Thermaltake DuOrb VGA Cooler

The DuOrb unit is fitted with the mounting hardware specific to your card and mounted to the PCB.  Four mainboard lugs function as nuts on the reverse side of the card holding the assembly snuggly in place.  No problems at all with our installation.

  

Under power, each of the 80mm fans glow with a soft blue that provides a nice effect. 

Performance

It is a no brainer that the Thermaltake DuOrb will completely blow a NVidia reference sink away, performance wise.  That's why we thought it best to toss in one of the more popular VGA coolers on the market today, the Zalman VF900.  All three apps were put under pressure by taking temperature readings after playing a set level of STALKER to get the GPU's temperatures up.  A temperature reading was taken after each of five identical passes per cooler with the highest and lowest results being thrown out.  The remaining three were averaged and then graphed below.  ThermalRight Chill Factor Thermal Paste was used as our interface material in all tests.  Ambient room temperature was a balmy 26 degrees Celsius.

Now this was a surprise.  I expected the Zalman VF900 and the Tt DuOrb to perform about on par with one another.  Five degrees Celsius difference at this level is huge!  So much so that I went back and double checked the Zalman's mounting to ensure all was perfectly flush and mounted properly.  It was.  If the five degrees Celsius doesn't get your attention then the 27 degrees Celsius difference under load between the OEM cooler and the Thermaltake should leave you gaping speechless.  Wow!!

Conclusion

The Thermaltake DuOrb has an eye catching design that would be lost on any enthusiast.  The soft blue glow was a nice effect with just the right amount of subtleness in any LAN box.  Speaking of subtleness, the two 80mm fans spin at 2500 RPM.  Surprisingly, fan noise was at a minimum.  I actually couldn't hear the fan's operation over other components in my case.  Very nice. 

The real beauty though is performance.  Here is a prime example of what you get for your upgrade dollar.  Under load the DuOrb brings you a 27 degree reduction of load temperatures from the OEM reference design cooler.  As if that wasn't enough, it also beats out the arguable VGA cooling king, the Zalman VF900 by a full five degrees Celsius.  Provided the price is right (I would guess $50) when the Tt DuOrb hits the market, this cooler represents a must have piece of hardware for anyone looking to boost their VGA cooling performance.

Pros

• Fantastic looks

• Stellar performance

• Quiet operation

• Copper construction

• Dual fans

• Included RAM sinks

• Near universal application

Cons

• Price and availability unknown at present

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