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A hot summer's review. Hot weather is just another reason to get more cooling for computers :D

Overview:
CoolerMaster. The brand familiar to most if not all enthusiastic computer users. CoolerMaster are renowned to produce premium computer cooling devices. Including many of the stylish and high-end aluminum cases (yes I do own one), high quality components/device coolers and many accessories that will allow maximum cooling performance to every part of your computer.

Today I will be reviewing the CoolerMaster Aero7+ CPU Cooler for the AMD Athlon and Pentium III platform. If you have noticed, the Aero series have a different type of fan on the heatsink. It is a called an "Aero Blower", the strange look from traditional fans have also gave it advantages over traditional fans. Comparing the specifications of a typical YS-Tech 80mm fan.

< blower >
Fan Dimension: 80 x 80 x 70 mm
Rated Speed: 1900~3500 rpm
Air Flow: 10.9~20.0 CFM
Air Pressure : 2.9~10.7mm H2O
< /blower >

< traditional >
Fan Dimension: 80 x 80 x 25 mm
Rated Speed: 3200~4500rpm
Airflow: 28.80~59.20 CFM
Static Pressure: 2.00~8.50mm H2O
< /traditional >

The maximum airflow for the blower is not even up to par with the minimum of a traditional fan. However the Static air pressure on the Aero Blower is higher. In terms of RPM, the Aero blower is much slower, in theory should mean less noise. What makes the Aero blower different from normal fans is it eliminates the hot spot below the fan on the heatsink. This usually is caused by the CPU core generating most of the heat in the center and the fan is not able to blow into this dead spot simply because the motor of the fan does not have any fan blades to push air. There are solutions to this problem, one of them includes using a fan duct but the downside of them are pretty obvious, the further from the heatsink meant that less air pressure and the hot air isn't being moved out quicker which sometimes made hardly any difference.

Another feature of the aero blower is a variable fan speed controller. By using a simple variable resistor, however, there isn’t temperature controlled speed adjustments like the Thermaltake SmartFan2. The fan runs power from a molex connector, and also provides a 3pin connector to allow fan speed monitoring when plugged into the motherboard.

Anyway, apart from the wicked/ghetto (cross out as appropriate) blower fan. Under it lies the copper block. On this particular model and also on the Aero Lite Series (aluminum heatsinks with aero blower fan with copper base), you will not find the heatpipe technology. With a little reading of other reviews on the net, the extra copper pipe does not really help with the cooling except adding extra cost to the heatsink. So it was wise to remove those ugly pipes out of the heatsink. On the other hand, they have added something called "Skived Fin", well in simple terms, thin copper slices, and increased surface area.

The cooler construction is very simple. The base is connected to the fins and screws attach the fan holder, and the fan can attached with 4 screws and it allows a standard 80mm fan to be fitted on it. The base of the cooler is very smooth and shinny which is supposed to help with the contact of the CPU, and the thermal paste is supposed to fill the little minute gaps between the CPU and the cooler. All the fins are slightly curved as you can see in the picture, I don't know how this might help with the cooling but I probably think its there for a reason.

Another feature that was included in the package was a 3 1/2" bracket which allows you to mount the fan speed controller (variable resistor) in a floppy drive bay, provided you have a spare one. If not you can use the supplied PCI slot bracket which is at the back of the case which I can imagine might be a little less convenient to use for most people.
The 3 1/2 mounting bracket only really matches a silver aluminum brushed case, it simply wouldn't work if you put it in a black Li-Lian or a generic beige case. The design is not very exciting either, simple brush aluminum with a CoolerMaster logo. The silver knob is actually rather tacky, it is some painted plastic and the tapered feel is horrible. Rather pay an extra three quid for an aluminum knob from rapid electronics.

All the cables are generously long and I have to admit that it does make the case look rather messy to have so long many cables, 1 for the 3pin to motherboard, 1 for the power and one for the speed control. I do not have a window for my case yet so that is not really a problem but you may have to consider wrapping and cutting the cables to right length for those who have windows.

The package that it came in was the most impressive of all. Comparing it with a bare cardboard box of a high end Thermalright SLK-900. I was more than impressed with the packaging that came with this Aero7+ cooler.

Installation was pretty straight forward. With a small guide how to install the cooler, I quickly snapped the cooler into place after applying the right amount of thermal paste also by CoolerMaster. I didn’t feel like winning the lotto of getting good thermal paste from unbranded stuff so I just used some CoolerMaster’s own retail thermal paste.

One of the improvements over the stock AMD heatsink is that you will not require any tools and there is no danger of jabbing the motherboard and harming other delicate electrical components inside the computer. I was upgrading from a CoolerMaster X-Dream cooler, the installation is pretty straight forward, one thing I noticed was this cooler was harder to install than my old CoolerMaster X-Dream cooler, partly because the base is bigger and decreased size of the thumb clip also made it harder to clip it. An advantage of it was that I could slide my motherboard out of the case and also slide it back with ease. This was believed to solve problems with the thumb clip obstructing RAM slots on some motherboards. With many minor updates with the cooler, installation did not take a whole lot of time.

