Zalman CNPS7000B-Cu LED HSF Review, CNPS7700's baby brother with blue LED Options

[solo]

Zalman CNPS7000B-Cu LED CPU Heat Sink Fan Review

Author: solo

Introduction

A while ago I tested the Zalman CNPS7700 CU and I fell in love with it immediately. Today I am going to take a look at its baby brother which a 92 MM fan and includes a nice eye catching blue LED light as well.

Specifications

Intel Pentium 4 (Socket 478), AMD Duron/Athlon/Athlon XP (Socket 462), and Sempron/AMD64 (Socket 754/939/940) compatible design for broad compatibility.

Product Page

The CNPS7000B-Cu LED

- Dimensions : 109 (L) x 109 (W) x 62 (H) mm
- Weight : 755g
- Base Material : Pure Copper
- Dissipation Area : 3,154 cm2
- Bearing Type : 2-Ball
- Speed : 1,350 ~ 2,600 rpm ± 10%
- Thermal Resistance : 0.27 ~ 0.20 °C/W
- Noise Level : 18.0 ~ 27.5 dB ± 10%

FAN Speed Controller (FAN MATE 2)

- Dimensions : 70 (L) x 26 (W) x 26 (H) mm
- Weight : 20g
- Output Voltage : 5V ~ 11V ± 2%
- Allowable Power : 6W or lower
- Connector : 3-Pin

Installation





The contents include:

01) Heatsink Assembly (CNPS7000B-Cu LED)
02) Four Bolts
03) Thermal Grease
04) Fan Speed Controller (FAN MATE 2)
05) Double-sided Tape (for installing FAN MATE 2
06) Cable for FAN MATE 2
07) User's Manual - in English and Korean
08) Two Clip Supports for Socket 478
09) One A-Type (Blue) Clip Support for Socket 462
10) One B-Type (White) Clip Support for Socket 462
11) Four Bolts - For fastening the Clip Supports
12) One set of Washers
13) Two Nipples
14) One Backplate
15) Small washers (from component #12)



Lots of nice shiny copper. The base is well lapped.



Another view. One of the nice things about the 7000 compared to the 7700 is that the holes here (used to mount a Socket 939 CPU) are fixed to the HSF, whereas the 7700 comes with two loose little brackets which slide onto the HSF fan for the screws. They are generally very awkward to work with when installing the 7700 as they like to fall off. This one is much easier.



Here are the clear blades of the fan which light up nicely with the blue LED light.



And another shot.



This is a show of the fan at night and looks sweet through a case window.

Installation

This was basically almost identical as with my Socket 939 AMD CPU and the CU7700 except the CNPS 7000 is only 92 MM so there is a lot more clearance available.



For the installation of the CNPS7700 see THIS

Take note that even though I managed to install this fan on a Intel LGA 775 CPU as well this kit does actually not support this CPU by default.

As per the manual “To use this product on Socket 775, ZM-CS1 (clip support for Socket 775) must be purchased separately)”.

I just happened to have such a clip that came with my CNPS7700 which is how I managed to mount it on the LGA 775 CPU.



And here is a shot of the CNPS7000B-CU on the Abit AN8 Ultra.



Performance



I did not do an extensive selection of testing to be honest, but I can say that there is a noticeable difference in performance compared to the CNPS7700 in that the 7700 definitely does a far better job. I’m not saying the CNPS7000 does not do a good job at all though. No sir. It is far better than most stock coolers.

Noise

I cannot complain about the noise at lower speeds and at full speed it is noticeable as expected.

Fan Mate 2

Personally I am not a fan of Fan Mate as I prefer to use the software that comes with my motherboard to manually set the speeds as I desire. Also as I mentioned before Fan Mate can sometimes prove to be incompatible with certain motherboards in that the board does not pick up the fan and gives a “no fan attached” error.

Conclusion

The Good

Looks really nice in cases with a fan window (lights up the interior as well).
Large low speed fan results in silent cooling
Fan speeds can be manually adjusted with the Fan Mate provided.
Performs well
Quality product

The not so good

Does not support LGA 775 CPU’s by default.
Fan Mate can conflicts with BIOS sensors

Final words

Yet another quality product from Zalman and it also looks great.

The installation was very easy. There was plenty clearance around the heat sink. It performed well. It does not cool the surrounding components as well as the CNPS7700 did though.

Other than the lack of LGA 775 support I have no complaints.

A great product.

Retail price should be around R400.00




This post has been edited by solo: Nov 30 2005, 10:49 AM

[Vault9]

[jasonhk]

Nice Review and HSF! What CPU was it on ?

[Xenithon]

Slightly O/T but are you using that fanmate 2?? You say you do not like using it and prefer the SW. I am actually after a fanmate 2 (which you unfortunately cannot buy separately here in SA ) so if you aren't using it and wanna get rid of it (for a price of course ) please let me know.

BTW: fantastic review! Actually checked your review site today and it looks great thus far!

[solo]

Thanx

Mmm I'll let you know about the Fan Mate. Not sure if I am keeping it yet for sure.

I tried it on and Intel 775 and and FX55. The temp above was between idle and load and ambient was pretty high. Idle with FX55 was about 35.