| TOP 5 BEST Heat Sinks |  |
SEARCH | |
All Heat Sinks | |
News | |
Reviews | |
|
|
| ||||||||||
|
 |
||||||||||||||
|
Zalman CNPS7000-Cu CPU Cooler Review
When all this noisy hype died down, and all of our friends went back home, in the silence we realized our computers were loud, and I mean really loud. It got annoying, head-ache annoying. There is only so much time one can spend feeling 'manly' at the roar and whine of our powerful machines before it becomes obnoxious, annoying, headache evoking. Now the quest for silence begins. We add the search for "dB" instead of just CFM when looking for CPU fans. We start looking at the fan size and RPM knowing of their correlate factor in noise levels, and it is fair to say we search long and hard. A few of us find water-cooling. We say "screw all the costs!! Stop this #%*$&! racket!" I tried water-cooling, and the ones that are good, cost a lot more that they should. I bought $110 water-cooling system, and it's for sale today. Here is the problem with water-cooling system. When I first turned it on, it was like "COOL! it's 10 degree's cooler than my former Volcano heatsink! Then I waited a while, played a few games, encoded some stuff and eventually, it went hotter and hotter. In the end it was even hotter than my old Intel retail heatsink. The water warms up. So what do I do? Put another 80MM Fan on the radiator. Still not as good as the Intel Retail HSF. So I put 2 more fans on the radiator and now I had 2 pushing and 2 pulling air through it. After a long day of using the computer it will be just as cool as Intel retail HSF. However, with all those stupid fans, it's a lot louder than that Intel heatsink. What's the point? If you keep your window open in the winter, your CPU will be cooler than an Intel OEM HSF with water-cooling and 1 80MM Fan. But in a 75F degree room, it's only a matter of a few hours when (and it will take a good few hours) your CPU temp will be around 70F as well. This is during idle, not while playing games which is totally unacceptable. So water-cooling was officially thrown out when I got the Zalman CNPS700-Cu Heatsink.
First, here's my system specs: Pentium IV W/HT 2.6Ghz @ 800FSB. Kingston PC3200/DDR400 Dual Channel Ram; 1GB. WD-1800JB (8 Megga-cache) X 2 Serial ATA Raid 0; 360GB (with HDD fan on each). MSI 865 Neo - FISR. GF4-4200Ti. Leadtek TV Deluxe XP. Sound Blaster Audigy W/Hoontech Optical/Coaxial IO. Plextor 52X32X52X; black. Lite-on DVD (rips DVD's @ 16X); black. Forton 530Watt W/Noise-Killer PSU. Sony 21" FD Trinitron Flat tube. (Soon to be 24") Goes up to 3MP (2048 X1536), NI Flicker free; black. Logitech MX-500. Some Goodlookin' case outta South Korea. Front USB 2.0 and Firewire. h/k AVR 55 DD Receiver (soon to be separates), VF730 S-VHS, Carver SD/A-360. ACI Jag II Stereo. ACI Titan II Stereo Subwoofers, 75LB each goes down to 20Hhz. ACI Quake Subwoofer (down to 33hz, for center channel). ACI MC1 (Center Channel).
This machine is more HT than PC, and that's the way I like it. Sure my HTPC takes up an entire room, but it's worth it. I am the president of a company that makes HTPCs. Either people who want what I call a 'true HTPC' like mine, or people who want to add a little HT to their PC. Either way, the majority are people who want to add a rack mount PC to their HT. I've had something like this for years, and never thought it would be marketable or catch on... boy was I wrong. Soon I went into cooperation with the HiFi shops and thus my corporation was formed, HiFi Computers, Inc. I tell you this because regardless if people have a $20,000 HTPC (yes 95% of the cost is HT not PC) noise is still an issue that can not simply and easily be overcome by simply throwing dollars at it. My clients don't want to overclock, they want quiet. They also don't want any water near $100,000 worth of electronics. Water can leak, needs to be refilled, and the pumps slightly vibrate. So the quest for a *silent* air cooler is on... for now. :) You never can say never in this industry. One may look at this review and laugh 6 months from now, or 6 years from now when CPU's just need a little heatsink. Who knows. But for now, The Zalman CI-6000 is the winner, hands down.
I'm not going to bore you with how I installed it. It's intuitive, there are instructions. It's not THAT big and heavy as everyone claims it to be. It will fit in your case most likely.
I compared the Zalman CNPS700-Cu heatsink in an A-B test to an Intel Retail Fan, Volcano Fan, and Ahanix Water-cooling rig. I don't have any super sound/temperature measuring equipment expect by comparison to my other fans/systems and my wannabe audiophile ears. MSI's Fussy Logic temperature gauge is what I used for testing temperature. Which is good enough, because everything is relative, and that will tell us which one is hotter, etc. I also used the fan at the highest RPM level available. Idle, on a hot summer day, after having the computer on all day, my MSI's temperature says: 1. Zalman fan 50C
In short: Water-cooling: eventually it will be a handful of degrees less than room temperature, but you get what you pay for. It is a hassle to turn on and off, and add in the slightly vibrating pump and refilling the reservoir. It's just not worth the price yet. Intel OEM heatsink is quieter, but hotter running.
the Volcano heatsink is louder but cooler running. So the Zalman fan is *tip top notch* in quality, quietness, and coolness. This fan was extensively engineered, and manufactured with the highest quality. Not a flaw in it. This wasn't slapped together. They went all out and made a better heatsink/fan. Zalman didn't just try to get some copper and drill a 80MMfan to it like all the rest. They were not satisfied with the noise/performance of the other 80MM fans, so they manufactured their own 92mm fan. Gotta love those Koreans. They are definitely up front with this computer enthusiast stuff. I'm an American and I lived in Korea for a time, I speak Korean, and years ago, their cases abandoned computer beige. Koreans know quality, craftsmanship and excellence. In fact, all the time I was there, I never saw a computer case that wasn't stylish. But style is not the only thing.
Sure the Zalman is a work of art, but it's also manufactured with an Asian work
ethic, a computer enthusiast/overclocker in mind. If you get this if you want to
overclock or you get this because your ears are bleeding, it's a safe bet. The
cost is 1/2 the price of the cheapest/crappiest water-cooling systems, quieter,
and outperforms them hands down.
|
|
|
| ||||||||||||
 | |||||||||||||||
 |
||||
 |
Find a Heatsink / RSS Feeds |
FrostyTech.com Info | ||
So
we all started to become obsessed with overclocking and performance. We invited all our friends over to LAN
parties with music blaring and people yelling and shouting at each other... With all the noise
and hype of overclocking and getting CPUs to go faster and faster
we forgot something in all the noise. 
Now you probably recognize
most of the hardware, until you get to the bottom because this is
a Home TheatrePC (HTPC). 
I
was fearful at reading all the other reviews and looking at the size of this thing in
the case. I thought it would hit my PSU. It's about the size of a CD, and
extends about 1CM (.25 inches) above the top of my MSI MB. Most MSI MB's
have the same layout, so if you have a new MSI, and are worried about the
compatibility, don't be. 
