Verdict: An overly complex mounting mechanism, but it's very good at cooling Athlon 64s

The Star Ice is one of the most flexible universal HSFs in production today, with mounts for Socket A, Socket 478/754/939/940 and LGA775 CPUs.

This flexibility comes at a price, though, as it has a nightmarish mounting mechanism. You have to screw two posts through the mounting bracket for Athlon 64 motherboards (four for LGA775 boards), and then screw in two standoffs with a small spanner (included), using exactly the right amount of tension.

The base is connected to the heatsink by four large copper heatpipes, which are cooled by a variable-speed 80mm fan. This can be controlled automatically or by one of two fan controllers, one of which is mounted on the back panel, with the other in a 3.5in drive bay. The fan speed varies between a near-silent 1,500rpm and an ear-bashing 4,500rpm. On an Athlon 64 the Star Ice proved to be a great HSF, but on our LGA775 Pentium 4e test chip, even with the fan spinning at maximum speed it was barely better than the reference Intel HSF.

So, although the Star Ice can fit both Athlon 64 and LGA775 CPUs, we wouldn't recommend it if you plan to reduce noise levels and/or overclock your Pentium 4e.

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