Methodology
A Ryzen 5 3600 has to be cooled at factory settings, in addition 16GB Crucial Ballistix Sport (2x8GB) DDR4 memory on a MSI B550 Tomahawk (BIOS 7C91vA3). The Asus ROG Strix GTX 1060 6GB is running in zero-fan mode for the CPU stress tests only for the image output, and a BitFenix Whisper M 450W serves as the power source, all housed in the Thermaltake Core P3 as an open benchtable.
All records are logged with HWInfo64 v6.30-4240 – 2000ms logging, the specified temperature is derived from the sensor CPU Die (Average). The load of Prime95 produces an average of 88 watts of CPU package power. Since I don’t have air conditioning, the values in the graphs are the delta between room temperature and CPU temperature. This allows all cooling systems to be compared fairly, even if the ambient temperature is different. The thermal paste supplied with the cooler or pre-applied is used in each case.
I determine the sound level with a Voltcraft SL-200 meter at a distance of 40cm, which works in 125ms cycles in Lo mode.
The room was measured at 33.2 dBA, an external sample table helps with the breakdown.
Benchmarks
When I evaluated the results, the temperatures were higher than I expected. But even a completely new test run with MX-4 thermal paste needs almost identical values. So without further ado I pulled out the Scythe Mugen 5 ARGB Plus, which apart from cosmetic differences has exactly the same heatsink – just unpainted. And lo and behold, better results can be achieved with Black Edition thermal paste and fan. So the only possible cause left was a defective test copy or the paint actually impedes the cooling performance.
As usual, here are the results as a graph:
1 fan |
30% PWM |
60% PWM |
100% PWM |
Fan speed |
567 RPM |
1059 RPM |
1517 RPM |
Sound level / characteristic |
33.5 dB |
35.6 d |
42.7 d |
Ambient temperature |
21,5 – 22,7°C |
23,0 – 23,4 |
22,9 – 22,7°C |
And the comparison to other coolers:
The fact that you have to admit defeat here against smaller and cheaper air coolers, partly from your own range, should raise concerns. A second test sample gave nearly identical results with under 1.25°C variance, so it really does seem to be the paint job.
Below the direct comparison between the painted and normal version with the same tube of thermal paste and fan, I have calculated the percentage difference:
Summary and conclusion
On the US side they still brag big with the sentence “The special materials used have no influence on heat conduction and radiation ensuring the heatsink has consistent performance as the original version”, which I could clearly refute here in my tests. According to the description, electrophoretic deposition is used, also known as dip coating.
Apparently, not only in marketing one applies too thickly, because on average 10% worse cooling performance only for a black cooler are not justifiable. In the end, that’s only a few °C more on the CPU, but you should still consider very well whether the Black RGB Edition would not be the better choice for a few euros less with the illumination turned off. Too bad Scythe, that was a shot in the oven!
But the very rare situation that a cooler is produced in different variants gives us an interesting insight. And to me the question is, what about other manufacturers of black coolers?
The test samples are purchased by ourselves or provided by the manufacturers without obligation. There is no influence on the tests and results. An expense allowance is only paid in exceptional cases, but is shown and also has no influence on the test results.
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