be quiet Dark Rock TF Top Flow Review

Introduction and Technical Specification

Introduction

In a market increasingly dominated by AIOs, it's nice to take see that there's still a place for a good old fashioned traditional tower CPU cooler in all its heatpipey glory. We say traditional, but if you haven't noticed already, the "TF" nomenclature actually identifies the latest offering from be quiet as being a Top Flow cooler, meaning of course that the fans are mounted so as to direct air not just through the fin stack, but also down onto the motherboard, something that's never a bad thing. With a TDP of some 220W all indicators point to the TF having some mean CPU cooling credentials. Looking at it though we can't help but think there's an awful lot of fan and not a lot of actual heatsink. It'll be interesting to see how the TF fares when it hits our famous Torture Tests.

Technical Specification

Intel 775,115x, 2011(-3) AMD AM2, AM2+, AM3, AM3+ FM2, FM2+ Dimensions 162.6X140X130.8mm (LxWxH) Weight 0.81kg Base Material Nickel coated copper Fins Top 62, Bottom 64* Heat-pipes 6x6mm Fans 2x135mm Silent Wings Fan Speed 1400rpm Fan Noise 26.7dB(A) Air Flow 67.8cfm Air Pressure 1.85mmH2O

* be quiet's information states Top fin stack has 62 elements and bottom has 64. When we counted we found top has 62 excluding the cover plate, but the bottom bank only has 31 fin elements. That's right guys, we don't just take the manufacturers word for it.

1 - Introduction and Technical Specification 2 - Up Close: Packaging and Contents 3 - Up close: The Cooler 4 - Up Close: Assembled with fans 5 - The Build 6 - Performance and Testing 7 - Conclusion «Prev 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next»

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