can reach an ear-splitting speed of 2,400rpm at full speed.
Interestingly, though, Corsair has also opted for both 6mm
and 8mm heatpipes with the A500; the company claims
this adds the ability to deal effectively with CPUs with both
low and high TDP. There are four heatpipes in total, and
they all make direct contact with the CPU.
With such a huge width, you’d be right in thinking the A500
would foul your motherboard’s memory slots. However, in
a very clever bit of design, Corsair has added a slide-and-
lock fan mount mechanism, where the fans are mounted
in sliders than can be raised or lowered to cater for different
memory heights. It’s an essential move, too, because
Corsair’s Dominator and Vengeance memory modules are
some of the tallest on the market. At some heights, however,
the fans can end up with some of their blades sitting above
the heatsink, reducing airflow through it.
The fans can be detached from the brackets too, should
you need to replace them or use other models. Each
bracket can also be removed separately, and it’s much
easier to deal with these brackets for mounting your fans
than the usual metal fan clips.
At full speed, the fans certainly aren’t quiet, hitting rather
unpleasant noise levels and with a raspy tone. However, if you
use PWM control, they can fall to 400rpm, and at this speed,
they were inaudible outside our test system. We tested the
A500 in our revised test systems this month, with ARCTIC’s
Liquid Freezer II 240 being the other cooler we’ve included in
the new results. It’s a worthy comparison, because like any
large, expensive air cooler, it needs to perform similarly to all-
in-one liquid coolers to be worth it. The A500 has a tough task
too, seeing as it costs around £20 more than ARCTIC’s latest
240mm all-in-one liquid cooler.Performance
In our AMD Socket AM4 system, where the A500 was
dealing with a Ryzen 7 1700 overclocked to 3.9GHz using
an MSI X470 Gaming Pro Carbon AC motherboard, both
coolers performed the same, with just 1°C between them.
Moving to our overclocked Core i5-9600K system with a
manual all-core overclock to 4.8GHz using an Asus ROG
Strix Z370-E Gaming, we saw more of a difference. Here,
we saw a 53°C delta T for the liquid cooler and 56°C for
the Corsair A500, admittedly with higher noise levels on
the Corsair cooler.
Finally, there was our LGA2066 system, where our
4.2GHz 10-core Core i9-7900X sat at 56°C with the liquid
cooler, and 57°C with the A500. The A500 is certainly
louder than the liquid cooler at full speed, but it’s equally
quiet at lower speeds.Conclusion
The Corsair A500 is a welcome addition to the large selection
of air cooler offerings already available, especially with its
innovative approach to avoiding tall memory modules. It’s
very well made, it looks good and it’s
easy to install. Best of all, it also kept
up with a 240mm liquid cooler in all our
tests, all but matching it in two of them.
It does cost more than the ARCTIC
liquid cooler, but it also comes with
two expensive fans and is a product
that ultimately feels more premium.
The only fly in the ointment was that,
at full speed, the fans were far noisier
than those on the Freezer II 240,
while the cooler didn’t offer better
cooling. However, if you’re not too
fussed by fan noise, or if your CPU will
rarely be hitting the limiter, we can
definitely recommend the A500.
ANTONY LEATHERVERDICT
The A500 is powerful, attractive and
innovative, but it’s also a little pricey.OVERALL SCORE
85 %
COOLING
35 / 40
FEATURES
15 / 20
DESIGN
18 / 20VALUE
17 / 20
FITTING
EasyLGA115xOVERALL SCORE
87 %
COOLING
36 / 40FEATURES
15 / 20
DESIGN
18 / 20
VALUE
18 / 20
FITTING
EasyLGA2066OVERALL SCORE
87 %
COOLING
36 / 40FEATURES
15 / 20
DESIGN
18 / 20
VALUE
18 / 20
FITTING
EasyAM4can reach an ear-splitting speed of 2,400rpm at full speed.
Interestingly, though, Corsair has also opted for both 6mm
and 8mm heatpipes with the A500; the company claims
this adds the ability to deal effectively with CPUs with both
low and high TDP. There are four heatpipes in total, and
they all make direct contact with the CPU.
With such a huge width, you’d be right in thinking the A500
would foul your motherboard’s memory slots. However, in
a very clever bit of design, Corsair has added a slide-and-
lock fan mount mechanism, where the fans are mounted
in sliders than can be raised or lowered to cater for different
memory heights. It’s an essential move, too, because
Corsair’s Dominator and Vengeance memory modules are
some of the tallest on the market. At some heights, however,
the fans can end up with some of their blades sitting above
the heatsink, reducing airflow through it.
The fans can be detached from the brackets too, should
you need to replace them or use other models. Each
bracket can also be removed separately, and it’s much
easier to deal with these brackets for mounting your fans
than the usual metal fan clips.
At full speed, the fans certainly aren’t quiet, hitting rather
unpleasant noise levels and with a raspy tone. However, if you
use PWM control, they can fall to 400rpm, and at this speed,
they were inaudible outside our test system. We tested the
A500 in our revised test systems this month, with ARCTIC’s
Liquid Freezer II 240 being the other cooler we’ve included in
the new results. It’s a worthy comparison, because like any
large, expensive air cooler, it needs to perform similarly to all-
in-one liquid coolers to be worth it. The A500 has a tough task
too, seeing as it costs around £20 more than ARCTIC’s latest
240mm all-in-one liquid cooler.
Performance
In our AMD Socket AM4 system, where the A500 was
dealing with a Ryzen 7 1700 overclocked to 3.9GHz using
an MSI X470 Gaming Pro Carbon AC motherboard, both
coolers performed the same, with just 1°C between them.
Moving to our overclocked Core i5-9600K system with a
manual all-core overclock to 4.8GHz using an Asus ROG
Strix Z370-E Gaming, we saw more of a difference. Here,
we saw a 53°C delta T for the liquid cooler and 56°C for
the Corsair A500, admittedly with higher noise levels on
the Corsair cooler.
Finally, there was our LGA2066 system, where our
4.2GHz 10-core Core i9-7900X sat at 56°C with the liquid
cooler, and 57°C with the A500. The A500 is certainly
louder than the liquid cooler at full speed, but it’s equally
quiet at lower speeds.Conclusion
The Corsair A500 is a welcome addition to the large selection
of air cooler offerings already available, especially with its
innovative approach to avoiding tall memory modules. It’s
very well made, it looks good and it’s
easy to install. Best of all, it also kept
up with a 240mm liquid cooler in all our
tests, all but matching it in two of them.
It does cost more than the ARCTIC
liquid cooler, but it also comes with
two expensive fans and is a product
that ultimately feels more premium.
The only fly in the ointment was that,
at full speed, the fans were far noisier
than those on the Freezer II 240,
while the cooler didn’t offer better
cooling. However, if you’re not too
fussed by fan noise, or if your CPU will
rarely be hitting the limiter, we can
definitely recommend the A500.
ANTONY LEATHERVERDICT
The A500 is powerful, attractive and
innovative, but it’s also a little pricey.OVERALLSCORE
85 %
COOLING
35 / 40
FEATURES
15 / 20
DESIGN
18 / 20VALUE
17 / 20
FITTING
EasyLGA115xOVERALLSCORE
87 %
COOLING
36 / 40FEATURES
15 / 20
DESIGN
18 / 20
VALUE
18 / 20
FITTING
EasyLGA2066OVERALLSCORE
87 %
COOLING
36 / 40FEATURES
15 / 20
DESIGN
18 / 20
VALUE
18 / 20
FITTING
EasyAM4