Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler Review Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler Review

Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler Review

With a budget price tag, will the new Arctic Freezer i13 X performance live up to your expectations? We are going to find that out in our Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler review. But before anything else, let’s talk about their company.

Arctic GmbH (formerly known as Arctic Cooling) is a Swiss company known for excellent cooling solutions. They focus mainly on processors and graphics cards, cooling solutions, case fans, and excellent thermal compounds.

A CPU cooler is one of the vital parts in your computer that can massively affect the aesthetics and more importantly, the performance.

Arctic is also known to manufacture high-quality low-noise PC coolers. Throughout the years of giving extraordinary cooling products, they earned the reputation of producing one of the best products to cool your system.

Being an option for Intel processors, the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler provides excellent cooling performance at an affordable price.

But let’s see if it provides the cooling everybody needs. Let’s first discuss the packaging.

Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler Packaging

The Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler came inside a blue cardboard box, with the front packaging showing the design of the cooler. On the sides of the box, it shows the technical specifications of the cooler.

Behind the box are some images of the Arctic Freezer i13 X’s highlights. These include the 100mm static pressure optimised fan, three direct touch heat pipes, and fluid dynamic bearing designed in Germany. It also includes the small footprint design of the i13 X cooler itself.

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It is good to know that Arctic did provide us with less packaging. Going to a more environmentally friendly approach is always a good thing.

Moving on into the container, we are greeted with a thank-you card for purchasing the cooler.

Looking inside the box, it contains a leaflet with a QR code that you can scan in your smartphone. This will allow you to see the instructions on how to install the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler.

Also, the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler comes pre-assembled with the static pressure optimised fan and the accessories bag packed in a small plastic zip-lock bag.

The accessories include two plated brackets, four pieces of screws and nuts made to hold down the cooler. Arctic also included a rigid backplate for you to place behind your motherboard, which will be for mounting the CPU cooler.

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Overall, the packaging was excellent with complete accessories and information. Let’s now head over to the CPU Cooler’s design and functionality section here in our Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler review.

Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler Review – Design and Functionality

Now in our Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler review, we will judge the product’s overall design and functions.

The new Arctic Freezer i13 X fits Intel Processors. It is supported by the following Intel Sockets: 1200, 1151, 1150, 1155, and 1156.

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The Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler offers a straightforward minimalistic design provided that it has a smaller form factor than other coolers.

Going on into the design of the fan, it is nice and compact being only 100mm. The five curved pressure optimised fan blades coloured in white makes it blend in beautifully with multiple colour theme computer builds.

In the middle of the fan, we have a white and black Arctic logo. Lastly, we got three direct-contact copper heat-pipes with a pre-applied Arctic MX-2 high-performance thermal paste located at the bottom.

The Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler provides low noise and efficient cooling performance.

Select your own fan profile in your motherboard’s BIOS or UEFI and enjoy silent operation, even on heavy load.

Let’s now go to the next section of our Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler review: its key features.

Key Features of the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler

Here are the key features of the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler:

Small Form Factor

The Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler performance provides superior cooling performance despite being in a smaller footprint.

It’s made with three direct-contact copper heat pipes in a compact design. It also provides optimal cooling performance without sacrificing clearance or compatibility issues.

Robust Fan Motor

The Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler has an efficient motor which runs more quietly and has a lower temperature compared to other fan motors. This makes the Arctic Freezer i13 X motor run more effectively without adding more heat into the cooler itself.

Freezer i13 X fan is made with a fluid dynamic bearing designed in Germany. This makes the fan produce less noise and also extending its lifespan.

Pressure Optimised Fan

Despite being the only 100mm, Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler fan provides higher static pressure making it more efficient in cooling.

Static pressure fans are more effective in moving and pushing air through smaller spaces.

It has a broad RPM range which you can control through your motherboards BIOS. Also, the fan has lower power consumption and fewer vibrations.

Direct Copper Heat pipes

The Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler has three direct-contact copper heat pipes connected into the cold plate.

The cold direct contact heat pipes combined with the pre-applied Arctic MX-2 high-performance thermal paste dissipates heat effectively.

Easy Installation

Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler mounts even without the hassle of removing your motherboard from the tower case. It can be mounted easily provided that you have the tool(s) needed.

You don’t even need to buy and apply thermal paste since Arctic even pre-applied the cooler with Arctic MX-2 thermal paste.

The fan connects into the motherboard’s PWM fan connector. The fans speed or RPM can be manually controlled or set into automatic depending on your motherboards BIOS configuration.

Specifications

Let’s now look into the specifications in this part of our Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler review.

Firstly, the Arctic Freezer i13 X is only compatible with Intel CPU sockets, specifically 1200, 1151, 1150, 1156 and lastly 1156.

On the AMD counterpart, you can check out the Arctic Freezer A13 X CPU Cooler variant.

RAM clearance is not an issue with the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler since it has smaller dimensions. However, always check your RAM heat spreader height which can block the intake fan of the cooler.

The fins of the heat spreader are built from high-quality aluminium for more excellent heat dissipation.

Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler fan dimensions are 100m, with the fan speeds ranging from 300 to 2000 RPM. The noise of the fan when operational is 22.5 to 24.5 dBA, talk about whisper quiet!

Connector for the Freezer i13 X is by 4-pin PWM.

The size and weight of the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler are 86 x 109 x 137mm (L x W x H). With the cooler being 443 grams, it is one of the lightest that we tested.

The length of the packaging is 94mm, with the width being 108mm. The height of the box measures 145mm. It weighs 0.61kg.

Let us now go to the hands-on section of our Arctic Freezer i13X CPU Cooler review!

Hands-on with the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler

Upon testing the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler, we noticed that the small form factor made it easy for handling and installing the cooler. It also fits perfectly inside any mATX or ATX case that we tried on.

Idle temperatures of our test bench with the stock Intel cooler reached around 28°C in 30 minutes and with the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler installed being 22.7°C.

This temperature difference is highly noticeable and makes the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler a very worthy addition to your gaming rig.

We did a stress test with Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU cooler which resulted in a very impressive 59°C. Well below the cooling levels of a lot of other coolers.

The 100mm fan was noticeably quiet during heavy loads compared to other budget CPU coolers that we previously tested.

Lastly, we tested the idle temps with 100% fan speed. Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler impressed us with 21°C.

Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler Review Summary

In conclusion, the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler performed excellently provided that it uses copper and aluminium. One advantage of being an air cooler is that it will be low maintenance.

Dust and debris will not be a problem if your intake fans have dust filters, and if you regularly clean your computer.

Therefore, the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler provides an excellent cooling solution for those on a budget. Arctic Freezer i13 X can also go head to head with some of the higher-priced air coolers out in the market today.

Although it may not be ideal for major overclocking, Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler is a budget-friendly option that certainly can perform more than its price.

Just the price to performance ratio of the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler makes it a highly recommended CPU cooler.

Aside from the price and performance, the Arctic Freezer i13 X CPU Cooler is made with durable quality materials that can last for many years in your system.

We highly recommend this product for those who want to upgrade their existing stock CPU coolers, or even for those who are looking for building their first computer.

If you’d like to purchase one, head over to their official website.