Zalman CNPS9500 twice as good as ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 64 Pro?

S

spono

Weaksauce
Joined
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So I'm looking at these air coolers recommended in Korruption's sticky at the top of this forum, and I start to think "Yeah, I haven't bought anything in a while. I'm working a crappy internship 40 hours a week. Why the hell not?" After I head over to newegg for current prices, I've found the two that would seem to fit my needs best:

Zalman CNPS9500 LED
HTML: 
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835118223

and

ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 64 Pro
HTML: 
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835185125

The first one is $50, the second is $30. Both have hundreds of 5-egg reviews and praise from Korruption. My questions is, is the Zalman nearly twice as good as the Arctic Cooling, to jusify the price?
 
Well the zalman does perform better but.... the 64 pro is decent as well. Also that thing can be had for around $20 even.

It depends on what type of cpu you are cooling really. If its something that produces alot of heat then the zalman might be better. If its just a typical amd 939 cpu or something that doesnt produce much heat, really a $20 freezer 64 pro is fine.

Here is the freezer 64 pro at chiefvalue.com for $18.99 before shipping. LINK
 
I'm running on an AMD64 3500+, stock cooling. Speedfan shows my temps as 41C idle, 57C load.
 
Honestly a freezer 64 pro should be fine for that I think. Zalman is overkill and expensive. You might look into an Ultra90. They cool similar to xp-90C and only cost $30 or so with a free fan at jab-tech.

Ultra90


This is my heatsink. :p HR-01
I only bought it because I got a good price off forums for it. It is "decent" but it is meant to be a passive heatsink. I stuck a fan on it and it does a decent job.
 
Thanks Retsam. Sweet zombie jesus that Ultra90 is awesome, in the most literal sense of the word. It looks like I have some more research to do, as it is now the Ultra90 or the Freezer64 Pro.
 
I just bought a Freezer Pro for $24.99 with free shipping at Newegg and replaced the fan with a 92mm Antec Tricool. My stock temps were 39C idle 45C load, which is pretty good for stock. My case seems to have great airflow, mostly because of my cable job and AS5. With the Freezer Pro and AS5, I'm getting about 36C idle and 41C load. Not a huge increase, but considering it kept pretty cool with the stock hardware, I didn't expect a huge jump. I'm not sure the Zalman would make things any cooler than they already are with my current setup.

The load temps is where the Freezer Pro really shines.
 
spono said:
Thanks Retsam. Sweet zombie jesus that Ultra90 is awesome, in the most literal sense of the word. It looks like I have some more research to do, as it is now the Ultra90 or the Freezer64 Pro.
Click to expand...

The Ultra 90 isn't worth it when you consider the performance. It performs slightly worse than the XP-90C (by a few *C), which means that it'd make more sense buying a stock X2 4200 or dual core Opteron heatsink which performs the same for ~$15 in ebay.

Is this hsf for overclocking? If so, this Scythe Ninja is your best bet on all accounts. It's arguably one of the best heatsinks in terms of performance (exactly the same level as the 9500), and can be run passively if you've got decent airflow in your system.

If you aren't looking to overclock, I wouldn't bother getting a new heatsink/fan.
 
Don't let the low price of the Freezer 64 pro fool you...it is a good performing, high quality hsf. It uses the stock mounting bracket and will probably be the quietest fan in your case.
 
quadnad said:
Is this hsf for overclocking? If so, this Scythe Ninja is your best bet on all accounts. It's arguably one of the best heatsinks in terms of performance (exactly the same level as the 9500), and can be run passively if you've got decent airflow in your system.

If you aren't looking to overclock, I wouldn't bother getting a new heatsink/fan.
Click to expand...

I tried overclocking my system for the first time about a week ago, but was only able to get ~100MHz over stock speeds (that's total, not FSB speeds). I plan to get a 3800+X2 or 4200+X2 once the prices drop (any comments on either?) and a 2x1GB set of ram (still looking at prices/performance, Patriot seems to be the cheapest right now) in the next couple weeks, and I will definitely try to overclock all that once I have it all installed and running smooth.
 
spono said:
I tried overclocking my system for the first time about a week ago, but was only able to get ~100MHz over stock speeds (that's total, not FSB speeds). I plan to get a 3800+X2 or 4200+X2 once the prices drop (any comments on either?) and a 2x1GB set of ram (still looking at prices/performance, Patriot seems to be the cheapest right now) in the next couple weeks, and I will definitely try to overclock all that once I have it all installed and running smooth.
Click to expand...

then I think the Ninja is the best option. and as for the proc, buy whatever you can afford :p
 
The freezer is a great heatsink. Pretty cool, and dead silent.

