A Closer Look at the MTEC Controller

If the soul of the Elite is its TECs, and the heart is the fan then the brains of this unit is the MTEC controller unit. This little black box is not only where all the power for the Elite is routed from but also it directly influences the noise and performance characteristics the Elite. This is accomplished via the LPC2141 microcontroller chip.

The LPC2141 is an ARM7TDMI-S based high-performance 32-bit RISC Microcontroller that among other things has an itegrated USB 2.0 Full Speed Device Controller. This chip is what allows the MTEC software to interact with said controller allowing you to not only override the factory default settings but also customize said settings until the unit is tweaked to what you consider perfection. If you want the utmost in cooling performance you can set up a set of advanced parameters so low that the unit will do 100% all the time to meet them. Alternatively, you can have this system stay whisper quiet right up to the point where it will perform just like a stock air cooling CPU cooler. It all comes down to your needs and how you want performance.


The MTEC controller uses a standard 6 pin PIC-E cable to power it and the entire Freezone Elite unit. On the positive side, this means that the entire unit can only use theoretically 75 watts maximum (this is more than enough as this unit is rated to use only 70 watts, which when you think about it is not much overhead but should be more than enough). The largest potential negative to using a 6 pin PIC-E power connector is not every PSU has one available if it is powering a few graphics cards. Of course, Coolit thought of this and in a great move has included a Molex to PCI-E 6-pin adapter.

All in all, the Freezone Elite continues to validate our initial impression that this is one well crafted kit. Earlier in this review we compared it to a Royals Royce and after taking a long hard look at the unit this analogy is not only fitting but actually an apt description of the Elite. Everything about this unit has been crafted with loving care, using only the highest quality of materials. Honestly, this level of quality and refinement is something one usually does not see in a production model; heck even some custom jobs that cost a lot more that the Freezone Elite are not as finely crafted. Will all this time, effort and attention to detail pay off in the testing phase? Hopefully so, otherwise we here at HWC are going to be awfully disappointed as this bad boy definitely talks the talk better than just about any CPU cooling solution we have seen so far. Let’s install this wee beastie so we can get to the testing stage!