Reviewed by Barry Little - March 31, 2008

Manufacturer: ASUS

Model: 90-PN591CM-00000

Price: $45.00 at MWave.com

ASUS is a company that needs no introduction to PC and technology enthusiasts, and gamers. Their award-winning line of motherboards, video cards,  notebooks, business and digital lifestyle products have become legendary in the computer peripherals industry, and their cooling products are no less impressive—as we’ll see when as we take a look at one of their mid-range CPU coolers—the ASUS Triton 77.

About ASUS

ASUS, a technology-oriented company blessed with one of the world's top R&D teams, is well known for high-quality and innovative technology. As a leading provider of 3C (computers, communications and consumer electronics) total solutions, ASUS offers a complete product portfolio to compete in the new millennium. In 2006, the company shipped 55 million motherboards, which means one in three desktop PCs sold last year was powered by an ASUS motherboard. Our 2006 revenues reached US$16.5 billion, and is expected to garner US$23 billion in 2007.

To succeed in this ultra-competitive industry, great products need to be complimented by speed-to-market, cost and service. That's why all 100,000 over employees of ASUS strive for the "ASUS Way of Total Quality Management" to offer the best quality without compromising cost and time-to-market while providing maximum value to all customers through world-class services.

With unyielding commitment to innovation and quality, ASUS won 2,168 awards in 2006, meaning on average, the company received over 5 awards everyday last year. BusinessWeek ranked ASUS amongst its “InfoTech 100” for the 9th straight year. The readers of Tom's Hardware Guide, the world's largest IT website, selected ASUS as the best maker of motherboards and graphics cards. Furthermore, the company is ranked as No.1 in quality products and services by the Wall Street Journal.

The Box

ASUS products features some of the most striking yet tasteful packing of computer peripherals on the market—mostly because the visuals used are powerful yet simple, and the information needed in making a decision to buy the product is kept short and to the point minus the ambiguous fluff and sensory-overload approach used by other companies. The Triton 77 is no exception. Against a stark, black background, we have a shot of the Triton 77 with a dramatic simulated airflow from the cooler’s unique Up-way Airflow design. An illustration of how the design works with “15°C faster heat dissipation” and “10~15°C Lower VRM Temp,” are on one side of the box, while the main selling points of the cooler are in 12 different languages on the other. Full specs on the Triton 77 are on the back.

The Triton 77 is sealed in a thick, form-fitting, plastic blister pack that does an excellent job of protecting the cooler and its contents. It snaps open clamshell-style without having to break out any sharp instruments to remove the cooler and its accessories. Though it takes a bit more effort than similar blister packs to open, the extra elbow grease is preferable to hacking through layers of thick plastic or inadvertently dumping an expensive cooler on the floor because the snaps didn’t hold securely enough.

Included in the box are a set of mounting brackets for Intel LGA Socket 775 motherboards, a slick, single “swing-arm” style mounting clip for AMD Socket 940/939/AM2 boards; a small tube of ASUS thermal paste, and a multilingual Installation Guide.

The Triton 77

At 122 x 103 x 127mm (4.9 x 4.1 x 5 in.), the ASUS Triton 77 isn’t the largest air cooler on the market, but its design should help it clear most motherboard obstacles with relative ease. And the good news is, at just 505g, it won’t give your motherboard a hernia doing so.

Keeping with its namesake, the ASUS Triton 77 sort of resembles an inverted hi-tech seashell made of nickel-plated aluminum fins with a 92x25mm fan attached beneath it via an ASUS-branded metal bracket with a tribal-style Triton logo, suspended above its base by five copper heatpipes. Though you might not guess from its color, the base of the Triton 77 is also made of copper. The two notches running across the top of the base is for the AMD mounting clip, while the holes on each side are for screwing on the Socket 775 brackets. The base itself is not highly polished as on some coolers, and has a rough, but even machined finish. While there will always be a debate on whether not a smooth or rough finish provides optimal heat transfer, what is important, is that the surface of the base is machined flat and level enough so that thermal compound can provide the proper bond between the heatsink and the heat spreader of the CPU for maximum heat transfer. In that regard, it appears that the ASUS Triton 77’s base is more than up to the task.

The Triton 77 uses a 4-pin PWM connector attached to a braided cable—a nice touch that not only is more cost effective (if only by a buck or two) than using nylon sleeving and heat shrink, but shows ASUS’s commitment to quality and the smallest details that keeps them one step ahead of the competition.

The fan is held in place by four pushpins, making fan servicing or replacing with a 92x25 or 80x25mm fan of your choice, a snap (no pun intended). At first glance, the fan appears to be no more than some generic 92mm number with an ASUS sticker on the hub. Things start to get interesting however, when you flip the fan over and see the Sunon label—a manufacturer of high-quality fans. And not just any Sunon, mind you—a Sunon MagLev^®. That’s when it hits you how any 92mm fan could have such a low (18 dbBA) noise rating.

Courtesy of Sunon, Inc.

