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The ThermalTake Orbs - Clockwise from back left - Super Orb, Mini Super Orb, Mini Copper Orb, Chrome Orb.

The fan power wires on the Thermaltake Orb's pass directly between the fins of the cooler. They are not attached in anyway, and it's possible that the plastic wire shielding can become worn. This is especially noticeable on the lower fans - where the wires can rub on the base of the cooler. Also the fans and fins on the Thermaltake Orb's also collect a lot of dust, but luckily the fan is easy to remove - just undo the 3 screws holding it in place. When the fan has been removed, often the easiest way to clean the Orb is to simply run it under a tap and then dry it thoroughly.

The unsecured wires can chafe between the fins of the Orb.

All the Thermaltake 'Orb' Coolers - Chrome Orb, Super Orb and Mini Super Orb (but not the Mini Copper Orb) - use the same "Thermaltake clip".

The "Thermaltake clip".

The Orb's are attached very tightly by the "Thermaltake clip", one side of the clip fits over the three lugs in the socket, then holding the Orb firmly, you press down - quite hard - on the clip mechanism and force it over the central lug in the other side of the socket. The clip then snaps back into place, holding the Orb tightly onto the CPU core. The "Thermaltake clip" is quite easy to install, but can to be difficult to remove. When trying to remove the cooler, pressing down on the clip tends to push it back into place, and it is almost impossible to remove by hand. I found that by pushing down on the top of the clip, and slipping a small flat-headed screwdriver between the base of the clip and the socket, I could leaver the clip out far enough to pull the cooler off. However in nearly every attempt to remove the Thermaltake coolers I managed to shave off some of the plastic moulding from the socket lugs, and after installing and removing a number of coolers using this clip, the CPU socket lugs were quite worn.

I was able to use all of the Orb coolers on my 'broken in' A7V, installing them and removing them without too much difficulty. However, using a Super Orb on my girlfriends a brand new A7V133 produced disastrous results. Like usual, installing the Super Orb was no problem. However, the clip locked firmly under the new lugs and could not be removed, it was also necessary to shove down very hard on the clip in order to remove it. When removing this heatsink, I had to press down so far - before the clip would slip off - that the bottom of the clip scratched the tracks on the motherboard. As you can see from the picture below, the process of removing the Super Orb cuts up the lugs on the brand new board quite a bit. The motherboard, which had been used for all of five minutes, now does not work - I will not be using these coolers again on any new system I have.

Damage to the socket and scratched tracks on the MotherBoard due to the removal of a Thermaltake Super Orb.

The motherboard now will not POST, simply beeping continually as if it has no RAM installed. Trying not to blame myself, it is easy to point the finger at the Super Orb, however some of the blame must also lie with Asus. Placing a vital collection of closely packed tracks directly under the socket lugs is not really a sensible thing to do. When assembling the system for the second time, I was carefu to place a few strips of electrical tape under the offending CPU lug. This tape would prevent a repeat of the damaged board, even if I were to use a cooler that was hard to remove. I did try this on the first board, but it is such a fiddly position that the tape stuck to my fingers, the RAM slots and the CPU lugs, and not on the tracks where I wanted it.

A few strips of electrical tape can help prevent scratches to the tracks of the motherboard.

Thermaltake Chrome Orb

The Thermaltake Chrome Orb.

The Chrome Orbs are rated for ThunderBird up to 1.3GHz and all Duron processors. The 69mm diameter of the Chrome Orbs can be a tight fit on a number of motherboards, but at 45mm in hight the overall dimensions of the Chrome Orb makes it one of the smallest in this roundup. The Chrome Orb is cooled by a 5500 RPM, 23.1 CFM, 29 dBA fan (the same fan is used on the 'bottom' of the Super Orbs).

The installed Chrome Orb.

Performance
Chrome Orb - 41°C idle - 43°C full load
The 29dBA fan on the Chrome Orb was not noticeable when running, however at 43°C under full load the performance of this cooler is a little lacking - probably due to its small size.

Thermaltake Super Orb

The Thermaltake Super Orb.

The Super Orb extends the orb idea that Thermaltake are famous for, and is rated for CPU's upto 1.5GHz. The Super Orb is much taller than the Chrome Orb at 74mm, but the same diameter - 69mm. To cool such a tall heatsink, Termaltake have used twin fans rated at 5000 RPM, 22.98CFM, 28.3dBA (Bottom) and 5500 RPM, 17.3CFM, 34dBA (Top). The Super Orb package comes with a small blister-pack of white thermal paste, and a 3-pin to molex adapter. The machined base of the Super Orb has a small circular lip, which means that it will not sit flush on the CPU core if a copper shim or spacer is used. The machined base of the Super Orb also has small - but noticeable - circular ridges, which due to the circular lip, are virtually impossible to lap and make any smoother.

Machined Super Orb base.

Since the A7V has two 3-pin fan connectors mounted close to the CPU socket, connecting the twin fans on the SuperOrb posed no problem at all.

The installed Super Orb.

Performance
Super Orb - 39°C idle - 42°C full load
Although the fans on the Super Orb did tend to produce a noticeably high-pitched sound, when the sides of the case were closed the noise was not noticeable. Given its much larger size than the Chrome Orb, better results may have been expected from the Super Orb. Because the slightly smaller Mini Super Orb out performed the Super Orb tested here, it may be possible that one of the fans on the Super Orb tested was not functioning at 100%, or there was some other unseen problem.