For the testing we will measure idle and load temperatures of the CPU as measured by Core Temp. Idle is defined as the temperature after being started up from cold, and sat at the desktop for 30mins, this is not really truly idle as Atom is so underpowered, even on the desktop it is still at 30%.

Load became more difficult. Without any cooling at all, running Prime 95 would cause the temps to rise to 73^oC, and then fall about 10^oC and repeat. For load we ran Prime 95 for 30mins and recorded the maximum temperature in that period of time. For all tests the laptop/cooler was on a desk and the laptop was plugged into the wall.

The test system specifications are listed below.

To stop this ending up as a mass of screen shots, and for ease of comparison all the figures have been consolidated into one graph.

Results

The winning cooler is the Coolermaster D1 with a total drop of 11^oC at load. The Choiix cooler also performed well but its smaller improvement can be attributed to its method of ventilation. The Coolermaster U1 also provides an improvement but nowhere near as much as the other coolers.