Thermolab ITX30 Review
Category : Aircooling
Published by Hiwa Pouri on 13.03.14
In the past the Korean company Thermolab has been able to surprise with high quality products, which were able to compete with the best in corresponding product categories. With the ITX30 the company has been working on a small cooler for mini ITX builds, like for instance HTPCs, and at a first glance this is a rather interesting little cooler, since it has been made entirely from copper.
Article in English |
Artikel in Deutsch |
Article en français |
Articolo in italiano |
Thermolab is one of the companies in the cooler market which is making a nice looking small factor form cooler for HTPC or Steam Box system for living rooms. Meanwhile there are two low-profile coolers and in this review we are testing the smaller one named the ITX30 with dimension of just 100(L) x 94(W) x 30(H)mm. This cooler is tiny and made out of pure copper, which is very rare these days considering that the copper is the best material for heat dissipation and also quite expensive.
|   
|
As noted earlier, both the base and the heatpipes on the Thermolab ITX30 are made of pure copper. It features two 6mm heatpipes which are not in direct contact with the CPU but have been routed through a copper base. In case of the Thermolab ITX30 you get a low-profile cooler that perfectly suits small-form-factor builds. The heatsink fins are made of copper also. The manufacturing quality is definitely high, which is a pleasant surprise considering that this is more of a budget cooler. A quick look at the base confirms that, since there is no perfect mirror finish. The bundled 80mm PWM fan is quite simple and will not stand out from a pile of standard OEM fans. The height of this cooler is 30mm including the 80mm fan which in total is 24mm less than Intel's stock cooler so we can be onehundred percent sure it fits in every case.
Specifications |
|
| Model | ITX30 |
| Type | Low-profile 80mm |
| Provided Fan(s) | 1x 80x10mm PWM |
| Supported Fan(s) | 1x 80mm |
| Base Material | Pure copper |
| Fins Material | Copper |
| Socket Support | Intel LGA 1150, 1155, 1156 |
| Thermal compound | Pre-Applied |
| Product Page | Thermolab ITX30 |
Like the cooler, bundle and the box are also quite simple. It is made out of solid cardboard and although the cooler inside is only protected by a bubble wrap our sample arrived without a single dent or any damage whatsoever. The bundled fan is attached to the heatsink while the rest of the mounting components are placed in a separate plastic bag. The bundle includes an installation manual, four screws, four transparent plastic washers, two fan clips, an 80mm fan and the heatsink itself which comes with pre-applied thermal compound.
| Page 1 - Presentation / Specifications |
| Page 2 - Photo Gallery |
| Page 3 - Installation & Test Setup |
| Page 4 - Absolute Performance |
| Page 5 - PWM Performance |
| Page 6 - Conclusion |
Photo Gallery
| Page 1 - Presentation / Specifications |
| Page 2 - Photo Gallery |
| Page 3 - Installation & Test Setup |
| Page 4 - Absolute Performance |
| Page 5 - PWM Performance |
| Page 6 - Conclusion |
Installation
| 
|
Installation of the Thermolab ITX30 is simple and easy since the bracket is pre-mounted so you just need to fix the bracket on top of the motherboard and mount it with the four screws which are included in the bundle. The entire process takes less than two minutes. The thermal compound is pre-applied so there is not more of it in case you decide to clean the cooler at some point in time. The overall pressure on the CPU is quite good for a low-profile cooler and you also get an Intel LGA 1150/1155/1156 mounting kit but there is no compatiblity with any AMD sockets.
Since the Thermolab ITX30 is an overall rather small cooler there will no compatibility issues with memory that features large heatspreaders. We mounted and tested the cooler with standard ATX and ITX motherboards.
