Introducing, the new AeroActive Cooler 6. It seems like with every new generation of ROG Phone, it has a brand new cooler design as well. I’m not complaining though, since the new AeroActive Cooler 6 comes with a brand spanking new 4-button design.
In today’s review, we’re literally reviewing this accessory only – because it brings so many new features and cooling capabilities to the ROG Phone 6, we think it deserves its own review.
The new AeroActive Cooler 6 comes in a rather huge box, in my opinion. Inside the box, there are two items inside – the AeroActive Cooler 6 itself and also a case.
The phone case is technically just the case included with the ROG Phone 6 Pro, but it has a larger cutout for the cooler to be in contact with the phone because the cooler is actually very huge, considering that the wing spans widely.
How to install the cooler is also very simple – we need to press the button at the top to release the clamp, then slide the phone in and connect the USB-C port, then snap the clamp back inside and the AeroActive Cooler 6 has been installed.
The AeroActive Cooler 6 has a total of 4 buttons – so we have the L1 and R1 shoulder buttons around the top curvature that is meant to be pressed downwards, then there are two larger L2 and R2 buttons that are pressed inwards to the cooler.
You might wonder – hey, can I just use the buttons on the AeroActive Cooler 6 instead of the AirTriggers? Hmmmmmm, not really.
How to hold and use the AeroActive Cooler 6?
Throughout my experience, I think this cooler is designed in a very special way. I think that it is made in tandem with the AirTriggers that are built onto the ROG Phone 6.
Mapping the buttons of the cooler is the same as how we map the AirTriggers, so just do the same for the AeroActive Cooler 6 and we’re set.
However, depending on how many buttons on the AeroActive Cooler 6 that you want to use, you might need to change the way you hold the phone. Take a look at these two shots – if I am only using the L1 and R1 buttons, then the grip can be rather loose. If I want to use L1 R2 and L2 R2 buttons, then I’ll have to grip the phone in a very specific way.
But, no matter which of the buttons of the AeroActive Cooler 6 I want to use, my forefingers are always around the AirTriggers because of how the cooler is designed. That goes to show that the cooler is cleverly designed to make users hold it in a particular way, but whether or not that way of holding the device is comfortable – is another question on its own.
Comfort
I played Genshin Impact and while the L1 and R1 buttons are great as they work in tandem with the AirTriggers on the phone. But using these buttons means that the phone is constantly getting pushed down, so I have to use the base of my palm to support that force.
If I want to use the L2 and R2 buttons then the phone will get pushed upwards, towards my face – so the base of my wrist will have to wrap around the phone to prevent that from happening.
For big hands like mine, I find that the overall grip is okay, just that I really don’t like how the L2 and R2 buttons are positioned and require quite a lot of force to actuate the button.
One of the improvements I’d like to see actually adding a grip so that we can hold the device better. Maybe something that can be attached and removed quickly like the Kunai 3 Gamepad’s grip. That would drastically improve the comfort, honestly.
Design of the AeroActive Cooler 6
Let’s go back to the AeroActive Cooler 6. It has a rubber flap on top so that we can still the power button when the cooler is installed. There are lots of RGB at the back of the phone as well.
It also has a kickstand, which I think is nice to have since you can also use the AeroActive Cooler 6 together with the Kunai 3 Gamepad to create something like this.
There is also another USB-C port at the bottom of the cooler so that we can charge the phone while the cooler is attached – or use it in tandem with the Kunai 3 Gamepad to create this.
Cooling performance
Okay, enough about the buttons – how is the cooling performance of the AeroActive Cooler 6? Wel, this is where things get interesting. I recorded a 30-minute gameplay video at first but then I realized it’s not scientific enough since the test is inconsistent.
Once we plug in the AeroActive Cooler 6, we can head into the Armoury Crate to configure the cooler’s cooling mode. There are 4 modes to choose from:
- Smart – automatically adjust according to the temperature of the phone
- Cool – only turn on the fan
- Frosty – turns on both the fan and the thermoelectric cooler (a.k.a. TEC or peltier cooler)
- Frozen – cranks up the fan speed to the maximum and turning on the thermoelectric cooler as well. This Frozen mode will require the charger to be plugged into the cooler’s USB-C port
To test its cooling performance, I resulted to use 3DMark Wilf Life Extreme stress test. Why we use this test is because it shows how many degrees Celsius it has risen since the beginning of the test. Of course, I also turned on X Mode to generate more heat.
So, I did a total of 4 tests – the first test with no cooler, the second test with the cooler in Cool mode, then the third test with the cooler in Frosty mode, and lastly with the fan in Frozen mode.
The results are interesting. As you can see on this table here, if we compare with the result we got without the fan, we can see the temperature delta with the fan in Cool mode only, the temperature dropped by 4°C.
Then, when we turn on the peltier cooler in Frosty mode, the temperature dropped by an additional degree Celsius. We’ll get back into this later.
The last test with the Frozen mode, the temperature actually dropped significantly by yet another 5°C. That’s a huge temperature delta of 10°C compared to the bare naked phone but of course – that also means you’ll need to bring a power bank with you to use it in Frozen mode and the fan noise is… loud.
But, what I want to highlight here is the minuscule improvement that the peltier cooler has. How peltier coolers work is essentially by using electricity to create a hot side and a cold side. Usually, the hot side will have some sort of fan to blow the heat away but in the case of the AeroActive Cooler 6, there’s no way for the heat from the hot side to escape.
Judging from what I can infer, the tiny 1°C drop might be due to most of the hot side’s air being blown back into the phone, which is why there is only a 1°C improvement.
Power consumption
As for the power consumption of each cooling mode, I can only get an estimate as I use the ROG Phone 6’s battery bypass mode and changing the fan modes then record our wattmeter’s reading. I think it doesn’t matter much – but yea, these are the power the cooler consume depending on what cooling mode you’re using.
Does the AeroActive Cooler 6 work?
In short, does the AeroActive Cooler 6 work? Yes, but I think the Chill mode is technically the most effective since it drops the temperature by 4°C and doesn’t require to be connected to a charger or power bank.
As for the price of RM349, it surely is a hefty price to pay for an accessory for the phone – but it does elevate the gaming experience by a lot.
Can we use the AeroActive Cooler 6 with the ROG Phone 5?
One big issue that I need to point out – the AeroActive Cooler 6 that we have here is made specifically for the ROG Phone 6. The ROG Phone 6 only has a USB-C port at the side.
However, we can plug this AeroActive Cooler 6 into the ROG Phone 5 and it fits perfectly – but it doesn’t work. That is because ROG is going to release another special edition AeroActive Cooler 6 for the ROG Phone 5 which I have no idea why they are doing this because as you can clearly see here – it plugs in just fine!
It seems like there’s some sort of software lock to prevent the ROG Phone 5 from using the AeroActive Cooler 6 – and that is disappointing. Also, the AeroActive Cooler 5 from last year cannot be used on the ROG Phone 6 since there are no pogo pins.
By the way, check out all the other videos regarding the ROG Phone 6 as well. Here’s our playlist.
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