Scythe Ultra Kaze Review/Comparison

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I recently posted about a new line of Scythe fans the Ultra Kaze. When I posted the link I purchased the 2000RPM model from www.aerocooler.com. The transaction when smoothly and I received my fan Thursay October, 18th.

Currently I am using a Thermaltake 120MM Smart Case Fan mounted on a Thermalright XP-120. With TT's rheostat I am able to control the fan from 1300RPM up to 2700RPM. For day to day use I kept the fan at 1800RPM because that offered an acceptable amount of cooling and noise. Upon ordering the Scythe Ultra Kaze 2000RPM I set my Thermaltake Smart Case Fan to 2000RPM and ran some tests. The results will be included.

Here is a picture of the XP-120, it seems like the fins are fairly close together and the added static pressure that Scythe promises might of benefit.


Here are the fan specs for the Thermaltake Smart Case Fan.

Thermaltake Smart Case Fan
P/N A2018
Fan Dimension 120x120x25 mm
Rated Voltage 12V
Started Voltage 6V
Rated Current 0.12~0.48A
Power Input 2.4~5.76W
Fan Speed 1300 RPM - 2800 RPM
Max Air Flow 38.6 ~93.7CFM
Max Air Pressure 1.5~4.1mm-H2O
Noise 17dBA at 1300 RPM - 46.5dBA at 2800 RPM
Bearing Type 1 Ball 1 Sleeve
Life Expectation 50,000 hrs
Connector 3 Pin
Weight 126 g

Link to fan.

Pics:
All pics are thumbnail size, click the thumbnail to enlarge the picture. Pictures were taken with a Canon A550 7.1MP camera then scaled to 50% in Microsoft Office Picture Manager. Some of the pictures are blurry, I borrowed the camera so I don't know all the tricks to make close up shots clean and crisp.

Fan by itself:


Fan installed:


Here are the fan specs for the Scythe Ultra Kaze.

Scythe Ultra Kaze 2000RPM
P/N DFS123812L-2000
Fan Dimension 120x120x38 mm
Rated Voltage DC12V
Started Voltage N/A
Rated Current 0.25 A
Power Input N/A
Fan Speed 2,000 RPM
Max Air Flow 87.63CFM
Max Air Pressure N/A
Noise 32.91dBA
Bearing Type Sleeve Bearing
Life Expectation 30,000 hrs
Connector 3 Pin
Weight 225 g

Link to fan.

Various pics:








Fan installed:






The Test
For the test I ran OCCT and allowed Everest Ultimate to montitor the temperatures. Before I ran OCCT I opened Everest's Monitoring tab to see what the RPM the fans were reporting.

Thermaltake Smart Case Fan set to 2000RPM via Zalman Fan Mate II.


Scythe Ultra Kaze at 12V (aka 2000RMP).


OCCT before the test.


OCCT Results with Thermaltake Smart Case Fan @ 2000RPM.







OCCT Results with Scythe Ultra Kaze @ 2000RPM







Noise
For this test I tried to isolate the fan from background noise and other sounds that may affect the test. I used an old PS2 SOCOM microphone along with Nero 8 WaveEditor to record 5 second clips of the fan. I positioned the microphone 5 inches away from the fan pulling in air. Because of the forum file upload limitation I had to compress the .wav files to .mp3 format. I used Nero 8's LAME profile to compress the audio files. Download the files, extract them and listen for yourself. Subjectively I would say that the Thermaltake fan at 2000 RPM has a higher pitch than the Scythe running at 12V.





Conclusion
Well there you have it. The Scythe doesn't seem to perform as well as the Thermaltake fan set to 2000RPM. While the TT fan was spinning faster than the Scythe the few extra degrees is not worth putting the TT fan back in my machine. On the plus side the Scythe fan is quieter than the TT fan at roughly the same RPM. There is the information for you to look at and now you can decide if you want buy some Scythe Ultra Kaze fans. Only time will tell now if the sleeve bearing gets louder and how long the fan will last.

Miscellaneous Pics