So what is a heatpipe, since we are going to be discussing
one here in just a minute perhaps we should find out exactly what they are
and how they work. Basically a heatpipe is a hollow cylinder filled with a vaporizable liquid.
The heatpipe tube itself has two completely different ends to it, one is the
condenser and the other is the Evaporator Once the evaporator become
hot enough that the fluid turns from a liquid to a gas the will gravitate to
condenser end where it changes back into a liquid after it has a chance to
cool and then it is wicked back to the Evaporator section to start the
process all over again.
Looking from the top down on the Big Typhoon VX you can
see that Thermaltake has covered the 120mm fan with very nice Thermaltake
fan grill which adds an extra touch of class to an already sexy looking
heatsink.
We have included this picture so you could see curved cut
fins on the heatsink, these have been cut purposely this way to help reduce
wind sheer noise create as the air is pushed through the fins by the 120mm fan.
I was kind of surprised to see the speed adjustment mounted on the heatsink
itself after having seen so many other Thermaltake fans that came with speed
controllers that were mounted in an I/O cover. It just seemed that
would have been a better place to put the adjustment setting so you didn't
have to make the adjust with the side of your case off.
Using this
adjustment you can vary the speed of the 120mm fan from a low setting of
1300 RPM which produces 13 dba of noise or you can turn it up to a maximum
setting of 2000 RPM which produces 24dba of noise.
Give Thermaltake credit for not using a plain compression type fit for their
attachment point for the 6mm heatpipes, if you look closely at the picture you
can see that the top alignment plate may be bolted to base of the heatsink,
but the heatpipes are soldered directly to the base.
The alignment
plate is really very simple but does the job it is designed for. the
mounting bracket simply rests in between the two upright legs of the
bracket.
Remember I said earlier that the Big Typhoon VX was
composed of a pair of heatsinks, in this picture you can actually see the
pair heatsink, each of the heatsinks has 71 fins per side with three 6mm
heatpipes running through them.
The base of the Big Typhoon was not a mirror finish but
it was smooth and had no scratches or marks that would cause any kind of
problems when we get ready to install it onto our motherboard.
