A source for socket 370 / A Zalman Flowers

[Jay_S]

Hey folks,

There was a post a while ago that mentioned directron having the CNPS3100-PLUS in stock. They don't anymore. But, Provantage.com curently does - and for only $16.53. If anyone is looking for an all-copper socket 370 / A cpu cooler, that looks like a good deal. I used the socket 423 version on my old P4 with excellent results, and this one should handle my coppermine easily.

There's an old 2001 review on overclockers.com. Note the the fan bracket (and the fan?) in the review are much different that the bracket pictured on the curent zalman web site. It still seems to come with the inline-resistor fan cable and not a proper fanmate.

Please also note - I have had so-so experiences with provantage. Their prices seem to fluctuate constantly (+/- a few cents every few days or so) and they charge freight based on invoice total & qty - not weight/dimensions. Crazy.

-Jay

[quizzicus]

Is that a smaller, earlier version of the CNPS 6000?

[Jay_S]

Yes - per Zalman, the CNPS6000-Cu weighs 462g. The CNPS3100-PLUS only weighs 296g. Another difference is the "fan controller" - the CNPS6000 comes with the fan mate where the 3100-PLUS only includes the wire-with-inline-resistor. I think the overclockers reviewer (link above) was a little ambitious clipping the CNPS3100-PLUS on a 70 watt cpu. But it should handle all the coppermines with ease. I'm getting a (really cheap!) dell 733 mhz P3, and am hoping this cheap little Zalman will be enough to cool it passively, with the 92mm fan installed as the case exhaust fan with a little shroud between it and the heat sink.

[JazzJackRabbit]

I wouldn't recommend 3100 for anything over A-XP1800 because that's the limit it can cool with fan connected via resistor. Anything over that and the fan must run at full speed to cool the CPU down to reasonable levels.