Sunon’s MagLev motor fan technology works on the deceptively simple principle of a toy spinning top and their advanced Vapo Bearings for quieter operation and longer life. You can read all about it here.

Courtesy of Sunon, Inc.

Conventional fan design for CPU coolers uses a push, pull or push-pull combination of transferring heat away from the CPU and towards the case’s rear exhaust fan. The ASUS Triton 77 breaks with the conventional in several important ways.

Courtesy of ASUS

The Up-Way Ventilation design of the Triton 77 pulls heat upward through its densely-packed fins from the processor area and the surrounding Voltage Regulator Modules (VRMs) and Mosfets. The heat is dispersed upward and outward to be pulled out of the case by its exhaust fans. At the same time, the five heatpipes wick heat away from the processor, dispersing it through the cooler’s aluminum fins as well. VRMs and Mosfets generate quite a bit of heat—even more when you start overclocking the CPU. Anything you can do to keep the temperatures down can not only help you to reach higher and more stable overclocks and keep components from having a premature heat stroke, but will also result in a more reliable system whether overclocked or not. How well does this work in actual practice? That’s what we’re going to find out.

Installation

Whether you have an Intel or AMD-based motherboard, one thing you’ll probably be happy about with the ASUS Triton 77, is that unlike other oversized CPU coolers, it does not require removal of the motherboard to install. The most time-consuming part will undoubtedly be removing the old thermal paste from your processor if you’re upgrading to the Triton 77.

The Installation Guide provides clear instructions and illustrations for installing either mounting mechanism for the Triton 77. For the review, I’ll be using an Intel Socket 775 EVGA 680i SLI motherboard and an Intel E6600 Core 2 Duo processor.

The Triton 77 is physically light enough to use the standard push-pin cooler mounting method of securing it to the motherboard. Simply secure the supplied Intel push-pin brackets to each side of the cooler with the supplied screws. The brackets mount to the flanges on the top of the base of the Triton 77. Clean the base and the top of the processor heat spreader with either 90% Isopropyl Alcohol or Arctic Silver’s ArctiClean, and a soft, lint-free cloth (a coffee filter will do just fine). Avoid touching both surfaces with your fingers. The oil in your fingertips will contaminate the surfaces and reduce the effectiveness of the thermal paste.

Speaking of thermal paste, the small tube ASUS supplies with the Triton 77 should be enough for several applications. While there are no specific instructions for the method in applying the paste, I applied a long, medium-width bead to the heat spreader of the processor similar to the technique recommended by Arctic Silver in applying their thermal paste to Intel Core 2 Duo processors. Regardless of which thermal paste you use, too much can be just as bad as too little.

No matter what AMD’s current standing is in the processor wars, there is no denying that AMD’s method of mounting coolers to a motherboard is vastly superior to Intel’s. I have never liked the klutzy, half-assed way push pins on many Intel-based mounting mechanisms work. Either they work perfectly the first time, or you have to spend an additional fifteen minutes or so trying to get the damned things to engage. It took almost that amount of time to get the retail Intel heatsink installed.

In contrast, the push-pins on the Triton 77 mounting brackets did their thing the first time without any additional effort. I had the Triton locked down in less than 15 seconds (maybe Intel ought to contract ASUS to manufacture their push-pins). I should point out that the instructions included with the ASUS Triton 77 are quite explicit in how the cooler should be mounted—whether for an AMD or Intel motherboard. For optimal results, ASUS recommends mounting the Triton 77 with the Triton logo facing the rear of the case and the exhaust fan, while the heatpipes should face the DIMM sockets on the motherboard. Kinda defeats the purpose of having the logo, I know, much like some of the cooler fan shroud designs on video cards that mostly go unseen when installed. Oh well...

Once the CPU temperatures are checked and monitored (I always boot into the BIOS to do this) to insure there’s no sudden elevation in temperature that would indicate the cooler not being seated properly or too much/not enough thermal paste applied, it’s time to run the tests.

Testing:

Here’s our test bed setup:

I used the latest official build of EVEREST Ultimate Edition—Version 4.50.1330 (check out what’s new in this release here). Of particular note is not just the added support for the latest processors, motherboards, or the new features and enhancements—but a revamped System Stability Test that puts an even greater workload on tested components while providing critical and comprehensive monitoring of temperatures, fan speeds and voltages.

With room temperature at 68°, the test bed was booted cold and allowed to run for thirty minutes before recording idle temperatures with EVEREST Ultimate Edition. EVEREST System Stability Test was used to crank and max-out both cores of the E6600 Core 2 Duo processor for one hour, while tracking the minimum, maximum and average temperature of the CPU and its cores. The Intel cooler was tested with the pre-applied thermal interface compound pads used on all of Intel’s retail heatsinks, while the ASUS Triton 77 was tested with the thermal paste that ASUS includes in the box. While I could have used an aftermarket, high-performance thermal paste on both, I felt that by using what was provided by the manufacturer would paint a much more accurate picture of your “out-of-the-box” experience with the cooler. The processor head spreader was thoroughly cleaned with Arctic Silver’s ArctiClean when switching from the Intel to the ASUS cooler, to insure that the previous TIM (Thermal Interface Material) was removed.

