Acoustic Samples: Listen to this Heatsink!

The little CCK-6012 doesn't make a lot of noise, and even if it did, in its intended operating environment you wouldn't notice the noise. servers are notoriously noisy. For those of you thinking about sticking the CCK-6012 in something else other than a 1U server we offer this small sampling of fan noise. To listen to the CCK-6012 simply click on the little pair of headphones and download the MP3 recording.

FrostyTech Acoustic Sampling Chamber
Standard Waveform view of a 10 second recording. Click on the headphones to listen to an MP3 recording of this heatsink in operation.

Sound Level Measurements:

Listening to the actual noise a heatsink makes allows you to hear what pure numbers alone cannot get across. To further emphasize FrostyTech's reliance on cold hard facts when evaluating a heatsink, we also take Decibel readings with a sound level meter. These results may be higher than the manufacturer's listed specs, but then again these are real world measurements.

FrostyTech Sound Level Results
-	Manufacturer	Model	Noise Level	Scale
				quiet
	Vantec	CCK6012	49.5 dB
				louder

Anything under 55 dB is pretty decent, and at 49.5 dB the Vantec CCK-6012 is pretty darn quiet as you might imagine.

Synthetic Temperature Test Results: *Ranked according to 100W small interface die test results.

1U - FrostyTech Synthetic Temperature Test Platform Results
	Mfg.	Model	Ambient Temp.	27mm large copper block	15mm small copper block		27mm large copper block	15mm small copper block	Thermal pad	No. Fans	Fan Noise	Clip force
				50W	50W		100W	100W
1	Arkua	6149	23.2	50.9	53.1		81.2	81.4	silver	1	low	med
2	Dynatron	DC1206BMR	23.8	51.0	56.5		80.6	86.8	silver	1	med	stiff
3	Spire	5R057B1M3R	23.0	44.9	69.7		66.4	89.7	silver	1	med	easy
4	Vantec	CCK6012	23.5	58.4	60.7		91.7	96.5	ceramic	1	low	stiff
5	Alpha	Pal153	21.9	60.4	62.4		97.4	104.3	silver	1	low	easy
6	Thermaltake	DTFCF014-1	26.0	60.0	69.6		94.2	108.4	ceramic	1	low	easy
7	Thermaltake	TFCFR06	24.9	67.1	71.3		106.1	112.1	ceramic	1	low	med
8	Vantec	FCE-6010	25.6	70.7	72.4		111.3	116.9	silver	1	low	stiff
				50W	50W		100W	100W

Even with all the copper under foot, the CCK-6012 doesn't quite place at the top of reference 1U heatsinks, but it does show some pretty decent thermal results relatively speaking. The 100W small interface die test is particularly devastating for 1U heatsinks (the really bad ones start to melt when the temp reaches 120 degrees Celsius). What is nice to see is that Vantec have improved over their first attempt, the FCE-6010, which proved to be one of the poorest performing 1U heatsinks we've tested.

Let's have a look at the rise above ambient temperature results and see how things fair under those results.

1U - Rise Above Ambient Temp. (c)
	Mfg.	Model	27mm large copper block	15mm small copper block		27mm large copper block	15mm small copper block
			50W	50W		100W	100W
1	Arkua	6149	27.7	30.0		58.0	58.2
2	Dynatron	DC1206BMR	27.2	52.7		56.8	63.0
3	Spire	5R057B1M3R	21.9	46.7		43.4	66.7
4	Vantec	CCK6012	34.9	37.2		68.2	73.0
5	Alpha	Pal153	38.6	40.5		75.5	82.4
6	Thermaltake	DTFCF014-1	34.0	43.6		68.2	82.4
7	Thermaltake	TFCR06	42.2	46.4		81.2	87.2
8	Vantec	FCE-6010	45.1	46.8		85.7	91.3
			50W	50W		100W	100W

These results peg the Vantec CCK-6012 at a performance level just a bit above the Alpha PAL153, but since that heatsink was tested with a different kind of thermal compound at the time the results may be a bit skewed. With a rise above ambient temperature of 73.0 degrees, the CCK-6012 is good stable performer for the type of 1U tests we can conduct.

In an enclosed case with additional cross ventilation it would really depend on the orientation of the heatsink as to weather it would see improved cooling benefits or not. Bottom line, the Vantec CCK-6012 is a big improvement over the lack luster FCE-6010 heatsink, and with all that copper I can't help but think of a few other applications for it besides cooling server processors in tight environments.