The Basics:

The first image shows an overview of the Cooler Master Hyper TX. The fan is one of the first interesting features worth checking out. It is a 92mm unit that features 9 curved blades that look a bit like a turbine, and should push a good deal of air through the fan with minimal noise. This picture also shows that the unit uses the standard Intel push and turn mounting clipos, which helps make installation a snap. Many "high end" coolers rely on a design that bolts through the motherboard, and although it may make installation ultra secure, it is a hassle to have to disassemble your system to install a cooler.


Looking at the cooler as posed in the below left image initially made me laugh. I got the visual of Darth Vader's helmet due to the unique shape of the plastic shroud. This bit of plastic really adds a great deal to the Hyper TX in terms of performance, silence, installation, and secondary cooling.


First, the plastic 'lip' guides the air from the fan straight through the aluminum fins of the heatpipe. Second, the fan is not bolted or clipped directly to the cooler, but rubber standoffs support it to the shroud to reduce vibration/noise. Next, the whole shroud and fan assembly can be slid right off the the cooler, which we will see makes installation extremely easy. And finally, the lip on the backside of the Hyper TX is designed to direct a percentage of the fan's air down to cool whatever motherboard features may be in the vicinity.


The below left image shows the base of the cooler, and the first thing you may notice is that thermal paste is pre-applied. This is not the typical thermal pad as found on the stock Intel cooler, but is more like thermal paste you might apply yourself. It arrived intact, so we'll give it a shot during testing.


The above right image shows the shroud and fan removed from the cooler, and we can see that the fan lead provides a 4-pin connection which can connect to most modern motherboards that provide fan speed control. The shroud slides onto the cooler guided by a groove on either side, and when fully in place a small clip on the top provides just enough catch to hold it firmly in place.