ID-Cooling Builds Mini-ITX CPU Cooler With Vapor Chamber

nekrosoft13

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The folks over at ID-Cooling have been working on a CPU cooler that uses a vapor chamber to draw heat away from the CPU. The CPU cooler is called the IS-VC45 and has a rather simple design.

The vapor chamber at the bottom of the cooler is welded to a handful of aluminum fins, and that's it. On top of those rests a slim 92 mm fan, and the entire construction is about 4 cm thick. Despite that, thanks to the vapor chamber, ID-Cooling stated that the unit is capable of dissipating heat coming from CPUs with TDP's of up to 130 W. For something this small, that's a tremendous amount of cooling power.

For comparison, the most powerful Intel CPU that you can put in a Mini-ITX system, which is what the cooler is geared at, is the Intel Core i7-4790K. This chip has a TDP of 88 W, meaning that all things being equal, you'll even have some cooling headroom left so that the CPU can run a little faster than its 4.0 GHz base frequency.


The fan on this unit will spin at speeds between 600 RPM and 2500 RPM, and they use a fluid dynamic bearing. ID-Cooling did not give information on the noise the fans will produce.

For larger systems, a CPU cooler with a vapor chamber simply doesn't make sense, which is almost certainly why we haven't seen very many of them. For smaller systems, however, where you cannot install large CPU coolers or water cooling loops, you need all the cooling power you can get in the smallest possible form factor.

The sticker price for this cooler isn't bad either, with ID-Cooling giving it an MSRP of $44.99. For comparison, Noctua's NH-L9i, which is a premium CPU cooler with almost identical dimensions, goes for $44.99 on Newegg.com but is only capable of dissipating up to 65 W for typical Haswell builds. There's no word yet on availability.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/id-cooling-vapor-chamber-cpu-cooler,28422.html
 
ID-Cooling has been using vapor chamber technology for sometime now. I haven't had an opportunity to test their vapor chamber coolers, but have used their SE-214X and find it a very nice cooler. Definitely as good as and better than some coolers of similar size & configuration, and at $34.99 it's priced right too.
 
I'm still skeptical. I'd like to see some testing before I thought about buying it.
 
I agree.

I noticed at CES2015 Cooler Master was showing what looked like almost exact copies of ID-Cooling vapor chamber with heat pipes
 
Ah, there is a thread for this cooler already (I've been responding to it in the A4 SFF thread). I'll just paste what I said there:

I got mine on Wed (ordered from ebay) and unless I'm doing something very wrong (or this thing is defective), it's barely as good or even slightly worse than the NH-L9i.
I've re-seated the thing 5 times already because I still can't believe the underwhelming results I'm getting considering it's rated for 130W TDP. You'd figure there'd be reviews by now so I can confirm my results but i can't find anything yet.

Looking at the CPU contact after the second re-seating or so, only the edges of the CPU were touching it seems (so concave). I was using the credit card method with NT-H1 TIM btw. I also tried both Noctua and ID fans but neither made any difference. What did make any difference, and I fear this might be a problem in the A4 case, is the exhaust fan that's right above this cooler in my FT-03 case. That dropped temps by 2-4C.

To everyone else (because I'm not sure yet how to quote others within the same post..n00bie here lol) the orientation was of course vertical (in FT-03) and yes I spun this thing several different ways lol.

With my 3770K @ 4.2 with ~1.2v and blend test ( I know it's not a realistic load but it is the fastest way I knew of to compare the two coolers) I was still hitting 90C after only a few minutes, otherwise games and the like mostly stayed at or slightly below 75C (which, coming from huge tower heatsinks, is still to high to me).

I even decided to use the grain/rice? method for TIM thinking whatever void is in the middle would get filled in, and while this helped temps not shoot up so fast, it still eventually got up there. So now I'm going to put plastic washer on the 4 corners of the backplate behind the MB to try and bring the cooler in better contact and will report back later.
 
Okay, let's see if we can rule out some of the possible sources of the problem.
Is the base concave or is it your CPU?
What is the temperature of the air going into the cooler? Often these pancake coolers eat their on heated exhaust .. which is why I usually mount the fan pulling out of cooler instead of pushing in.
 
Okay, let's see if we can rule out some of the possible sources of the problem.
Is the base concave or is it your CPU?
What is the temperature of the air going into the cooler? Often these pancake coolers eat their on heated exhaust .. which is why I usually mount the fan pulling out of cooler instead of pushing in.

Alright, think I found the main problem. The base of this cooler is concave. Applying the TIM evenly and seating it on the CPU multiple times using ever thicker layers of TIM each time, the base is still not making contact with the middle of the CPU.

