I have seen a lot of really weird ways of keeping CPU's cool lately and this is one of those off the wall ideas that I think looks pretty good. The idea behind this mod is to pull the fan away from the heat sink to cut down on the turbulence that is normally caused by the fans hub blocking the flow of air across the center of the heat sink.

As you can see in the photos above, (courtesy of Thermaltake)  in theory by pulling the fan away from the heat sink the air should be able to be useful on a larger area of the heat sink and also flow more smoothly which would cut down on the noise level.

• ASUS A7N8X Deluxe
• AMD Athlon XP 1700+ (1467MHz @ 2000MHz 10X200 400MHz FSB)
• 2X Samsung PC-3200
• Thermaltake Volcano 9

I was kind of lazy when I installed this.  I did it without taking the heat sink off, (note to self: next time take the heat sink off.) it was kind of difficult to install with the heat sink attached. With the fan removed attach the Ducting mod to the 4 screw holes that held the fan in place with the provided screws.  The old screws will not work because they are to long but keep them somewhere safe just incase you want to remove the Ducting mod later. The fan is a little tricky to install if you leave the heat sink in place. Use the provided nuts and bolts to attach the fan and finger guard to the other side of the Ducting mod. Make sure you put the nuts on the back side so you can't see them from the front of the fan.  For the final step make sure your fan is hooked back up to whatever power source it used before.

I was a little let down when I ran all my tests and the Ducting mod didn't do anything to help cooling at all. I was hoping for at least a small improvement but it didn't improve cooling at all.  It did however do one thing that I am happy with, the sound level was lower, not a huge difference but a noticeable one.

After all my testing and the time I spent putting this mod on, I was a little upset that the performance didn't live up to what it promised. However, I was testing this system with a Volcano 9 that I get incredible performance with. Also I have an overclock that everyone has got to admit that I am getting great temps with (1700+ 1467MHz @ 2000MHz 10X200 400MHz FSB). So depending on your application you may get better results then I did. It was nice that this mod tamed the volume of the Volcano 9 because at full blast the fan would put out quite a bit of noise. I did want to add one thing before I finish off this review. A lot of people are into enhancing the looks of there computer and  spend countless time and money buying stuff for there system just to make it look better. For looks, and no other reason, I would pick this mod up. I realy like the look it gives my cooler and I think it would be worth every penny just for the looks and sound control.