Thermalright Ultima-90

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Thermalright Ultima-90

The Thermalright Ultima-90 is a surprisingly good cooler, made even more attractive by the smaller size, lighter weight, and lower price tag than most of the top air coolers tested at AnandTech. In virtually every measurement the Ultima-90 was at least the equal of all the top-tier coolers, matching or outperforming the Tuniq 120, Thermalright Ultra-120, Scythe Infinity with push-pull fans, and the Scythe Ninja Plus B/OCZ Vindicator running a high output SilenX IXTREME fan.

At this point in time, Thermalright seems to have an excellent handle on how to design heatpipe towers that perform at the top of the performance charts. Now we can also add that they apparently know what to do to make a cooler smaller and lighter without giving up too much in performance. The Ultima-90 weighs only 460g, but it uses the same heatpipe setup as the much larger Ultra-120 eXtreme. That heatpipe arrangement of six staggered full loops creating twelve risers appears to be the key to the performance of both the eXtreme and this new Ultima-90.

The Ultima-90 is ideal wherever you want to use a high-performance cooler. Its smaller size and weight make it particularly well-suited to tight cases and motherboards with limited clearance around the CPU. It is also shorter than most top coolers, with a height of just 139mm. However, this is still not small enough for thin rack cases, a very small HTPC case, or a case that places the power supply above the CPU socket. The lower cost of the Ultima-90 will also be attractive to many buyers, with a retail price of $50 compared to other top coolers in the $65 to $80 range. You will still have to add a fan, but that can be as little as $5 to as much as $20 or more depending on your choice.