Hot on the heels of the impressive Freezer 7 Pro review (April 7th~ Editors Choice), I today find myself testing an altogether different beast. Whereas the Freezer 7 Pro was designed from the outset to be a low cost, moderately sized and quiet CPU cooler, today's review unit is a monster of a heatsink marketed as a high end, no-compromise heavyweight -- did the title give it away? Yes, it's the Scythe Ninja Rev.B!

But surprisingly (to this reviewer at least), the Ninja Rev.B isn't as uncompromising as it could have been (all for the better). It comes with a low noise fan of decent quality, and i can say right now that this cooler is not just an option for the overclockers out there, the Ninja is a dream for the HTPC crowd or those with sensitive ears, providing you can fit the thing in your box, that is.

So to sum up in an introduction exactly where to place the Ninja, you'd have to say it is an uncompromising low noise solution, not necessarily designed for the lowest temperatures with no regard to noise pollution, but to offer the best temps possible with minimal airflow, and the two ends of the scales are massively different goals, it really isn't as simple as assuming that if a cooler is good with high airflow, then it must be very good with low airflow. As already said, the design goals are different, and so is the performance outcome.

This one is no doubt going to be interesting as not only is the Ninja Rev.B built for low airflow, but Scythe claim it is such an efficient heatsink -what with its 12 heatpipes and huge surface area- that you can fling the fan across the room and go "passive".

I'm ready to test all the above claims to see exactly where the Ninja excels and where it crashes and burns, and wIth passive testing ahoy, that last comment may be more "assute" than "tongue in cheek".