Conclusion

The Xigmatek HDT-S1283 really does prove that more heatpipes and more weight is not needed since from a performance point of view it has heralded in a new cooling era as it is simply in a league of its own. It easily leaves bigger, heavier and above all else more costly coolers in its dust. Why would anyone want to stick a full kilogram of copper onto their motherboard when almost half that will give you just as good results?

Unfortunately, not everything is perfect with this unit. By relying on plastic pins, we feel that Xigmatek has really limited its true potential and it is a crying shame such a kick ass cooler is hobbled with such a cheesy mounting setup. Worse still is the fact that its fan installation process can be considered truly frustrating; however the HDT-S1283 actually has the cooling potential to make up for its prima-donna ways.

If you are like us and don’t trust 600 grams to four little push pins, Thermalright makes a very good conversion kit that will change this cooler from pushpins to a screw and backplate system for about 10 bucks. To us this would be money wisely spent and it more than likely would translate into even better results. As already mentioned, we were not too fond of the fan mounting system, since even if you do end up mounting the fan the way we recommend this setup still leaves a good-sized gap between the fan and the heatsink. We believe if Xigmatek had gone for a normal friction style mount it would have increased the cooling potential (as no air would have escaped through this gap) and the CPU numbers would have been even lower. Another minor quibble we have with this unit is we have to wonder how much better this cooler would have been if its face was as good as the Noctua’s we tested a while ago. To us if you take the mounting system of the Noctua and the front face from the Noctua and combine it with the Xigmatek HDT-S1283, you would have the best cooling solution available in terms of performance and ease of installation

In the end the HDT-S1283 has a lot going for it, and has very few negatives. We hope that future revisions will fix these little things and turn this from a very good cooler at a great price into a great cooler at an amazing price. For this reason we believe that this cooler is a Dam Good Value and should be at the top of your short list.


Pros:
- Amazing dual and quad cooling performance
- Quite fan
- HDT base works as advertised
- Great price
- Tool-less installation

Cons:
- Plastic mounting system
- Short warranty
- Fan installation may make you feel like a tool