Verdict: More shocking than a trip to the electric chair

Sharkoon is a relatively new name to the CPU HSF market. The Red Shock is its latest model and is apparently 'optimal for high-end overclocked systems'.

The design of the Red Shock is very similar to that of old Thermalright heatsinks, and comprises a large copper base with a huge array of copper fins, plus four copper heatpipes. If this sounds like a lot of copper to you then you'd be right; the Red Shock weighs in at a considerable 516g. For this reason, the Red Shock has to be bolted through the motherboard, which means you'll have to pull apart your PC in order to install it. Like the old Thermalright heatsinks, the Red Shock may not fit all motherboards that have tall components, such as capacitors, close to the CPU socket.

Sharkoon doesn't supply a fan with the Red Shock, but it has clips for 80mm, 92mm and 120mm fans. Unfortunately, it failed to keep the Pentium 4 cool enough to prevent it from overheating and shutting down, and even with a 120mm Akasa Amber fan, it cooled the CPU to just 2ûC below the reference Intel HSF. It also failed to keep the Athlon 64 cool enough without a fan, but with the 120mm Akasa Amber fan, it cooled the CPU to 6ûC below the reference AMD HSF.

Contrary to the Sharkoon website, the Red Shock isn't up to the job of cooling high-end overclocked CPUs; in fact, the only shocking thing about it is its £37.58 price tag.

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