Written: 6/20/99
Written by:
John Chow
One of the best cooler on the market today is
Global Win's VEK 12. It's low price and great performance has made it a favorite
among overclockers. The problem with it is that Global Win never designed the
VEK 12 to work with the new Pentium III CPUs. This is a problem we're going to
fix.
There are many good reasons for using the VEK
12 on a Pentium III. The first and most important is that it will simply out
perform any Pentium III cooler on the market today. Global Win VES 20, TennMax
P3 TF or any other Pentium III coolers are no match for the Global Win VEK 12
(at least until Alpha converts their P125 to work with the Pentium III).
The VEK 12 gets it great performance by the
sheer size (it's big) and number of pin fins (260) the heatsink use and by using
fans that are up to 2.5 times more powerful than it's closest Pentium III
competition.
Another reason to consider converting the VEK
12 to work with your Pentium III are the vents cut into the heatsink. This
allows the overhead fans to blow massive amounts of air (over 50 CFM) onto the
L2 cache of the Pentium III. This is a very important feature to have because
it's normally the L2 cache that prevents a Pentium III from achieving very high
overclock speeds.
Converting a VEK 12 from Pentium II cooler to
Pentium III cooler is a snap. It requires no cutting or drilling.
I don't know if Global Win did this
intentionally or by accident, but the VEK 12's heatsink is cut in such a way
that the cuts line up perfectly with the 4 mounting holes of a Pentium III (see
below).
I've always believe in using simple solutions
to problems. I'm not like Intel. I don't spend millions of dollars to design and
build special jigs just so I can remove a stock Pentium III heatsink when a 2
cent case screw will do the same thing. Then again, if I had Intel's money.....
:-)
The simple method is also what I use to
attach a VEK 12 to my Pentium III-500. There is nothing fancy about it. I didn't
invest millions of dollars trying to figure it out. All I know is it works and
it works well.
When I first got the Pentium III, I was going
to just use a Global Win VES 20 cooler on it. However, one side by side look at
the VES 20 and VEK 12 is all you need to know which one is better. Add the fact
that the VEK 12 is just 50 cents more than a VES 20 and it's a no brainer.
So, exactly how did I get a VEK 12 to work
with my Pentium III-500? Let's find out.
Next page: Putting it together
