Best Cooler for Pentium 4 (Prescotts)
11 Jul 2008 @ amazon.com
I ordered the Zalman CNPS 7000 Cu for my brother’s Dell Dimension 3000 Pentium 4 3.0ghz Prescott /w Hyper Threading Technology. On the stock Intel heatsink (Just a copper heatsink with a funnel attached to a 92mm fan on the rear of the case), the temperatures would easily hit the 45+°C on idle, and would march up around the high 50°C’s under load practically making his computer a personal space heater. This is expected of Prescott’s, they are known to run this hot.
The room temperature is constantly in the low 70°F’s, and my Celeron (Northwood) doesn’t come close to overheating nor does it reach the 50’s, and it is in an enclosed space with one opening, the rear of the cabinet. My brother’s computer is on a platform, and can get air from any direction. So cooler room temperatures were not helping the CPU get any colder.
We got this fan in, and immediately put it on. Installation took no more than an hour (had to clean the case and parts out while we were at it). We had to take the motherboard out because of its size, but that isn’t a problem with us. This fan is big and heavy, I can’t stress that enough. The motherboard is a MicroATX board in a MicroATX case so most will think the fan won’t fit, luckily this does. The only thing the fan came close to touching is the RAM, but after the RAM is seated, it is clearly out of the way. It hovers over about 10-20% of the Northbridge heatsink, and the first RAM slot so you can expect some heat to be picked up by the fan making everything else cooler as well. It was a little heavy, but not heavy enough to strain the board or any critical part with its weight.
If you go to Zalman’s website, they have a guide on how much space you need to measure from your slot to other parts of the PC to make sure it fits, and whether or not your motherboard will have any problems with it.
Zalman wanted to make sure this heatsink was on the processor, so they give you two metal brackets and a couple of screws to get this heatsink on the CPU tightly (very tightly). When you put the brackets on, do a little bit on each side at a time. Zalman states this in the booklet, and will even demonstrate it on their website. It is so they can get the tightest fit, and not break the motherboard, brackets, cooler, or screws.
It includes some thermal grease which isn’t that bad, but I’m waiting for some Arctic Silver 5 to come in. With the Zalman heatsink/fan and their grease, the P4 doesn’t rise above 48°C on load. So an amazing 10°C lower than the stock Intel heatsink. Not only that, it is quiet, even without the fan controller. So quiet, that you can hear the A/C vents (they are quiet too) over it. If you put your hand where the airflow comes out, it is always cold which is what we have been aiming for. It used to be warm air all the time. When we get the Arctic Silver 5 in, I would expect about a 5°C temperature drop since it practically does just that over standard greases. That is reserved for another review.
All in all, get this Zalman if you have a Pentium 4, and are needing a colder solution without having to buy an expensive water cooling set. It is worth every penny. If you have the extra space, don’t hesitate to get the CNPS 7700. It is the same thing, just bigger and with a 120mm fan. Also the 7700’s come with the Fanmate 2 controller which works much better than the Fanmate 1.
Impressed
30 May 2008 @ amazon.com
I first opened this thinking this is going to be a project to do. It says in the add it supports socket 939 but on the box it doesn’t have it listed.. I began to panic but calmly opened the case and removed the old fan. I was thinking great this thing is 2wice the size as the old one and there are barely any parts that came with it. The good thing is I didn’t need any of the brackets or screws that came with it and the fan housing screws where the existing fan mount to the mother board fits. I just had to unscrew and screw back in with the zalman housed to the old mount. It took me a few minutes to figure that out but after that it was a snap to install. It comes with a manual fan adjuster as well. it is a simple fan that does the trick.. this is the first day i’ve had it so i can’t comment on durability but they have a good enough reputation i’m not worried about it. So far this is a great investment and it improved computer performance immediatly. I also had to reroute the cables inside the computer but that only took a few minutes. plastic tie wraps woulld be a good idea. it took ruffly 10 minutes to install. it is a few inches wider in diameter than the old fan but it fitted without being an obstruction. the conductive grease it came with was the hardest thing to open and get to sqeeze out. I think i was running about 49C under full load now it’s about 43 in a hot room that has no ac. I imagine much cooler if you have an air conditioned room or in colder temps over a generic stock fan.
Highly recomended
05 Aug 2006 @ amazon.com
This cooler dropped CPU temps by 10 degrees at idle and under load, compared to the stock Intel unit. My idling temps dropped to 84F and at 70 percent load, have never gone over 114F. Load temps average around 111F. I’m running an Intel P4 socket 478 3.2 GHZ Northwood overclocked a modest 10 percent, to 3.55 GHZ with no increase in temps compared to running at 3.2 GHZ.
This cooler is just what I needed for a computer running 12-18 hrs daily. It’s strengths are the ability to conduct additional heat away quickly under load and to easily do the same for overclocking.
Although nearly twice the weight of most CPU coolers, the additional weight didn’t pose a problem for me. I’m running an Asus P4P800 Deluxe MB. Make sure your MB is securely supported before installing this massive cooler. Visit the Zalman website to make sure this model will work with your motherboard. As it turned out, I had plenty of room to spare for this beast, despite being about 1.5 times larger than the stock intel fan/cooler.
I almost forgot to mention how quiet this unit runs! It’s plugged directly to the motherboard, running at 2400 + RPM and the noise is barely detectable. The case fans and hard drive(s) noise easily mask the low noise levels of the Zalman fan.
The only way to get better cooling is to go with the much more expensive copper pipe/fin types, or water cooling. For the money, it’s a tough one to beat!
Blissful
20 May 2005 @ amazon.com
I bought a computer from a local store about a year ago for use as a web and email server over my DSL line. This means it is running 24x7. The standard Intel P4 CPU fan sounded like a chainsaw. I don’t have a huge house, but I could hear that fan from anywhere within it. After reading a few reviews, I decided on the Zalman CNPS7000-Cu. Here are a couple of notes:
- First off, this guy is HEAVY (773 grams == 1.7 lbs).
- Installation only took about 30 minutes (admittedly, about 10 of that was figuring out how to take the old fan off).
- The instructions were simple and easy to follow, though I would certainly recommend cleaning the remainder of the gunk off of your CPU before installing the new fan. This only applies if you are replacing an existing fan, as I was.
- In addition to being heavy, it’s big. Zalman’s website has guidelines for determining if it will fit in your case. DO THIS.
After starting the computer up, I can hear a soft whirr while I’m at the desk working on it (and I suspect that may be the power supply fan). If I step to the door, about 8 feet away, I can’t hear it. My computer is also running about 10 degrees F cooler than it was before, with RPMs in the 2500 range as opposed to 4600 with the old fan. Oh, and I’m running directly off of the motherboard, without using the included speed controller, so this guy isn’t even running in "silent mode" which is allegedly about 5dB quieter.
In the end, I HIGHLY recommend this fan to anyone wanting an inexpensive, yet effective way of quieting their environment. I will definitely be purchasing another of these for the HTPC I’ve been thinking about.
Oh, and Happy Birthday to my beautiful wife, with whom I should be spending time and not fussing with computer fans!