Rosewill AIOLOS 120mm CPU Cooler Review

Test System & Temperature Testing

Here is a short list of the parts that make up the Legit Reviews Core i7-930 test system:

CPU Intel Core i7 930

Motherboard MSI X58-M

Memory Kingston Hyper-X 12GB (6x2GB) 1600 DDR3

Video Card MSI GTX 550 Ti

Hard Drive OCZ Vertex 2 60GB

Power Supply EnerMax ECO Liberty 620

Chassis Fractal Design XL Titanium Grey

O/S Windows 7 Home Professional (64bit)

Ambient Temperature 25*C

The CPU is an older generation Intel CPU, but it draws more power and will push limits more for cooling. To benchmark I used Prime95 for stress testing, CPU-Z to watch clocks and voltages, and CoreTemp to watch the temperatures. I ran each test 4 times each, idle, and stressed for 30 minutes before taking the final temperature. An average temperature was calculated from the 4 tests.

I also tested a small overclock, bumping the FSB from 133 to 166. All voltages left on auto. I also used Arctic Silver 5 on all coolers to be consistent.

CPU coolers tested:

Intel Boxed unit

Rosewill ROCC-12001 Aiolos

Scythe Ninja 3

Core i7 930 (stock 2.8GHz)

Intel Boxed Unit

Idle 40.5*C

Stressed 78.25*C

Rosewill ROCC-12001 Aiolos

Idle 37.75*C

Stressed 71.75*C

Scythe Ninja 3

Idle 36.75*C

Stressed 61.5*C

I was really concerned when I found these numbers, and I actually didnt believe it at first. I repeatedly double checked my installation and settings in the BIOS to make sure that the overclock wasnt on and voltages were set to auto. I also checked the fan speeds and the fan showed it was running at 100%. It is a nice and quiet unit and really decent cooling at idle speeds. But once stressed, it could not handle the higher heat output.

Core i7 930 (Overclocked to 3.6, voltages set to auto)

Intel Boxed Unit

Idle 45.5*C

Stressed 97.75*C

Note Intel TJMax temperature is 100*C on the Core i7. Once it reaches that temperature it will start to undervolt and/or underclock itself to avoid overheating and killing your CPU. Yes, you can turn this off in your motherboard BIOS, but not recommended. Intel did hit that wall and at the end of the 30 minutes on each test, had clocked itself back down to 2.8GHz (stock). Voltages were running at 1.44 for the core by that time, and FSB was still at 166.

Rosewill ROCC-12001 Aiolos

Idle 41.5*C

Stressed 99.99*C

Note Like the Intel cooler, overclocked it maxed out the TJMax pretty quickly and had to drop its multiplier to lower the temperature. It dropped the clock back down to its regular 2.8GHz speed, just with a higher FSB

Scythe Ninja 3

Idle 39.25*C

Stressed 88.75*C