Intel’s Alder Lake LGA 1700 Cooler Shows Up Online, Has Wraith Spire Vibes

Intel’s box coolers have long been overdue for a refresh; fortunately, it seems that “team blue” will finally deliver and ship a more adequate cooling solution with the forthcoming (non-K) Alder Lake series of processors! As the old saying goes: better late than never!

Pictured below is the so called Laminar RM1 cooler that had leaked back in September. This time around, though, we can really make out the fine detail and, needless to say, it’s not exactly a mind-blowing design — hardly anything worth writing home about. Looks aside, it’s not any beefier a cooling solution than the ones that came before it.

It’s not necessarily a fresh coat of paint either, but one simply has to wonder: will such a meager heat sink really suffice for 65W Alder Lake CPUs? Acoustics and thermals will almost surely be sacrificed and it’s impossible not to take issue with such a thing. It’s a missed opportunity, and the fact that it came after a long series of misses makes it all the more upsetting.

Temper Your Expectations

Now, to be fair, non-K Alder Lake processors won’t run nearly as hot as their more powerful 125W brethren, so there’s no huge reason for concern here. With that being said, it’s truly baffling that Intel has seemingly just added a fancier shroud on top and called it a day. A bonus LED strip around the fan might look nice, but it obviously does nothing to improve its performance.

There is a possibility that Intel will ship this particular cooler with 35W CPUs, but that still remains to be seen — one can never be too certain these days. After all, we’re talking about a company that had shipped multiple generations of processors all on the same 14nm manufacturing process.

This might not seem like a burning issue but is nonetheless hugely important: these are the coolers most folks will only ever be using with their non-K Alder Lake processors. Enthusiasts will, naturally, supply their own aftermarket solutions, but these individuals aren’t great in number. It’s the “casual” buyers that deserve the most attention as they don’t possess the same amount of knowledge and technical savviness. And it is precisely this sizable group that Intel could fail yet again. It’s still too early to jump to conclusions, but Intel doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to these things so our apprehension is definitely warranted.

In any case, we’re bound to find out in just a few weeks!