Test Setup |
|
| Mainboard | ASUS Z87-Deluxe (BIOS 1602) |
| CPU | Intel Core i7-4770K Stock (Turbo On / HT On) |
| Memory | ADATA XPG V2 2x4GB DDR3-2800 CL12 1.65V |
| Video | Intel HD Graphics 4600 |
| Software |
Windows 7 x64 wPrime Benchmark v2.10 CPUID HWMonitor 1.24.0 |
| PSU | Seasonic Platinum SS-660XP2 |
| Fan Controller | Lamptron FC5 V3 |
| Thermal Compound | Pre-applied |
| Page 1 - Presentation / Specifications |
| Page 2 - Photo Gallery |
| Page 3 - Installation & Test Setup |
| Page 4 - Absolute Performance |
| Page 5 - PWM Performance |
| Page 6 - Conclusion |
Absolute Performance
Temperatures
| 7V | Idle | Load |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 32 °C | 51 °C |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 33 °C | 53 °C |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 34 °C | 57 °C |
| Raijintek Pallas | 37 °C | 59 °C |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 36 °C | 60 °C |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 36 °C | 61 °C |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 35 °C | 63 °C |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 38 °C | 75 °C |
| Intel Stock | 39 °C | 83 °C |
To measure cooling capacity we took temperatures in idle and load with the fans at 7 and 12 V. The idle temperature represents the lowest temperature hit by the processor package after 10 minutes in idle. The load temperature is the highest temperature hit by the processor package after one pass of wPrime v2.10. The wPrime test takes 4 minutes and puts load on all 8 threads. Room temperature is 25°C.
| 12V | Idle | Load |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 32 °C | 51 °C |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 33 °C | 51 °C |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 33 °C | 53 °C |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 34 °C | 55 °C |
| Raijintek Pallas | 36 °C | 56 °C |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 34 °C | 57 °C |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 36 °C | 58 °C |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 36 °C | 69 °C |
| Intel Stock | 35 °C | 70 °C |
Fan Speeds
| 7 Volt | 12 Volt | |
| Raijintek Pallas | 960 rpm | 1'440 rpm |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 900 rpm | 1'500 rpm |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 900 rpm | 1'500 rpm |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 660 rpm | 1'530 rpm |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 600 rpm | 1'740 rpm |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 1'200 rpm | 1'980 rpm |
| Intel Stock | 1'260 rpm | 2'040 rpm |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 1'580 rpm | 2'400 rpm |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 1'620 rpm | 2'580 rpm |
Fan speeds (RPM) at 7 and 12 V.
Noise Levels
| 7 Volt | 12 Volt | |
| Intel Stock | 33.3 dBA | 37.1 dBA |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 32.3 dBA | 37.4 dBA |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 33.4 dBA | 38.9 dBA |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 32.3 dBA | 38.4 dBA |
| Raijintek Pallas | 34.7 dBA | 39.3 dBA |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 34.2 dBA | 39.5 dBA |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 33.4 dBA | 39.6 dBA |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 33.0 dBA | 40.3 dBA |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 34.5 dBA | 41.7 dBA |
Decibel meter (Voltcraft SL-200) has been placed 1 meter away from the cooler. Measurements are conducted in a quiet room, where there are no other noise source. 32 dBA is the lowest we can get in our room. Also here the measurements are conducted at 7 and 12 V.
| Page 1 - Presentation / Specifications |
| Page 2 - Photo Gallery |
| Page 3 - Installation & Test Setup |
| Page 4 - Absolute Performance |
| Page 5 - PWM Performance |
| Page 6 - Conclusion |
PWM Performance
Temperatures
| Idle | Load | |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 33 °C | 55 °C |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 35 °C | 55 °C |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 34 °C | 57 °C |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 36 °C | 57 °C |
| Raijintek Pallas | 37 °C | 58 °C |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 35 °C | 59 °C |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 36 °C | 60 °C |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 39 °C | 70 °C |
| Intel Stock | 39 °C | 75 °C |
At this point we plugged the fan(s) to the motherboard CPU fan header and let the motherboard take care of fan speeds. In other words the motherboard will adjust the fan speed via PWM signal according to CPU temperature. The idle temperature is the lowest temperature hit by the processor package after 10 minutes idle. The load temperature is the highest temperature hit by the processor package after one pass of wPrime v2.10. The wPrime test takes 4 minutes puts load on all 8 threads. Room temperature is 25°C.
Fan Speeds
| Idle | Load | |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 380 rpm | 687 rpm |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 450 rpm | 740 rpm |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 471 rpm | 770 rpm |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 800 rpm | 969 rpm |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 765 rpm | 1'077 rpm |
| Raijintek Pallas | 952 rpm | 1'170 rpm |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 950 rpm | 1'465 rpm |
| Intel Stock | 1'230 rpm | 1'630 rpm |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 1'475 rpm | 2'253 rpm |
Values are in RPM, we took the lowest speed hit by the fan(s) in idle and the highest under load.
