Thermalright has been a major player in the CPU cooling business for more than six years. I believe it was sometime in the fall of 2001 when I heard of them. My first experience with their products wasn't until a little more than a year later when I picked up an SLK-800A. I was so impressed with their product and all the ones after that that I've used Thermalright heatsinks pretty much exclusively on my overclocked systems since. As Thermalright has grown as a company, so too has their product line. They don't make just good CPU coolers anymore. Now you can get Thermalright video card coolers, chipset heatsinks, memory coolers and even water blocks. They also have their own brand of thermal compound. It seems that whenever Thermalright has seen a need for better cooling, they've provided a solution.

Arguably one of Thermalright's best CPU coolers to date has been the Ultra-120. Both the original and eXtreme version utilize a tower design with a plated copper base and multiple heatpipes soldered to a proprietary aluminum fin structure. Thermalright is now set to further capitalize on the success of the Ultra-120 eXtreme with the release the TRue Black 120. While physically identical to the Ultra-120 eXtreme, other than the new black nickel finish, the TRue Black comes with another set of clips to attach a second fan in a push/pull configuration and Thermalright has thrown in a small tube of their improved thermal compound, Chill Factor 2.


While even Thermalright admits that without the second fan option and upgraded thermal paste, the TRue Black offers no performance benefit over the Ultra-120 eXtreme, but its name is sure to appeal to owners of AMD's Black Edition processors. In deviation from their standard brown box packaging, Thermalright has even dressed this cooler in an all black container.

Join me as I take a closer look at the Thermalright TRue Black 120.