With the Dark Knight S1283 Xigmatek presents a towercooler which should have an enormeous cooling potential. Three heatpipes with eight millimeters in diameter are directly built into the ground plate through the "Direct Touch" process. You'll also find a big and silent 120 mm fan to transfer the heat to the environment. Special about the Dark Knight is its very good looking black design. The still young company XIGMATEK which was founded in 2005 is focussed on manufacturing producs for the "IT thermal industry". What they actually produce are for example affordable coolers which can cope with the best on the market.
On the following pages you'll have the opportunity to read what Xigmateks Dark Knight S1283 is capable of.
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Specifications and included in delivery
Specifications
| Model | Dark Knight S1283 |
| Material | Aluminium |
| Dimension (WxDxH) | 120x50x159 mm |
| Cooling area | ca. 3100 cm2 |
| Fan dimensions | 120 x 25 mm |
| RPM | 1000 - 2200 RPM +/-10% |
| Acoustic pressure | < 30dB +/-10% |
| Connector | 4-Pin |
| Power consumption | 3.72 Watt |
| Flow rate | 89.5 CFM |
| Weight | 600g |
Included in delivery
- CPU cooler
- Mounting kit for Socket AM2, 939, 940, 745 and 775
- 120 mm fan with anti vibration mounting kit
- Mounting components
- Thermal grease
- Manual multilingual
Xigmateks Dark Knight comes well protected from outside influeces so that the fins wont be damaged.
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Construction and design
Construction
The Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 consists of aluminium and copper. Three massive heatpipes are the basis and establish direct contact to the CPU. Furthermore the 54 fins are cooled via a 120 mm fan. Compared to the Achilles S1284C the provided cooling area is a bit smaller.
The four massive, black, nickel coated heatpipes immediately catch the beholders view. On the ground plate those are planed to establish direct contact with the CPU. Xigmatek calls this manufacturing process H.D.T. (Heatpipe Direct Touch).
As you can see on the image above there are small gaps between the Heatpipes and the cooler ground plate. At the this point we would wish and appreciate an also perfect manufacturing process.
Design
The looks of Xigmateks Dark Knight is breathtaking. The fins got a simple but effectiv shape and especially their black finish looks very nice and is a real eye-cather!
The 120 mm fan got transparent dark grey rotor blades which are illuminated by four white LEDs. Xigmatek creates a great optical impact. If you drive the fan with 12 volts it is loud.
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Mounting
If you want to mount your cooler on a Socket 775 motherboard you get a backplate with which you can bolt the cooler. On a Socket AM2 or 939 Xigmatek provides you with a clip. For the 120 mm fan you'll find five rubber plugs in order you'll lose one.
If you bolt the Dark Knight to the mainboard via the backplate it will be mounted rock solidly. If you use the clip on a socket AM2 or 939 the motherboard can be bent a little.
On a Socket 775 motherboard you can mount the cooler in every single direction. Because of its sheer size you might encounter compatibility issues with some mainboards.
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Testsystem and testroutine
Testsystem
| Mainboard | Gigabyte X48-DS5 |
| Processor | Intel Core 2 Quad QX6800 |
| Memory | Kingston KHX 8500 D2K2 DDR2 |
| Hard disk | Maxtor 160 GByte |
| Power supply | OCZ 520 Watt |
| Thermal grease | Arctic Silver 5 |
Testroutine
In our tables we mention absolute temperatures as well as the temperature difference between CPU core and environment temperature. We further provide subjective information about the noise level of the fan the cooler comes with.
The noise level we classify as follows: very silent, silent, audible, noisy and very noisy.
The CPU temperature we evaluate with Real Temp and with Prime95 we reach a 100% CPU load.
Futher we test the different fans with different voltages and under different conditions. After one hour warm-up we perform three test runs where every single one takes one hour:
- Standard clock 12 volts load
- Standard clock 6 volts load
- Overclocking 12 volts load
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Results standard clock (2.93 GHz) 12 volts
| Ranking | Cooler / fan | Temp. diff. load | Absolute temp. | RPM | Noise | Review link |
| 1. | Xigmatek Achilles S1284C | 47 K | 68 °C | 1550 | silent | Xigmatek Achilles S1284C |
| 2. | Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 | 51 K | 74 °C | 2120 | very noisy | Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 |
| 3. | Zerotherm BTF-90 | 59 K | 80 °C | 2100 | noisy | |
| 4. | Xigmatek Apache EP-CD901 | >80 K (crash) | >100 °C (crash) | 2570 | noisy, hum | Xigmatek Apache EP-CD901 |
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Results standard clock 6 volts
| Ranking | Cooler / fan | Temp. diff. load | Absolute temp. | RPM | Noise | Review link |
| 1. | Xigmatek Achilles S1284C | 55 K | 76 °C | 1000 | silent | Xigmatek Achilles S1284C |
| 2. | Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 | 61 K | 85 °C | 970 | silent | Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 |
| 3. | Zerotherm BTF-90 | 65 K | 85 °C | 1530 | audible | |
| 4. | Xigmatek Apache EP-CD901 | >80 K (crash) | >100 °C (crash) | 1540 | audible | Xigmatek Apache EP-CD901 |
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Results overclocking (3,66 GHz) 12 volts
| Ranking | Cooler / fan | Temp. diff. load | Absolute temp. | RPM | Noise | Review link |
| 1. | Xigmatek Achilles S1284C | 56 K | 77 °C | 1550 | silent | Xigmatek Achilles S1284C |
| 2. | Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 | 56 K | 80 °C | 2100 | very noisy | Xigmatek Dark Knight S1283 |
| 3. | Zerotherm BTF-90 | 64 K | 85 °C | 2100 | noisy | |
| 4. | Xigmatek Apache EP-CD901 | >80 K (crash) | >100 °C (crash) | 2570 | noisy | Xigmatek Apache EP-CD901 |
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Conclusion
With the Dark Knight S1283 Xigmatek
present an overall good product which is aimed at overclockers as well
as PC enthusiasts
With its nice black looks, the decent
design and the good performance the Dark Knigh S1283 knows to convince.
Further the cooler can be mounted easily using a backplate or a clip
for AM2/939 Systems.
The only drawback is the fan. If you drive it with 12
volts it is very noisy and with 6 Volts the delivered performance is
not completely sufficient. At 12 volts also overclocking our CPU to
3.66 GHz wasn't a problem.
You can buy the Xigmatek Dark Knight HDT-S1283 for CHF 74.- at Digitec.ch.
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Author: i.gigier@ocaholic.ch Revised by: m.buechel@ocaholic.ch