The Noctua L9i has a flat base and makes perfect contact with this CPU using the credit card method for TIM, as does the Thermaltake Venomous X I had before the Noctua. You could use the dot method and it will of course spread out but the middle of the CPU will probably have nothing but a thick layer of TIM between it and the cooler = poor temps.

So I guess it may still have potential assuming they're not all like mine with a concave base. Currently using the dot method and ambient temp of 65F, temps on prime are:
448K- 81,80,78,77 and on the second pass @ 8k- 93,93,88,86 and I just stopped at that point.
 
**Update**: After contacting ID-Cooling for an exchange, they instead told me I could keep the cooler and would be refunded the money. They also said I could lap the base myself for full CPU contact and that at the moment they are developing an upgraded version of this cooler that will supposedly take care of this base problem (how serious was it I wonder??).

So...guess it's back to the Noctua L9i. They still haven't pulled the product at all...guess I'll wait and see what happens then.
 
So defective product but great customer support and a refund.

Yeah, my guess is they had no problem in the initial run of the first prototype cooler, but when mass produced problem bit them in the a$$. Probably costing them a pretty penny. to do the refunds. They are refunding retail price, not the wholesale price they sold them for.
 
Got mine in and luckily had better results than El-Dubya. I didn't have a straight edge to check for certain but eyeballing it it does look like the base could be flatter, has a nice mirror finish though.

Pics:

IS-VC45_box.jpg

Sure wish Noctua would do simpler boxes like this and cut a few dollars off their products, even their fans come with ridiculously fancy packaging.


IS-VC45_box-inside.jpg

Everything was securely held in place by the foam, though I'd rather see the foam come up flush with the height of the box but that's just a nitpick :p


IS-VC45_accessories.jpg

Comes with a manual (they really need to hire a professional translator, it's understandable but has lots of poor wording), clips to hold the fan (designed for the stock 15mm fan, I'll need to figure out how to mount a 25mm fan to this puppy), 4 threaded adapters for LGA 2011, small tube of thermal paste, and the ugliest fan I've ever laid eyes on :p

I get the feeling that ID Cooling is seeking to emulate Noctua but come on guys, this is just silly.


IS-VC45_heatsink.jpg

Here's the heatsink with the LGA 115x backplate attached


IS-VC45_heatsink-2.jpg

This thing is tiny!


IS-VC45_heatsink-bottom.jpg

Nice mirror finish on the base


IS-VC45_installed.jpg

Spec says it can cool 130W TDP CPUs so that's what I did :D

Here it is installed on my Gigabyte X99M Gaming 5 with the i7 5930K at stock clock.

There's a slim 120mm at the top of the case and the other fans you can see in the picture.

Ran Prime95 on Blend with 10 threads and it got to a little over 80°C after ~10 minutes. Not great temps but it wasn't throttling (was running at 3.6GHz) and the fan wasn't obnoxiously loud so considering it's only 45mm tall including fan I'd say it's an interesting option for SFF.
 
Nice!
Could you try turning the fan over to see if temps improve?
I've found they usually do with theses pancake coolers.
Reason is with fan pushing into cooler heated air hits mobo, turns out, hits RAM, GPU, heatsinks, turns up along side of cooler and as it passes fan is sucked back into cooler .. around and around it goes.
With fan pulling from cooler the cool air is drawn over RAM, mobo, etc. into bottom of cooler, up through fan and carried out of case.
I usually see 5-10c difference.
 
@ Aibohphobia, where can I get pic skillz like that :eek:! Glad to see it worked out for you, and if Prime isn't going much above 80C, any usual tasks should be just fine then.

@ doyll, I'm not sure he can turn the fan around since the clips hold the fan right up against the foam strips on the cooler and stop the fan from spinning at all. The Noctua can though since it leaves a small space between the fan and the fins.

Ok, well ID-Cooling was able to inform about the changes they're making to this cooler which include going straight out copper (no nickle plating) and using an increased number of fins.
They were quick to respond to me and yes, great customer support. So I definitely plan on picking up one of these Rev.2 coolers in the near future.
 
Probably not a problem. Generally fan blades are reliefed back from house enough to allow mounting either face against cooler. Only one way to find out for sure.
 
Probably not a problem. Generally fan blades are reliefed back from house enough to allow mounting either face against cooler. Only one way to find out for sure.

What I meant to say was I tried it with mine ( as you suggested earlier) and I couldn't get the fan to turn, but maybe Aibohphobia can get a bit creative with this idea.

Here is a pic of the upgraded cooler they sent me as mentioned earlier. All copper with more fins.

IS-VC45%20Rev2_zpstorlos41.png
 
I tried flipping the fan around but it was hitting mid 90s and throttling (didn't have any issue with the foam strips interfering with the fan though), so I swapped the slim Noctua I had on the rear of the case (I installed it blowing down) with the ID Cooling fan but got similar results.

