Spire has a lot of work to do with the Spire Gemini Rev. 2 and a lot of competition to keep in check, so how does it stand up?

An absolute must for any HD6990 owners

You just know by the sheer size of the box it comes in that the Fiend Shark is a bit special, but even so, its size may still surprise you, as will the care taken with the way the contents are packed. It certainly puts most other cooler manufacturer's to shame in that respect, with its fixing components all having their own separate space in the two plastic packing trays.

Great design, great cooler

A good all-round CPU cooler, but is it worth the price?

Easy to fit cooler for upgraders

This CPU chiller is good for stock clockers only

This CPU cooler looks better than it performs

Can this passive GPU cooler keep your HD 6850 silent and deadly?

Can this self-contained water cooling system keep your chips chilled?

A well built and effective CPU cooler, but is it good value for money?

Corsair gets progressive in the battle to lower case temperatures

A CPU air cooler described as "silent" – but is it efficient?

Superb cooling for you GPU - if you get your hands dirty

In its attempt to bolt as much on as possible, we think Cooler Master has lost sight of simple efficient cooling. Installation is tricky and causes issues with memory. It's also overly noisy for the level of cooling it provides.

The performance is the one thing to take away from this, it's simply excellent. Couple that with a reasonable price tag and if you're after a high-performance cooler, and don't mind supplying your own fan, then you're onto a winning combination.

Crazy naming aside, you get the feeling the Prolimatech Armageddon means business, it's a hefty 750g of heatsink cooling with six heatpipes and a 160mm high rack of cooling fins, which measure 140mm across.

There's little we have to criticise on the Xigmatek Gaia SD1283, it is out performed a little by more expensive units but that's why you pay your money. We're not massive fans of the mounting system but it is highly flexible.

It takes the classic low-profile design that can still fit into a slimline PC case and yet provide efficient high-performance cooling without excessive noise levels. Its main problem is that it has some fine competition the classic Zalman Super Flower Cooler is still one of the best on the market or the more recent Scythe Shuriken with its full 120mm fan is another.

Intriguingly, the first batch of Spire's Thermax Eclipse II CPU cooler hit online retailers in the wrong packaging. We mention this because we received one of these, and were a little confused as to which it was. A squint at Spire's website sets the record straight, since the Eclipse II has black nickel-coated fins, something that immediately separates it from the sea of silver aluminium you're faced with when you browse CPU coolers on any etailer's site, and those looks will definitely appeal to people with a windowed chassis.

Cooler Master's V6 is named after the 'V' pattern of its six heat pipes, and follows on from the well-received V8 and V10 models. The arrangement is supposed to help spread the heat about better than other designs where the heat pipes are in a neat row, and Cooler Master has the thermal images to prove it.

Titan's Fenrir EVO is a big tower cooler whose looks live up to the macho name (a monstrous wolf from Norse mythology). The stack of fins are anodised a snazzy matt black with a copper-coloured section, and the top sports a wolf's-head logo.

It doesn't matter how tall your stack of fins is, if you want heavyweight cooling for your processor then liquid-cooling it where it's at.

If you're going to stress Intel or AMD's latest processors then you'll need a heavyweight cooler. Named after the monstrous wolf from Norse mythology, Titan's Fenrir sports a suitably heavy-metal wolf-head motif and certainly looks like it means business. The heavy-metal theme is not uncommon with coolers – witness Scythe's Yasya and Xigmatek's ridiculously-named Thor's Hammer. Fenrir is big beast too, standing 165mm proud of the motherboard. The width means you'll need to watch it fouling your RAM, especially if your sticks have heat spreaders on top.

The Hammer is a wonderful gothic-looking creation, with a very fetching gloss black nickel-plated finish complete with an usual design of interlacing fins. Thor's Hammer tops other big towers such as Titan's Fenrir by carrying a lot of pipe-work, with four main 8mm heat pipes with Direct Touch, where they're in direct contact with the top of the processor, and another three inner 6mm pipes. It's something of a monster, too, at over 160mm tall. It won't suit crowded boards, and if your RAM has heat spreaders on top you could be in for a disappointment.