Review: Hedgehog / Super Hedgehog

Hedgehog / Super Hedgehog

NAME Hedgehog-238M
MATERIAL C1020 
SIZE 61X69X61
WEIGHT 445G
FAN 60X60X25 5400rpm 3pin connector/molex

These hedges have been the want of many overclockers the are very similar to Alphas but they are made entirely of copper, so I hear yourself yelling what's the down side, well it is heavy... but who cares.. how does it perform is all that matters...

Kanie are new to the overclocking / cooling market but they sure hit the market with a bang with there latest cooler the hedgehog-238m this thing certainly rocks, it is one of the most impressive coolers I've seen in my life. They decided to develop a copper heatsink after noticing a lot of people yelling for one. The design is similar to an Alpha BUT! it isn't the same, this one doesn't have specially shaped fins, they have holes and copper strips put in them. If this product is to show for the rest of there plans they will rule the market, this is a nice heatsink made of pure copper, infect let me tell you about it...


This heatsink needs to be looked as an upgrade for the ever so popular Alpha Range, which also work on the same idea, a heatsink with large fins and a large fan on top, with the overall shroud covering it. The Alphas have been regarded as the best heatsink's for overclocking, but also seen as a little expensive. This heatsink has been described as a the only one for overclocking, it has been developed for socket A and also FCPGA with a copper plate, it lies perfectly flat. I've noticed a few other reviews on the net about this heatsink and people saying that the bottom isn't flat, this one was perfect I didn't even need to sand it, but I will try later on with some of my "special" polishing cloth.

The seems to have been designed with the same heatsink overall heatsink style of the Alpha but with a few changes, firstly as they were working with copper they had a few problems making it they can't "drill" it to easily, as copper is very soft and could be damaged easily. They have literally inserted the fins to the base of the heatsink. The unit is orange duh! and it is made of copper, it also has an Alpha style clip which has a long clip, which to be honest isn't the easiest way of fitting it but it does a very good job of holding it in place.

There is a metal shroud which goes over the main unit between the heatsink and its 60mm fan on the top. Another thing which you notice when you compare the hedgehog with an Alpha is the fact that the pins are more densely packed on the Alpha than on the hedgehog this is probably due to problems in working with the copper. But this looks like it could cause a problem in performance. I wouldn't mind knowing the thermal resistance of this copper to do more further tests:(

Unlike most of the heatsink's this doesn't come ready made and ready to put on, I built it in a matter of seconds and it had a couple of major advantages... it didn't have any poor thermal paste on the bottom... But as I stated this has a much louder fan, sounds like an aircraft is taking off. But I am used to the noise and it feels like my baybus is going to retire... but I still love it ;) 46 DBs ;)

Anyway on to testing: -
Test System: -
Coolermaster ATCS 200 Case
Abit KT7 Raid
1Ghz TBird CPU
Alpha PAL Cooler
Hedgehog Cooler
Global Win FOP38 Cooler
Elsa Ge-force 64MB GTS
1 * Crucial 128meg PC133 Cas2 Dimm
1 * Mushkin 128Meg PC150 Cas2 Dimm
Quantum Viking 2 9.1 GB LVD SCSI DRIVE
Seagate Barracuda 50.1GB LVD
Soundblaster Live Soundcard
Adaptec 2904u2w Scsi card
Pioneer 6xDVD/32xCD Scsi
Teac 32X CDRom Scsi
And my baybus ;)

Well, I had to test this, and the best way I could think of was to well put it in my pc ;) To test this I took off my Alpha from my TBird 1Ghz and cleaned the CPU off with some alcohol. This means the top of the CPU will be nice and clean and will be ready for testing. Then after building the cooler I put a little bit of arctic silver on the bottom and fitted it being more careful than you would guess! I then took it off again to make sure no damaged was made, sounds silly but I needed to check, both the cooler and the cpu were ok. I took it off and polished the bottom with some of my special paper and then cleaned it off


After cleaning the CPU I put a small bit of the artic silver on the core of the CPU and then dab it around with a small bit of plastic, this stuff seriously rocks ;)

This was a bit of a pain to fit at first esp. as it was copper and heavy I didn't want to kill my TBird, the clip was a little stiff To fit this it was easy, I've never had much problems with heatsinks on socket A chips but you cant be to heavy handed with them. I put the heatsink on and gently pulled over the clip and it was fine.

As usual the first thing I did was to dive in the bios to check my cpu wasn't going to melt down then one with the testing, I also noticed something interesting, which was the fact my fan is now at 7100 RPM, ouch that is fast.... the temperature of the cpu was normal for a clean boot, running at 38 degrees, but you do notice the fan which is rather loud. I then booted windows 2000 and did a little browsing on the net to see what was about for about an hour or so, then I checked the temperature of the CPU in the bios and it hadn't risen more than 4 degree it was very cool indeed, this heatsink was a real treat. This was good, when I had the Alpha installed I had a few problems with heat rising which was unwanted of course. I then dived back in to Windows and ran 3DMark on a 2 hour loop to see how hot it got. After doing this I came back found the system was perfectly stable and was running fine. I checked the case temperature and also the CPU it had risen a tiny bit to a mere: 45 degrees, this heatsink is the one to have.... 

Results: -

All tests were done on the 1Ghz with Arctic Silver paste to get the best results out of this heatsink

 
Conclusion
I think this heatsink is one of the best I can find and that I've ever seen.  I am unsure if this would be suitable for all people to fit as it is copper and it could cause some problems.  It outperforms the Alpha and were slightly better than the Taisol heatsink. I think that this is a must for any serious overclockers, but remember the noise;  And this heatsink is lovely! If only they had done more work on it like Alpha did with there's, it would completely beat any other heatsink if they could just get the surface area up.

Pros: - 
Copper
Socket A Compatible 
Good Value

Cons: - 
Could be better developed
Could have a better Fan

Summary
I think these are the ultimate they are designed for hardcore overclockers and also they look very nice as well, congratulation to Kanie on a cool product.. literally.

Now, Ive got the normal fan but any serious overclocker would put a  Delta. I took this fan off from my Fop38, and didn't even put a grill on it, I don't know why but I didn't, hey my fingers are still here ;) so I had to shut my case... here is what we found :-

As you can see this setup with a delta on it seriously rocks, I don't think this heatsink can be beaten easily.