Just don't buy the Silencer64. Ever. Worst heatsink I've ever used. quiet, but 11 degrees above stock.
 
Thanks for the suggestion on the Ninja, quadnad. I'll have to wait until I get home to measure my case, just to see if that thing will even fit in there. I'm using a Cooler Master Centurion 532 case right now, and there's some air duct thing on the inside of the left panel right over the CPU, but that can be easily removed. The case isn't especially wide though, so, like I said, I'll have to wait until 5:00 so I can measure it. Pretty much every newegg review of the thing mentioned size.
 
quadnad said:
then I think the Ninja is the best option. and as for the proc, buy whatever you can afford :p
Click to expand...
werd, for the price, you cant go wrong ;)
 
spono said:
Thanks for the suggestion on the Ninja, quadnad. I'll have to wait until I get home to measure my case, just to see if that thing will even fit in there. I'm using a Cooler Master Centurion 532 case right now, and there's some air duct thing on the inside of the left panel right over the CPU, but that can be easily removed. The case isn't especially wide though, so, like I said, I'll have to wait until 5:00 so I can measure it. Pretty much every newegg review of the thing mentioned size.
Click to expand...
the centurion 532 should be wide enough for any tower heatsink ;)
 
After some rough measurements, I can't see how the Ninja could possibly fit in my case. The height of the HSF isn't a problem, it's the width. By itself, I don't think there'd be a problem, but it looks like a fan attached to the case-front side would hit the ram. Putting the fan on the botton of the Ninja might work, but my PSU doesn't have an intake fan on the bottom, but on the side facing the front of the case. It looks like i'm gonna go with the Freezer64 Pro unless anyone can say they have experience with my mobo (see signature) and knows the Ninja will fit.
 
spono said:
After some rough measurements, I can't see how the Ninja could possibly fit in my case. The height of the HSF isn't a problem, it's the width. By itself, I don't think there'd be a problem, but it looks like a fan attached to the case-front side would hit the ram. Putting the fan on the botton of the Ninja might work, but my PSU doesn't have an intake fan on the bottom, but on the side facing the front of the case. It looks like i'm gonna go with the Freezer64 Pro unless anyone can say they have experience with my mobo (see signature) and knows the Ninja will fit.
Click to expand...

the fan on the ninja will clear the ram. it's got a surprising amount of clearance where you see the copper heatpipes converge at the bottom.
 
I just went from an AM2 9500 to the new Thermalright SI-128, and I have to say I'm achieving better results in terms of temperatures. I'd load around 36C before, now Im hitting 32 - 33C. Granted I have a 120mm S-Flex fan on my SI-128, and I probably dont have the most amazing airflow (1 * 90mm liquid bearing fan in rear and just the default 90mm in the front which is way too difficult to get at in these nextherm cases for me to even bother with) in my case, I still feel it's doing a better job. Im pretty content at this point, there really arent a whole lot of options for high end coolers on the AM2 platform right now. I just wish Asus would update the bios so I could get past this FSB Limitation. Others are experiencing the same issue as well it seems. I will say that the 9500 mounts so much easier than the Thermalright. I had a rough time getting this thing to mount without it sliding around.
 
spono said:
After some rough measurements, I can't see how the Ninja could possibly fit in my case. The height of the HSF isn't a problem, it's the width. By itself, I don't think there'd be a problem, but it looks like a fan attached to the case-front side would hit the ram. Putting the fan on the botton of the Ninja might work, but my PSU doesn't have an intake fan on the bottom, but on the side facing the front of the case. It looks like i'm gonna go with the Freezer64 Pro unless anyone can say they have experience with my mobo (see signature) and knows the Ninja will fit.
Click to expand...
You won't be disappointed with the 64pro...and you'll save money also.
 
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