Article by: Joe Anderson (Hardware Reviewer)
Edited By: Nathan Glentworth (Owner / Head Editor)
Product was submitted by: Zalman
 <--CLICK FOR DEALS ON A ZALMAN CPU COOLER IN THE UNITED STATES
 <--CLICK FOR DEALS ON A ZALMAN CPU COOLER IN CANADA
PRODUCT PICTORIAL AND WALKTHROUGH
At just a shade over 6-inches in height, the 11X is relatively massive from the front, but the unique design belies this a bit, as we'll see presently. The 120mm fan has a black frame and frosted clear blades as well as some blue LEDs for a bit of extra visual interest.
Zalman equips the 11X with a seven-blade fan featuring PWM control and a “long life bearing.” The fantail is generous in length and terminates in a four-pin connector. “But my mobo doesn't have any four-pin headers,” you might exclaim. No worries. The fan will work perfectly fine when connected to a three-pin header, you just won't be able to take advantage of the PWM control. They also include a resistor cable, allowing the user to reduce fan speed and noise.
Mr. Bones is impressed, but not surprised, at the quality as well as the fit and finish of the 11X. “After all,” he says, “it is a Zalman product.” He's also impressed by the size of the cooler, but he doesn't subscribe to the old adage that “size matters.” Will the 11X exhibit cooling performance commensurate with its size? We'll see.
Viewed from the top, you can see that this cooler has a distinct profile and the plastic top cap incorporates the naming convention to good effect. We'll discuss this shape in more detail a bit later when we can see it better, but the design is very interesting and innovative.
Five 6mm heatpipes exit the baseplate area and wend their way up into the fin arrays on either side of the 11X and all the metal parts are plated in what Zalman calls a black pearl nickel finish. Whether or not this finish will help cooling performance is open to conjecture, but it sure looks good.
|
