Prolimatech Megahalems CPU Cooler Review

Heatsink Construction & Design

If one was to just glance at the Megahalems from the side you could easily be forgiven for thinking this was just another tower cooler. In a nutshell this hybrid tower design is basicall a standard tower cooler with a huge chunk taken out of the center. Indeed, it was designed from the ground up to incorporate two smaller cooling towers into one base.


Starting at the base and working our way up we see that this is not a HDT or heatpipe direct touch cooler; rather it uses the older solid base with 6 large heatpipes sandwiched between it and a top chunk of metal. It may be old school, but then again the TRUE is still a top contender using this design so we shouldn’t discount it on this fact alone.

As with many other similar coolers, the Megahalems’ heatpipes have been laid out into two distinct patterns with 3 running East to West, and the other three West to East. Usually, these are staggered or interposed but Prolimatech has gone for the simpler approach and has them clustered into their two groups. The only downside we can really point to is the straight lined approach Promilatech has taken as all 6 heatpipes line up perfectly with each other. In a normal tower this setup has been proven to be slightly less efficient at cooling those heatpipes as the first acts as wind block for the others. It will be interesting to see if this is the case here.


As we said earlier, the center of the tower fin array design is missing and the two sections and their accompanying small cooling fins are separated by a good chunk of space. The idea behind this is very simple and it really is surprising why no one has though of it before. As most of you are well aware, the area directly in front of the fan hub is a dead zone, and more importantly, when you have a solid face style cooler the static pressure is increased (this is why Noctua and Thermalright for example have multifaceted faces to help reduce static pressure). By removing this dead zone altogether, Prolimatech has not only reduced the static pressure dramatically but they have also made what appears to be a negative pressure zone in the center. What we mean is the air from the fan being pushed over the fins will naturally want to take the path of lest resistance which is straight down the center “hole”. This in turn will cause a lower pressure area to each side of the hole which in theory should suck cool fresh air in from the sides and increase the overall cool “fresh” air movement over the cooling fins of both towers.


If our theory of having a negative pressure zone is correct, having all the 6 heatpipes line up makes sense as this increases their surface area to the side intake cool air. Basically, not only will this heatsink be cooled by the fan's air moving over it, but the wake of that air will suck in even MORE air to further cool each of the sections' fins.


This cooler is (L)130mm X (W)74mmX (H)158.7mm and while the center hole idea is obviously this cooler's main claim to fame (and it certainly will be interesting to see if it works as well as we think it will) it’s not its only trick. This cooler is a serious piece of kit, and its superior built quality back this up. Prolimatech were obviously not taking any chances with this product as it not only has six large 6mm U-shaped heatpipes but has numerous cooling fins on each of the two I-tower frames. This adds up to a lot of surface area and when you throw in dual fan capabilities on top of its 790grams of pre-fan weight, you are left with one serious cooler.


The base of this unit is NOT perfectly flat. It is close to flat but the razor test showed a slight ripple in the base even though it is decently polished with no major tool marks (though many smaller ones are present). It will be interesting to see how this “imperfect” base effects its performance.

Overall, (and with the base as the exception) the tech and engineering which has gone into this unit is impressive. However, even some of the worst ideas must have looked great on paper. So with that in mind let’s stop talking about this interesting and unique cooler and start USING it!