Components and Design
The front of the heatsink has a low noise 120mm fan attached using four screws. The fan RPMs range from 1,000 to 2,150 RPMs depending on the fan controller settings used. Zalman also states it will put out about 20 to 39 dBA of noise.
The five heatpipe design are U-shaped stretching from the base all the way through the top of the aluminum fin array. The entire heatsink of CNPS10X Extreme is “black-pearl” nickel plated for long-term corrosion resistance.
The back panel of the heatsink shows the three tiered layers of the aluminum fin array. I think it was done more for asthetics than to improve performance. It’s a subtle improvement, but I like the layered look.
Here’s a quick shot of the right side of the heatsink. Nothing too special to point out here other than the four pin power connector for the fan and fan controller.
The PWM fan controller slides into the top of the heatsink as shown above. It has three speeds and can be detached and used externally via a fan controler extension cord that’s provided with the heatsink. The top of the heatsink is also made from plastic and has a small graphic with the CNPS10X logo.
Last but not least, the base of the heatsink is made of copper that has been polished to a mirror finish. We didn’t notice any abrasions from poor milling which is a great sign and should give us great results during testing.
What’s not to like about the CNPS10X Extreme? Not much. The entire design is very solid in terms of what we look for in a good heatsink. We like to see polished copper bases, multiple heatpipes that extend all the way through the fin arrays, and having a decent fan is always a plus. We also liked the included PWM fan controller which should come in handy when we don’t need the fan to run at full capacity during normal operation.
