Scythe Big Shuriken 2 Rev.B Low Profile CPU Cooler Review

Currently Scythe’s Big Shuriken 2 Revision B CPU cooler costs £37.99 which is a really competitive price. For that price it is coming in at cheaper than the Noctua NH-L12 and SilverStone NT06, of which it is smaller than both. While it doesn’t have the quality or extra fan of the Noctua cooler, it certainly beats it on raw performance terms. Furthermore it can’t catch the SilverStone NT06 in performance but it is nearly 25mm smaller which can make all the difference in some cases.

It is clear that the Scythe Shuriken 2 Revision B isn’t the best performing low profile CPU cooler but what is low profile? Low profile varies between what your usage scenario is as anything below the typical 155-175mm in height we see on CPU coolers is going to be “lower” profile. The Big Shuriken 2 is at the other end of this extreme being perhaps the smallest low profile top down CPU cooler you can actually get. Its closest physical rival is the Gelid Slim Hero but that is very much a budget orientated low profile CPU cooler whereas the Big Shuriken 2 is very much a performance low profile CPU cooler with five 6mm heat pipes. This actually leaves the Scythe Big Shuriken 2 in a unique place where it is one of the smallest low profile CPU coolers on the market yet packs the performance of low profile CPU coolers that are much taller, in fact for its performance if it were to be average its height would have to be around 100mm yet it is only 58mm. In essence it has got the best of both words, excellent performance and an extremely small height.

So we’ve seen the cooling and acoustic performance was generally excellent, and the height was even better in relation to these. In fact with all the bases covered I haven’t really got a lot of bad things to say about the Big Shuriken 2 and most of the things I did come up with were just “nit-picks”. The performance is much better than you can hope for at the price point of £37.99, the acoustics are excellent, the mounting system gives an incredibly firm mount and is relatively straight forward and the product looks pretty good.

Pros

• Excellent performance for the size
• Excellent acoustic performance
• A tiny 58mm high
• Capable of overclocking
• Very strong mount
• Great value for money
• Looks “the business”

Cons

• Thermal paste in a sachet not a tube, not really enough for more than one use
• Mounting procedure can be fiddly and has a lot of stages
• Fan cable isn’t black or sleeved

eTeknix says: If you’re looking for a really small CPU cooler where every millimeter counts then the Big Shuriken 2 has got your back. Furthermore it does this while still retaining an excellent level of performance that is suitable for overclocking and more importantly for HTPCs, it stays very quiet. To top it all off the whole product lives up to Scythe’s usual excellent quality standards and comes very reasonably priced. We cannot recommend the Scythe Big Shuriken 2 highly enough and it exceeds in its market segment.

We would like to say a big thank you to Quiet PC for providing this review sample.