Noise Levels
| Idle | Load | |
| Noctua NH-U12S Single Fan | 32.0 dBA | 32.0 dBA |
| Noctua NH-U12S Dual Fan | 32.0 dBA | 32.4 dBA |
| Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure | 32.0 dBA | 32.7 dBA |
| Corsair H75 Single Fan | 32.2 dBA | 33.2 dBA |
| Cooler Master Hyper 103 | 32.0 dBA | 33.6 dBA |
| Prolimatech Lynx | 33.3 dBA | 33.9 dBA |
| Thermolab ITX30 | 34.1 dBA | 37.6 dBA |
| Intel Stock | 33.3 dBA | 34.4 dBA |
| Raijintek Pallas | 35.9 dBA | 41.4 dBA |
Decibel meter (Voltcraft SL-200) has been placed 1 meter away from the cooler. Measurements are conducted in a quiet room, where there are no other noise source. 32 dBA is the lowest we can get in our room. Also here the measurements are conducted at lowest and highest fan speeds in idle and under load respectively.
| Page 1 - Presentation / Specifications |
| Page 2 - Photo Gallery |
| Page 3 - Installation & Test Setup |
| Page 4 - Absolute Performance |
| Page 5 - PWM Performance |
| Page 6 - Conclusion |
Conclusion
| General | + | - | |
| Overall the Thermolab ITX30 is a very pleasant surprise. The cooler comes with an impressive level of manufacturing quality and also good performance for such a tiny cooler. This is definitely one of the smallest ITX cooler we have had for review and certainly liked the simplicity and manufacturing quality. Overall performance is good and noise levels are decent as well. They could be a little bit lower but as we said, for its size, you get great cooling performance. The cooler is bundled with a slim 80mm, 10mm tall, PWM fan, which is a little noisy at 12 Volt. Apart from that, we also did not like the lack of AMD compatibility. |
- Low Profile Cooler Performance
- Quality - PWM |
- Socket compatibility | |
| Installation | + | - | |
| Mounting is quite easy and practical. It is even easier than mounting the Intel stock cooler, as the bracket is pre-mounted, the mounting mechanism parts are solid and thermal paste is pre-applied, so it is practically ready to mount right out of the box. |
- Basic mounting easy and practical
|
- Not compatible to AMD sockets | |
| Performance | + | - | |
| Cooling performance of the Thermolab ITX30 is definitely good for its size as this is, after all, a 30mm tall cooler. It does a way better job than a lot of coolers we have seen in the past. Thermolab made a pure copper cooler witch is very rare and all parts are built according to high standards. When compared to the rest of the coolers we have tested so far, it even does a better job than some more expensive low-profile solutions. So far, Thermolab's ITX30 is one of the best performing low-profile coolers we've had on test in our lab. | - Cooling performances | ||
| Noise Levels | + | - | |
| The overall noise levels are good and the Thermolab ITX30 is silent, except at 12V. Luckily this cooler is powerful enough to keep an HTPC or Steam Box system, which are usually not above 50W, at adequate temperatures. It can do a great job even when the fan is set to work at 7V, meaning noise level will not be an issue. | - Noise Level at 7V | - Noise Level at 12V | |
| Recommendation / Price | + | - | |
| We can definitely recommend this cooler as it is a very good alternative to stock and entry-level coolers. The Thermolab ITX30 is a high quality cooler, but we could not find any price on Geizhals.eu. The only place we found it in stock, is on Ebay, where it is priced at 49 USD, which is quite a bit too much for this type of cooler but still in line with the level of quality. Hopefully, some retail/e-tail stores in Europe will get it soon so we will definitely keep an eye on it. |
- Price
- HTPC - Mini-ITX Gaming |
||
| Rating | |||
| We gave the ITX30 from Thermolab 4 out of 5 stars. | |||
| Page 1 - Presentation / Specifications |
| Page 2 - Photo Gallery |
| Page 3 - Installation & Test Setup |
| Page 4 - Absolute Performance |
| Page 5 - PWM Performance |
| Page 6 - Conclusion |