Whats a good cpu cooler?

[devinkoz]

I am looking for a cpu cooler (am3 socket - Amd Athlon x4 635), that is around 40-55$. I was looking at some zalman coolers, but I am not sure which one. With a good cpu cooler, how much do you think I would be able to overclock my cpu stably? 3.5ghz? Thanks.

 

[xaira]

that cpu doesnt really run hot, but the hyper 212 is a good 1

 

[4745454b]

Just buy it from anyone other then Newegg. Newegg is charging $50 for it, Amazon and others are $30 with free shipping.

 

[davcon]

^+1 for the CM Hyper 212+

 

[devinkoz]

Could my CPU be stably overclocked through BIOS to 3.4ghz? Would I see a performance difference?

 

[4745454b]

Question one depends on the bios. I'm not sure what board you have so I have no idea. Question two depends on what you are using to judge the performance increase. Games not so much, but CPU tasks like media transcoding should.

 

[loneninja]

Even a Cooler Master TX3(approximately $20) will keep an Athlon II X4 @ 3.5 cool enough. I only hit 52C on the cores while running Prime95 and it's with 1.5V.

 

[MARSOC_Operator]

Noctua and Scythe are the best.

 

[devinkoz]

Thanks everybody, I think I might decide between a cooler master and a zalman. I wont buy one right away, i'll see if my cpu has any cooling issues first while overclocking it a bit. Thanks all again.

 

[davcon]

Thanks everybody, I think I might decide between a cooler master and a zalman. I wont buy one right away, i'll see if my cpu has any cooling issues first while overclocking it a bit. Thanks all again.

If you decide to buy a Zalman stay away from their old model line the new CNPS10X tower coolers are much better.
This model peforms the best from reviews i've read.
http://www.ncixus.com/products/41865/CNPS10X%20QUIET/ZALMAN%20TECH/
The only shortcoming it has though is you can't add another fan.
http://www.silentpcreview.com/Recommended_Heatsinks

 

[JackNaylorPE]

Just purchase "by the numbers"

The Megahalems is by far the most widely selected "winner" on the test bench. If the $65 price is an issue the Scythe 2100 outperforms everything else in its price range.

http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=544&Itemid=62&limit=1&limitstart=11
http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=544&Itemid=62&limit=1&limitstart=13