Performance

Test system:
Note:
Room temperature is maintained at 20°C (68°F). Since you need EIST enabled to make use of the Turbo Boost feature with this generation of Intel Core processors, letting the machine fall back to the idle state is becoming a norm. Hence Idle (stock) refers to the machine running at 1.60 GHz (12x 133 MHz), with vCore at 0.928 V. Idle (nominal) refers to the machine idling at the processor's nominal clock speed of 3.06 GHz (23x 133 MHz), with EIST and C1E disabled.

Load (stock) refers to the CPU running four threads of Prime95's "In-place large FFTs" stress test for 15 minutes, with default BClk value of 133 MHz, with EIST, C1E, and Turbo Boost enabled. Turbo Boost bumps the clock speed of all four cores by 133 MHz, taking it up to 3.20 GHz (24x 133 MHz).

Load (OC) refers to the CPU running four threads of Prime95's "In-place large FFTs" stress test for 15 minutes, with overclocked BClk value of 166 MHz (4.00 GHz, 1.38V). We chose 4.00 GHz as it's stable on just about any cooler, while giving us close to 1.4 V of vCore to test load on. Later in the review, we'll let the cooler run wild by testing the maximum stable OC achievable.

The fan is set to run at 100% speed (i.e. no motherboard-based fan-speed control was in place).

Temperatures have been taken via RealTemp.


With huge architectural improvements, processor manufacturers have made their chips adequately fast in idle clock states to run most applications without any noticeable performance drop. Whenever the CPU isn't keeping up, it jumps to higher clock speeds, and if even that isn't enough, technologies like Turbo Boost kick in, pushing the clock speed up further.

Zaward Vapor 120 sports an innovative fan blade design that uses golf-ball dimples to step up air-flow per RPM. Idle Stock continues to be a jam-packed area, with the Vapor 120 performing on-par with the Akasa Venom, though anything in the 30's should be comfortable. Idling at the CPU's nominal speeds, the Vapor 120 begins to rift away from the other, much larger contenders, but still being better than Intel Stock HSF, until...


...Blam! The rift widens, showing that despite its diminutive stature, the Vapor 120 keeps the CPU significantly cooler than Intel's cooler, and hence you should consider replacing it with the Vapor. With the overclocked speeds applied, Vapor 120 begins to catch up with larger coolers such as the Akasa Venom. If that wasn't surprising enough, wait till you see the noise levels.

Fan Noise

When I first got bombarded with terms such as "golf-ball dimples", "turbulence", "increased air-flow"; and the fact that the fan design, along with the heatsink fin design, was going to try to compensate the heatsink's overall lower metal content, I held onto the idea that this was going to be a noisy fan, until I gave it a spin. This is a very, very quiet fan when you leave speed control to the motherboard. The fan should typically blend into the ambient noise, so should its pitch.

It's when you pump in all the power you can, that Vapor 120's fan begins to get loud, but definitely not louder than some of the other higher-end CPUs we've tested so far. It doesn't have an unpleasant pitch like the Intel HSF, either. I'm impressed with the acoustics.