Verdict: Quiet, but average cooling, and not suitable for some motherboards.

The Arctic Cooling Freezer series of CPU HSFs has dominated the market for the last few years, due to the HSFs' outstanding cooling abilities and incredible value for money.

The latest addition to the Freezer series for Socket AM2 CPUs is the Freezer 64 Pro, which has been slightly revised since we last tested it more than a year ago. While the heatsink remains the same, Arctic Cooling has replaced the fan with a quieter, 4-pin PWM-controlled model that spins at speeds between 900rpm and 2,200rpm.

Unfortunately, the stiff mounting mechanism hasn't been updated, so despite the fact that the cooler simply clips onto the standard motherboard mounting bracket, the Freezer 64 Pro is difficult to install.

The mounting mechanism can also affect the Freezer 64 Pro's cooling ability. This is because, on motherboards with a vertically orientated CPU socket, the fan can only point directly up or down. This means that air flowing into the fins comes either from the back of the graphics card, which is hot, or from the top of the case. It also means that unless you have a roof vent or fan, the air isn't directly exhausted.

With the fan blowing upwards on our Asus M2R32-MVP motherboard (which has a vertically orientated CPU socket), the Freezer 64 Pro cooled the CPU to 8ûC below the reference AMD HSF, which is an average result.

The Freezer 64 Pro's cooling ability will vary depending on the layout of your motherboard, so it's only worth considering if your motherboard has a horizontally orientated CPU socket.

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