I was excited to see how well this will perform, with copper's thermal resistance lower than aluminum, I was pretty sure that this will be a better performer my older aluminum cooler. In size this cooler isn't exactly huge like the Thermalright SLK so this should not have any problems fitting into a standard ATX motherboard. Although it is not too huge, the aero cooler is taller than most coolers even with a fan duct, and this cooler is also rather heavy compared to aluminum heat sinks, this is way beyond the weights of the AMD specifications for a 3 hole clip heatsink but that should not be a matter unless you are traveling around the country to a LAN party, in that case you should remove the cooler, its not worth risking breaking off those clips on the motherboard.

Enough of the introduction. Lets get down to actual benchmarks where it really shines.

Testing:
AthlonXP 1700+ (Thoroughbred-B) (1470MHz)
AthlonXP 1700+ Overclocked @ 166mhz x 12.5 (2075MHz)
Asus A7N8X-Deluxe Rev 1.04 Motherboard
Corsair XMS DDR400 512MB

[ During the first tests it was originally on an AthlonXP 2400 however due to a little accident with dropping the CPU which killed it, I had to restart the whole process of testing again. RIP Athlon2400 ]

Heatsink Candidates:
AMD Stock heatsink
Aero7 @ minimum speed (3500rpm)
Aero7 @ maximum silent speed (2500rpm)
Aero7 @ maximum speed (1900rpm)
Aero7 w/ 80mm Delta "screamer" @ 5V
Aero7 w/ 80mm Delta "screamer" @ 7V
Aero7 w/ 80mm Delta "screamer" @ 12V (yes the evil fan that modded timmeh's finger)

Idle Temperatures are recorded after the PC has left idling for 2 hours with 0-4% CPU usage
Load Temperatures are recorded after the PC has UD and Raven Shield running for 2 hours.

MBM5 was used to record temperatures

With the comparison of a delta fan, we are able to see that the aero blower does not have the most cutting edge performance. However the significant advantage of the blower is that it is relatively low noise compared to a delta fan. Just to note that the aero fan is actually rather good at noise levels, with the fan maxed out the performance better than the delta at 7V, and also produces less noise than the Delta @ 7V.

One thing that brought to me is that after near two months of usage, the heatsink started to tarnish and finger prints are seen on the surfurce of the base. This is a major problem when copper starts to oxidize, as a matter of fact that the thermal resistance increases and would directly decrease the performance because it allows less heat to be removed. This can temporarily be fixed using a copper polish or vinegar and a lot of rubbing. This may prove to be a problem if the copper fins become oxidized and we are unable to remove it. Some heatsink manufactures have looked into these problems that plague copper heatsinks and they have came into solutions by coating the base with other metal.

After all this comparison and testing, I am more than happy with this heatsink. The cooler is more than capable of cooling overclocked components, the aero blower isn't a bad performer but it isn't exactly silent either. This cooler is suited for power users and overclockers who may not wish to use a water based cooling solution. The package offers better value than most high end heatsink such as the Thermalright SLK-900 (cost twice as much as I paid for the aero and doesn't include a fan).

Lastly I would like to point out the benchmarks can only be used for a guidance, when down to choosing your own Cooler, do not solely rely on benchmarks as results can be very different. Even with the same configuration may vary from person to person, depending on the computer setup.

Conclusion:
A complete package for power users or overclockers who want an air cooling solution at an affordable price and value. Overkill for most users with no intention of overclocking or tweaking their PC.

This cooler certainly performs better than the stock heatsink that came with boxed CPUs. Also it performs even better when matched up with a delta fan, that is if you are prepared to go deaf, ear muffs are a good start. The appearance is pretty simple, lighted LEDs or UV paint are no where to be seen. The cooler also likes to take in hot exhaust air just been blown into the heatsink. This can case a problem if the case is not ventilated properly.

This is a very well made heatsink which will happily dissipate huge amounts of heat generated from the CPU. It is certainly worth the price, although i always wondered if I could DiY a heatsink (doubt it would work any better than not having a cooler at all). The Blower may not be everyone's taste but it certainly appeals to me in performance and features.

+ Good Performance
+ Low noise
+ Packed with many extra features
+ Excellent packing (if that means anything to you :P )

- No automated thermal control like SmartFanII
- Maybe expensive for most non-demanding users
- Cheap fan control knob

[Extra] The aero blower of mine is in the process of being modified. 2 blue LEDs and also being mounted on the exterior of my case to cool the graphics card. More on the forums as I prepare for my quest.

Related:
Coolermaster website