X-bit labs

SuperCoolers Return: Zalman CNPS9700 LED and Scythe Infinity

Category: Coolers

by Sergey Lepilov

[ 12/11/2006 | 03:12 PM ]

Cooling solutions manufacturers cannot remain indifferent to the ever growing demand for high-efficiency solutions needed to deal with constantly increasing heat dissipation of central processors. This is when products known as “super-coolers” come into the game. Today we are going to introduce to you two solutions like that from Zalman and Scythe.

Table of contents:

• Zalman CNPS9700 LED
  
• Package and Accessories
  
• Design
  
• Assembly and Installation
  
• Scythe Infinity (SCINF-1000)
  
• Package and Accessories
  
• Design
  
• Assembly and Installation
  
• Specifications
  
• Testbed and Methods
  
• Thermal Performance
  
• AMD Athlon 64 Platform
  
• Intel Core 2 Duo Platform
  
• Intel Pentium D Platform
  
• Conclusion
  

It is in response to the constantly increasing heat dissipation of central processors that the manufacturers have developed high-efficiency air coolers, which have come to be known as “super-coolers”. The peak of the heat dissipation growth fell at the Pentium 4 and D processors, but the CPU manufacturers’ current orientation at creating power-economical processors doesn’t allow us to do without super-coolers because two “cool” cores heat up just as much as a single hot core does. Moreover, a processor can generate much more heat than usual if overclocked.

This makes a super-cooler still helpful and I can’t but check out two new models from Zalman and Scythe. The Korean company has released a new evolutionary model called CNPS9700 LED whereas the Japanese firm has announced a cooler called Infinity. In this review I will examine the design of these coolers, compare them with their market opponents and evaluate their noise level.

Zalman CNPS9700 LED

The Korea-headquartered Zalman is used to making new coolers larger than older ones as they did with the CNPS7000 series that was followed by the CNPS7700. Zalman plays the same trick again, replacing the CNPS9500 LED, released over a year ago, with the CNPS9700 LED model that boasts a much larger heat dissipation area.

The cooler’s design hasn’t changed otherwise and it still looks like a hedgehog curled up into a ball, only a larger one now. Anyway, this cooler is worthy of a closer inspection and study which I am going to give it right now.