steps very clearly with the pictures else users may have a hard time to understand them. Thermolab includes a tube of 5grams silver thermal grease which is good accessory for those still haven't get any high end thermal paste yet. However fan is not included where users need to purchase one or two 120mm fans in order to maximize its performance.

 

Thermolab includes two set of components for Baram installation; for Intel 775 and AMD AM2+/AM2. Base on the installation components, it looks like the installation process is not simple but let us go through later. Besides that hopefully Thermolab will release and include another socket bracket for Intel; LGA1366 or socket B which is the Intel latest socket.

 

Thermolab Baram

Heatpipe tower CPU cooler is not rare but dual 120mm fans heatpipe tower CPU cooler can be considered an extreme air CPU cooler that in the market at this moment; further than that will be water cooling. The dimension of Thermolab Baram is 160 x 132 x 67 mm and the height is something users need to take into consideration when choosing this cooler as most of the standard low end ATX cases will not able to support this cooler as Baram will block the case side panel to be closed due to its height. Thermolab Baram can support any CPU up to 250W thermal dissipation which is more than enough to support any desktop processor.

 

Here is the top view of Thermolab Baram and you may notice that Thermolab Baram fins are very different than other heatpipe tower CPU coolers. Basically why it is so unique for Thermolab Baram is due to the cooler consists of two different shape of aluminum fin; both of them are inserted in between each other. This is the optimum fin structure of Thermolab Baram in order to minimize air resistance intake. Besides that the fins pitch of Thermolab Baram is different than other coolers too as the fin gap is smaller in the center which is used to optimize for axial fan. Besides that the air tunnel is formed inside the stack heatsink fins to accelerate the airflow.

 

As Thermolab Baram can support dual 120mm fans; one for blowing and one for sucking hence both sides of the fin are symmetrical. In order to maximize the dual fans cooling performance of Thermolab Baram, it is advised to use the same model fans which have the same air flow else the incoming and outgoing airflows will not balanced. The fan can be mounted easily on the Thermolab Baram cooler by using the fan wire clip; each fan will require two clips.

 

As we mentioned before Thermolab Baram has total five heatpipes and it should perform better than other coolers as most of the high end heatpipe tower CPU coolers only come with four heatpipes. The heatpipes aren't aligned to each other in a row which is standard for heatpipe coolers and why Thermolab is doing this is to maximize the thermal distribution effects with its efficient heatpipes arrangement; some sort like Zig-zap arrangement.

 

Thermolab Baram is made by aluminum fins, copper heatpipes and aluminum base. The heatpipes of Thermolab Baram are not directed contact with the processor surface which is one of the latest ways to increase its thermal conduction efficiency but let us see whether Baram will still outperform those heatpipe coolers which has direct contact with the processor. The base finishing of Thermolab Baram is very excellent where it is as shine as a mirror.

 

Installation, Testing & Performance

 

As Thermolab Baram doesn't come with any fan, we have chosen two of our most powerful 120mm fans to pair with this giant cooler to see how far it can go. Gelid Solution's Wing will be the intake fan and Nanoxia FX12 will be the exhausting fan.

 

We choose to install the fans on the Thermolab Baram first before install it on the motherboard as Thermolab Baram is a giant cooler and it will be difficult to install the fans if the cooler is installed on the motherboard first; it may blocking with other peripherals like PSU, casing, memory and etc. The fan clips of Thermolab Baram aren't so tight so we are able to install the 120mm fans on it easily with pliers.

 

Here is the complete installation for Thermolab Baram with Gelid Wing and Nanoxia FX12. Thermolab Baram alone has around 625 grams and plus the two fans then the overall weight will be around 780 grams. Hence it is really important to install this cooler firmly on the motherboard to avoid it's falling down especially for those are placing their case in vertical orientation.

 

Before proceed with installation, right bracket must be selected as AMD and Intel platforms will have different installation components. After identify the right installation component, users need to install socket clip on the Baram cooler's base with four cooler fixing bolts which are used to secure the socket clip on the cooler firmly. After that users need to upside down the motherboard and secure the Baram cooler with the right backplate and four fixing bolts.

 

This is one of the most tedious cpu cooler installation process that we have ever seen and it will cause a big headache for newbie but it should be fine for a computer expert. However we will not recommend computer newbie to use this cooler until they are familiar and understand clearly what they are going to do, else it may just break the motherboard if it is not handled properly. Anyway we are still able to finish the whole installation process of Thermolab Baram around 30 minutes including uninstallation process of previous setup.

Test Bed

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E8300
Memory: 4GB 800MHz DDR2 Memory
Hard Drive: 250GB 7200RPM 8MB Seagate HDD
Graphic Card: OEM Nvidia GeForce 8800GT 512MB
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3
Optical Drive: 16x DVD RW
System BIOS: F7
Operating System: Microsoft Window XP SP2
Benchmark Software: Gigabyte Easy Tune 6
Ambient Temperature: 27 Degree Celsius

Here are the performance results of Thermolab Baram with other famous and popular heatpipe CPU coolers. With the results above, it is clearly stated that the performance of Thermolab Baram outperforms the rest of its competitors which is really amazing and fabulous. During idle load, the temperature of Thermolab Baram is only 27˚ which is same with the ambient temperature and 43˚ during the full load.

With dual powerful fans on Thermolab Baram, noise can't be eliminated and there is certain level of loud noise generated so it is advisable to have a fan speed controller on these fans if users choose to use a powerful fan on Thermolab Baram so that the noise can be reduced when the system is not running at full load. Besides that users also can choose to use other more silent fans or single fan so that users can balance between the performance and noise.

 

Conclusion

If you are looking for a top air cooler for your system then you should really take a look on this Baram dual 120mm fans Tower CPU cooler from Thermolab. For such air cooler, Thermolab Baram is almost reaching its limitation and most probably it will outperform some of the entry level of water cooling as well. Its good performance is mainly due to its unique designs such as efficient heatpipes arrangement, optimized fin structure & fin pitch, five copper heatpipes and so on. With its price of 52USD, it might be a bit expensive for a solo CPU cooler without any fan but for such good performance air cooler, it is definitely worth for it.

 

Pros:

* Excellent performance
* Support dual 120mm fans with simple installation
* Five copper heatpipes with its efficient arrangement
* Optimized fin structure & pitch
* Excellent base finishing

Cons:

* Installation could be further simplified
* Fan is not included
* Intel Socket 1366 is not yet released

 

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

 

Only registered users may post a comment.

Andy Goh	4.0 / 5	Sat 14 Mar 09
Ya... Where to find this baby? Kinda interested... Nice nice!

sin (Guest)	4.0 / 5	Mon 5 Jan 09
interesting but out of my budget

Administrator	5.0 / 5	Sun 4 Jan 09
good cooler but too huge for my htpc case

Lee (Guest)	5.0 / 5	Sun 4 Jan 09
very nice cooler? anyway to get this in Malaysia?