Thermaltake Jing Review

Results Analysis

The Jing proved to be considerably quieter than the Frio and was one of the quietest coolers on test with its fans at their lowest setting. It proved to be an exceptional cooler too, and was much better than several other coolers we've looked at recently with its fans set to high speed.

In our LGA1155 system, it returned a delta T of 51°C, 18°C lower than the reference Intel cooler. This is just 2°C worse than the Frio with its fans on full speed. Lowering the Jing's fans to their lowest speed saw the temperature of our CPU increase by 2°C - a worthy compromise given how quiet they are at this setting.

It was a similar story in our Socket AM3 system, with just a 1°C difference between the delta T recorded at low and high fan speed settings. Here, though, the Frio's superior airflow counted for a lot more, and while the Jing was still far better than the reference cooler, the Frio was 11°C cooler with both coolers' fans set to high speed.

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Conclusion

The Jing's caveat is not noise or performance - it scored highly in both these areas. Using its lowest fan speed setting, which has the fans spinning at 800rpm, it's extremely quiet indeed and performed similarly to the excellent Thermaltake Frio in our LGA1155 system. The price of the Jing is considerable, however, especially when compared to other coolers.

It's one of the most expensive coolers we've reviewed and costs £10 more than the Frio for starters. Given that the Frio outperformed the Jing in both test systems, this puts the Jing at a disadvantage when it comes to value. This was particularly pronounced in our LGA1155 system - while the Jing outperformed the reference cooler by 18°C, the Gelid Tranquillo was only 3°C warmer and costs less than half the price.

Given how far we'd overclocked the Core i5-2600K CPU, it's clear that you simply don't need a huge dual-fan cooler to get the most out of Intel's new CPUs.

AMD Socket AM3 Scores

• Cooling
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• 7/10

• Design
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• 9/10

• Value
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Overall
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• 7/10

Intel LGA1155 Scores

• Cooling
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• 9/10

• Design
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

• Value
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• -
• -
• 6/10

• Overall
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• x
• -
• -
• 8/10

Score Guide