The FCE6030D uses a high aspect ratio fin design. What that refers to is the ratio of fin thickness to that of its height. The thinner and more closely packed the fins are, the more difficult it can be to extrude a long fin.

These fins have a ratio of about 20:1 (~1mm thick, 20mm high). It is also important to note that only the slimmest amount of material has be removed directly above where the CPU core mounts. We've never been much of a fan of heatsink with huge saw cuts directly down the center plain of the heatsink. The whole point of cutting that much material away from the hottest region just doesn't seem to make much thermal sense.

The Vantec's thermal performance was tested on our very own Frosty Synthetic Temperature Test platform. The results were compared with those of several other performance-class heatsinks.

FrostyTech Synthetic Temperature Test Platform:

The FrostyTech Synthetic Temperature Test Platform consists of an aluminum block heated by a 120V 250 Ohm precision resistor producing 50W of heat. That heat is transmitted to the heatsink via the aluminum block and up through special copper die templates with thermistors embedded directly in them.

A temperature reading for a particular heatsink is taken once the temperature stabilizes in the copper die template. Since each of the die templates have the approximate surface area of either a silicon topped or heatspreader-topped processor the flow of heat to the base of the heatsink accurately mimics a real life configuration.

Shown with the copper die template for a silicon-topped processor, the synthetic heatsink test apparatus awaits a coating of silver-based thermal compound and the Vantec FCE-6030D heatsink. A slightly larger copper die template was used to test the effective cooling ability of the FCE-6030D atop a heatspreader-based processor like an overclocked PGA Celeron processor. While this heatsink is not really made for those types of older processor's the differences in surface area between the two copper die templates can illuminate potential problems with a heatsinks design, and the ability for it to transfer heat throughout its' base and fins.