AnandTech: Enzotech Ultra-X: If Looks Could Chill

Conclusion

It would have been great to see the Enzotech Ultra-X top our cooling test results. This is not because we have a bias in favor of Enzotech, but because a cooler as beautifully finished as the Ultra-X deserves recognition. Unfortunately the best we can say about the Enzotech is that it is the best of the down-facing coolers by a small margin in overclocking, which is a notch below the top-performing heatpipe towers. This is certainly not bad performance, but it is not the best we have tested at AnandTech.

Nothing we have measured in this review of the Enzotech Ultra-X has changed our opinion of the influence of air cooler design on cooler performance. The heatpipe towers with side-facing fans are the top-performing coolers we have tested, in both overclocking ability and cooling efficiency. The best designs with down-facing fans perform in a second tier category just below the top heatpipe towers. The Enzotech Ultra-X performs in that category. That means the top of the air cooler list is still the domain of the Thermalrights, Tuniq Tower 120, and a few push-pull configured towers.

This makes the Ultra-X a beautifully built gem of a cooler with solid engineering of the installation kits for Intel 775 and AMD. The Enzotech is relatively easy to install, but you will have to remove the motherboard to install the Ultra-X. Like many other top coolers the Enzotech Ultra-X is heavy at 835g, but the installation is solid on every motherboard we tried. This is a cooler that attaches to the board securely enough that you won't worry about the cooler falling off when you least expect it. Ultra-X is still a big cooler and you will need to take precautions when moving your system, but the install is solid.

The fan choice for the Ultra-X, however, is not a particularly good selection. It is very noisy at highest speed, where it is most effective at cooling. At lowest speed it is reasonably quiet, but the output borders on anemic. Look back through our reviews of coolers and choose a fan that better balances air output and noise. Fortunately almost any 25mm thick 120mm fan can be mounted on the Ultra-X (though that's an additional cost to an already pricey cooler). Another plus is that the included rheostat for varying fan speed will work on almost any fan with a 3-pin connector, and that means it can be used with almost any 120mm fan.

We really appreciate the obvious quality that went into the manufacturing of the Enzotech Ultra X. The mirror finish mounting base is a very satisfying sight compared to the rough, poorly-machined surfaces seen on far too many coolers today. However, it is hard to argue for mirror-finishes and thoughtful well-engineered installations when you can't find any performance improvements. In the end the Ultra-X still suffers from the same shortfalls as other down-facing coolers, and its cooling efficiency is not even as good as a few of the better down-facers. Overclocking fares a bit better, but then we have a noisy obtrusive fan. If you admire quality production you will like the Ultra-X, but the performance and noise levels still leave a lot to be desired. This is particularly true when you factor in that the Enzotech Ultra-X is one of the more expensive air coolers we have tested. There are better values available in the air cooling market.