X-bit labs

Zalman VF900-Cu LED: New Universal VGA Cooler Review

Category: Coolers

by Sergey Lepilov

[ 08/04/2006 | 01:36 PM ]

Cute appearance, high efficiency, a very quiet fan with highlighting, tool-less installation on the graphics card – these are the features the new VGA cooler from Zalman will bring to your system. Read more in our review of this solution!

Table of contents:

• Package and Accessories
  
• Design
  
• Compatibility and Assembly
  
• Specification
  
• Testbed and Methods
  
• Thermal Performance
  
• Radeon X800 GTO2 256MB as an X850 XT PE (540/1240MHz)
  
• Radeon X1900 XTX 512MB (650/1550MHz)
  
• Conclusion
  

In my recent article called New CPU Coolers Tested: Zalman CNPS8000 and Scythe Mine (SCMN-1000) Review I stressed the fact that the growth of heat dissipation of CPUs has not only stopped, but changed into a decline. Unfortunately, I can’t say the same about another very important computer component, namely the graphics card. Alas, graphics cards need ever more power and produce ever more heat. At Computex 2006 the leading GPU manufacturers said that next-generation graphics cards would require as much as 130-300W of juice, and so a 1000-1200W power supply would have become necessary by the end of this year!

It is to cool the graphics card that Zalman, the manufacturer of various cooling systems, has released its new VF900-Cu LED for. Owners of the Zalman VF700-Cu can notice the change of only one letter in the model name while the word LED means the highlighting of the fan (but there are models with a highlighted fan in the 700 series, too). Despite these inconsiderable discrepancies, the two cooler models are completely different products. The new VF900-Cu LED is to be correctly viewed as a revolution rather than a modernization of the good old VF700.

Package and Accessories

The new cooler is packed into a small cardboard box with a round window that gives you a view of the front side of the Zalman VF900-Cu LED:

The cooler is firmly fixed in a plastic tray; the accessories and manual are in the top of the box. Detailed information about the product’s technical characteristics is given on the reverse side of the package; small photographs illustrate the key points of the new cooling solution.

The cooler’s base, impressive with its flatness and mirror-like polish, peeps out through the small window.

The package contains the following components:

• Screws, springs and rubber circles
• Eight aluminum heatsinks for the memory chips
• Fan speed controller Fan Mate 2 with a connecting cable
• Double-sided scotch tape to fasten the Fan Mate 2
• User manual
• Zalman CSL850 thermal paste (zinc oxide, 1.2W/m*K)
• Sticker with the Zalman logo

According to the text on the box, the cooler is manufactured in Taiwan.