Zalman is a somewhat new company to the world of heatsinks, they have been selling heatsinks for about a year now. Zalman just opened their first US office which is located in Orange County, CA. They were kind enough to invite me down for the grand opening and give me some things.
Zalman is a company which strives to provide high quality products which are quiet. Zalman heatsinks very unique in their design to say the least. Because of the many fins which are spread out there is a lot of surface area for the heat to be dissipated. CNPS (Computer Noise Prevention System) is a system that cuts traditional computer system’s noise of 30dB or higher to 20dB or lower, which is below what a normal user can usually notice.
The box of this Zalman CNPS6000-Cu is pretty large, only because you get so much and the heatsink is no small deal. You can also see that everything is packed very professionally.
Taking a look at the heatsink, as you can see the Zalman CNPS 6000-Cu heatsink is very unique looking which I mentioned before. It looks like an open flower which is made up of many copper fins.
The heatsink is basically made by taking all of the fins and compressing them at the base which forms the copper strip. The copper strip is the fins of the heatsink. Not only is it a very good concept but the base is finished very well.
When you purchase this heatsink you get a lot of things with it. Along with the heatsink you get a fan bracket which holds a 92mm fan. You also get a fan speed controller, this unit is basically a 6w rheostat. The fan controller gives you the option of having the 92mm fan running at different speeds.
Below are the specs of the 92mm fan which is included with the Zalman CNPS6000-Cu. The table below shows silent mode and normal mode, silent mode is when the fan controller is at the lowest setting and the normal mode is when the fan is at the highest speed. At silent mode you will only be getting 20 dB which is hardly noticeable by the human ear. Even when running at normal mode it is only 36 dB which is not very loud.
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Fan(PS92252H)
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Silent Mode
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Normal Mode
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Dimensions(mm)
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92(L) X 92(H) X 25(W)
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Weight (g)
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88
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Rot. Speed
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1600 RPM +- 10%
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2800 RPM +- 10%
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Noise Level (dB)
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20.0
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36.1
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Bearing Type
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Sleeve
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You would think that that’s all that you would get, nope, there’s more. You also get a manual which describes in good detail how to install the heatsink. In additional to all of this you also get 2 clips incase you lose or break one, you get thermal compound, a clip installation tool, and screws which you need to install the bracket. I really like the fact that you get extra screws and extra clip, I am always loosing pieces to things.
Installation of this heatsink was one of the easiest that I have ever done. All you need to do is drop the clip into the groove, place the heatsink on the core, attach the clip to one side of the tab and use the clip tool to attach the other side to the socket. I think that this heatsink looks really cool installed and if you have a window you can display something different than the standard heatsink.
After the heatsink is installed you need to install the fan bracket. To install it you just screw two to three of the silver screws into the expansion slot screw holes. When the fan bracket is installed you will need to position the fan over the heatsink by using the gold knob on the arm. Then you will plug your fan into the fan control device and the fan control device into a motherboard header. This fan control can be adjusted while the computer is running.
Test Bed
- AOpen AK77 Pro(A)-133
- 1.2Ghz Thunderbird
- 256MB Crucial PC2100
- Asus Geforce 2 GTS 64MB
- Globalwin YCC-8870 case
Like always I will be using Artic Silver 3 for testing, I will also be using an external Compunurse thermal probe for the temperature readings. I tested both the normal mode and silent mode of this heatsink. I booted up the computer and let it idle for about 20 minutes and took the reading from the probe. After I had the normal mode results I turned the fan down to silent mode using the fan controller. With it set to normal mode at idle the CPU was 45.4 degrees Celsius and with it set at silent mode the idle CPU temperature was 49 degrees Celsius. I apologize for the poor quality of the graph I need to figure out why it looks so bad.
I then used Prime95 to torture test the CPU and bring it to load. At normal mode the CPU got up to 52.1 degrees Celsius which is a little more than I like to see but it is not a bad temperature. With it set at silent mode the CPU at load got up to 55 degrees Celsius, again is not bad if you are not worried about overclocking.
Conclusion
Even though the performance is not the best in the world you must take into mind that this heatsink is designed to keep your CPU at a good temperature and at the same time having it be quiet. There are so many good things about this heatsink which I like. I like that it’s very easy to install, that it’s quiet, you get a lot of stuff and spare parts and that it looks cool. The only con to this heatsink is that it’s not the best if you’re going to be overclocking with a higher voltage.
If you want a very quiet, easy to install heatsink with a lot of extras included I would really recommend this one to you. This heatsink retails for about $45 which is really good considering all that you get, not too much if you ask me. Overall I am going to give this heatsink an 8.5/10 and award it the OCmodshop Seal of Approval. I would like to thank Zalman for giving me this heatsink to review, I will have Zalman product reviews posted soon. You can pick up this heatsink from Sharka Corporation
Pros
- Very cool looking
- Very quiet
- Good performance
- Thermal compound included
- Fan control device included
- Spare parts included
- Easy to install
- Great clip design
Cons
- Not the best for overclocking