I had the side panel on this time though and when I tested before the ambient was 15.7°C but I'm testing at 18.0°C today. So between the two it looks like this doesn't perform quite as well as I initially thought.


So I tested with Prime at 4 threads and FurMark at 1280x720 and 0x MSAA with the Noctua 150mm fan on the side bracket and CPU got to mid 70s. I'll need to try actually playing BF4 on it but it looks like with adequate cooling it would work for gaming but for heavy sustained loads it doesn't quite cut it.

I'll look forward to that improved version but it seems this is something they should have figured out in development instead of rushing a fix after they've already released it.

It's easy to get annoyed with Noctua for taking so long to bring products to market but their stuff always performs to spec.


@El-Dubya I'm using a DSLR, tripod, background stand, and 3 lights but even a good phone camera, indirect sunlight from a window, and some paper can achieve really good results.
 
Case airflow can be hard to figure out. I use a low cost and simple remote digital indoor/outdoor thermometer to monitor air temp in difference places inside of case .. like in front of CPU and GPU intake fans. A piece of insulated wire twisted in from sensor to a clothespin to clip it in place and bend so sensor is in airlfow you want to check.
5464e11e-6dfb-431d-8cb5-0b2b88229684_zpsec54bc38.jpg
 
I would love to see how this performs on a 65W APU versus an NH-L9a and maybe a Scythe Big Shuriken Rev.B. Not that I have problems with my Scythe, but it's always nice to use as compact a package as possible in an ITX build.
 
What I meant to say was I tried it with mine ( as you suggested earlier) and I couldn't get the fan to turn, but maybe Aibohphobia can get a bit creative with this idea.

Here is a pic of the upgraded cooler they sent me as mentioned earlier. All copper with more fins.

So you've already received a "revised" IS-VC45 from ID-Cooling that fixes the concave base?
 
So you've already received a "revised" IS-VC45 from ID-Cooling that fixes the concave base?

No, just the pic. I guess I could have worded that better.

It seems they're still selling the IS-VC45 as if everything is going as normal, and I still don't see any major reviews on this item yet so I really don't know what's going on at this point.

Their facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/idcooling.global) still has it up front and with a positive review no doubt (if he actually is talking about the vc45).
 
any word when this new revision will be for sale? is it still the same part/model number?
 
I'd love to have the copper model, as opposed to the nickel plated. Love me some shiny copper, and I'm very strongly considering the purchase from their Ebay page.
 
Any news on the copper version?

Just got word back from them, although it sounds somewhat cryptic. All they said was "the product will launch a month late, it's being debugged." A month from when I don't know, but I wouldn't expect it until June-ish.
 
The copper version might be a good alternative for the L9i... if it´s decent i`ll consider getting it, even though ID-Cooling doesn't seem to be available in Europe and i would have to import it :/ Have to find a good cooler, A4-SFX has max 48mm clearance :D
 
The copper version might be a good alternative for the L9i... if it´s decent i`ll consider getting it, even though ID-Cooling doesn't seem to be available in Europe and i would have to import it :/ Have to find a good cooler, A4-SFX has max 48mm clearance :D

I will be trying out the ID-Cooling IS-25 in a few weeks ,I hope maybe sooner but it is coming in from china. This cooler is only is 27mm high. Going to try and cool my i5-4670k,

If I keep temps under 80c @4ghz I will delid to further improve cooling. If I get temps over 80c at 4ghz I will be forced to sell the i5 and wait for intel to release broadwell i5's. and back to my g3258 for the time being.

I tried out there IS-40 and it worked very well ,but it was to tall for my NES build and just was pulling to much hot air from the top of the case. Open case testing showed me it could drop temps by 10c over the intel stock cooler.

I'll try to remember to let you know the results.
 
How much more is the copper version? Rather nice and compact with a mirror finish.
 
I bet they are trying to kill off stock of the original VC45 before coming out with the copper version.

just an idea
 
Maybe i'm bad at searching but I don't see this model on amazon, ebay, or newegg anymore.
 
Got a reply from idcooling. They mentioned the "new" one is not copper but it has "improved technology". It's already on sale. I ended up buying one and i'll sell how it goes.
 
I been used 2 different id-cooling cpu coolers, they did there job, but the QC is bad. I had to lap both coolers upon arrival.

I hope they get there QC better as they do have a nice line up of itx coolers.

ended up with a noctua nh-l9i at the end of it all.
 
Just got one of these myself, for overclocking my uSFF i5-3570k. Will report back with results.

I'm very power-limited, but lower temps may mean lower volts for a possibly better overclock.
 
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