A Galaxy Audio CM-130 Check Mate SPL Meter was used to obtain the decibel readings for the CPU coolers used in the test. Removing as much extraneous noise from the room as possible, the meter was placed six inches from the cooler and positioned to minimize the impact the fan’s airflow would have on the readings. VRM temperatures at idle and under load were taken dead center on the VRM/Mosfet heat sinks with a Raytek MiniTemp MT4.

Keep in mind that the results obtained are specific to the particular configuration of the test bed used, which is an open-air environment to facilitate faster and easier hardware upgrades. Your results will vary depending on your specific hardware configuration.

Usually, most people assume that a CPU cooler’s idle temperatures aren’t as important as when the CPU is under load. Nevertheless, as the chart shows here, that’s not always the case. On average, the Intel retail cooler runs a good 10°C warmer than the ASUS Triton 77 while idling and 7°C warmer on average than the Triton when under load—and this is with a relatively mild overclock. The maximum temperature recorded on the Intel retail cooler was 67°C, while the ASUS Triton 77 topped out at a 56°C.

Since the main selling feature of the Triton 77 is its unique design that allows it to cool the motherboard’s VRM/Mosfets as efficiently as the CPU, let’s see just how well it does that compared to a more conventional cooler design.

The reference-design 680i motherboard is notorious for hot-running VRM/Mosfets (the ones near the back of the motherboard are the worse). Overclocking just aggravates the situation. Here, we see that the ASUS Triton 77’s Up Way Ventilation Design keeps the rear VRM/Mosfets at near-idle temperatures under load, while the Intel retail heat sink allows the temperature to soar a good 10°C higher—not good. One reason why we don’t see as dramatic a difference in temperatures for the VRM/Mosfets on the right-hand edge of the board is that the 120mm fan on the Top Deck Station is also providing cooling as well as the Triton 77. Now let’s take a look at how much the improved cooling the Triton 77 offers over Intel’s retail solution costs, in terms of noise.

On average, we see that the ASUS Triton is quieter than the Intel Retail cooler when it comes to noise. Keep in mind that the noise recorded here is the total amount of noise coming from the test bed system, which includes the fan on the video card, power supply, the cooling fan on the Top Deck Station and the 18dBA fan on the Triton 77. Again, your results in building a system that is not only fast but also quiet will depend on the individual components and the design of the case you install them in.

Final Impressions and Conclusion

The Triton 77 certainly lives up to the claims that ASUS makes about it. It definitely provides better cooling than the retail Intel cooler while keeping the decibels down, while its Up-Way Ventilation design can help keep the VRMs and Mosfets from frying during light to moderate overclocking, particularly on motherboards that don’t provide a robust-enough cooling solution for either—like the reference 680i SLI boards. It’s light, easy to install, and looks good. What more could you ask for? 

Probably a lot if you’re going to overclock your rig beyond moderate levels. It’s doubtful that the Triton 77 could keep up with high-end coolers from Noctua, Scythe Thermalrite and Tuniq. But that’s not the audience the Triton 77 is marketed for, and the coolers in that league are much more expensive than the Triton 77.

Speaking of price, the ASUS Triton 77 goes for around $45-$49, though some places are offering $10-$15 rebates. Without rebates, there’s no denying that Triton 77 is a bit pricey for a midrange CPU cooler. Is it really worth the premium if there are other coolers out there that are cheaper that can get the job done?

CPU cooler design is a delicate and often precarious balance of compromises and “one-size-does-not-fit-all” trade-offs. Some coolers in the ASUS Triton 77’s price range require that you remove the motherboard to install them. While some folks may consider that a necessary but acceptable evil, others may balk at the inconvenience of having to tear down their system to install a CPU cooler. Understandable and fair enough—particularly if you have a case where swapping out components can be a real pain.

Some are heavier. Is that bad? Depending on the quality and design of the mounting mechanism it can be, especially if you frequently haul your rig to LAN parties. Some are physically larger and can make for an installation that’s too close for comfort—or no installation at all on some motherboards. The size and orientation of the Triton 77 does tip the odds a bit more in your favor if your motherboard is an obstacle course of tall capacitors, VRM and Mosfet heatsinks, and Northbridge coolers.

Some will cool better cooling but at the cost of higher noise and perhaps not as efficient VRM/Mosfet cooling—if any at all. Some have proprietary designs that prohibit switching out the fan with one of your choice. No such limitation with the Triton 77. Although you’d be hard-pressed to improve on the Sunon MagLev that comes with the cooler, if you can find a better 92 or 80mm fan that suits your needs, you can install it with very little effort.

Whether you’re trying to reduce your system’s overall decibel level, or looking for a quick and easy to install unit that will give you plenty of cooling headroom for mild to moderate overclocking—or both—the ASUS Triton 77 CPU Cooler is clearly at the top of its class.

Barry’s Rigs ‘n Reviews would like to thank William O’Neal at ASUS for providing the sample for this review!

Final Score: