Time for a new CPU cooler review, this time the turn goes to Gelid. Gelid is a company that made a nice impression last year introducing themselves by releasing their first aftermarket CPU cooler, the 'Silent Spirit' cooler.

Times change, progress is made and anno Q4 2009 it's time to release their second mid-range consumer level CPU cooler. Their latest creation comes in the form of a tower cooler called Tranquillo --  as in tranquilizer we suspect.

Over the years we have seen several cooling methods grow in popularity, two jump out big-time, liquid cooling and heatpipe based CPU coolers.

Why did Heatpipe cooling become so popular?  Well, when done right you can achieve three things. Pretty efficient cooling, low noise, and fairly nice aesthetics. Tranquillo  --- we find the product at the premises of Gelid. Armed with Swiss management and design team, yet based in Hong Kong, Gelid hints a lot towards Arctic cooling.

Gelid ... well let's look it up in the dictionary:

Adj. 1. gelid - extremely cold; "an arctic climate"; "a frigid day"; "gelid waters of the North Atlantic"; "glacial winds"; "icy hands"; "polar weather" arctic, frigid, icy, glacial, polar cold - having a low or inadequate temperature or feeling a sensation of coldness or having been made cold by e.g. ice or refrigeration; "a cold climate"; "a cold room"; "dinner has gotten cold"; "cold fingers"; "if you are cold, turn up the heat"; "a cold beer" Need I say more ? You'll notice a lot of similarities. Recently Gelid silently introduced new thermal paste and a new design ventilator, a couple of weeks ago they however launched their Gelid Tranquillo, a low cost yet efficient CPU cooling solution.

Today we'll test a Intel Core i5 750 processor in both a default and overclocked state with this cooler. But let's have a peek first.