This is the heatsink that Intel currently supplies with this year's CPUs, including those in the E2000, E4000, E7000, E8000 and quad-core Q9000 ranges.

At first glance, the manufacturer's efforts to reduce costs by cutting things down to the smallest possible size are obvious: compared to some of the other heatsinks we've tested, this one is truly tiny.

It measures 80 mm across but is only 15 mm--less than one inch--deep.

Cover Your Ears!

After a spin in our labs, our verdict about this processor is loud and clear: it's just too noisy!

It's all well and good saying that this is an Intel heatsink designed to cool those specific processors that it's shipped with--which it just about manages--but we'd prefer it to make a slightly quieter job of it.

Because it's so tiny, the fan has to turn incredibly quickly to keep the processor at  anywhere near a normal temperature, and when it's not under much stress, it has a tendency to accelerate or decelerate every ten second or so which quickly becomes annoying.

Of course, this effect will probably be less noticeable if you've got an otherwise well-ventilated PC--but it got on our nerves when we were running our test computer with the case wide open.


When it comes to pushing the CPU harder--encoding video, for instance, or playing games--the fan quickly accelerates to rattle along at its noisy top speed.

Despite this, the processor doesn't remain particularly cool.