Korean cases and cooling specialist Zalman Technologies has released the jet-engine inspired Zet5 CPU cooler to retail. According to Korea’s Quasar Zone , this appealingly curvy cooler has been released on its home turf with a special offer. The black model with be marketed at 77,00KRW ($55.60) and the white model for 79.000 KRW ($57.00), with prices expected to rise after August 25. First impressions are that enthusiasts will be paying a premium for the unique design. We expect that those prices include 10% VAT for locals.
We saw the Zalman Zet5 CPU cooler at Computex in May and noted that the new lineup (which included a smaller Zet4 and Zet3) was a complete revamp of the firm’s dated CNPS9000 series of circular tower coolers.
The flagship Zalman Zet5 stood above its brethren with five nickel-plated heatpipes and its range-topping rating, which suggested it would be capable of handling CPUs with up to 200W TDP. As a reminder, the Zet4 is rated to 180W, and the Zet3 for 150W. They all share the same design language, but Zalman prunes back fans/heatpipes for cheaper, lower TDP models.
Shifting focus back to the Zalman Zet5, in particular, and Quasar Zone shares some tasty packaging and unboxing images to give a good idea of the retail experience. It had samples of both the black and white Zet5. In the box, you appear to get a manual, mounting hardware (naturally), a small tube of ZM-STC10 thermal paste, and a promotional pass of some sort.
Size, weight | 130 x 117 x 158(H)mm, 970g |
Materials | Pure Copper, Pure Aluminum, ABS |
TDP | 200W |
PWM fan speed | 600~2,000RPM±10% |
Max fan noise | 30.4dB(A)±10% |
Max airflow | 44.48CFM±10% |
Fan connector | Fan : 4-Pin / LED : 3-Pin |
Comaptibility | LGA1851/1700/1200/115X, AM5/AM4 |
We also enjoyed seeing the Zalman Zet5 posed on Jet Wing style presentation stands by Quasar Zone. We saw similar at Computex . Remember that once it is in your case, it won’t look quite as aerodynamic, though. Looking at it top down, fitted to a CPU, it isn’t quite so eye-catching.
In summary, Quasar Zone’s unboxing and hands-on time seems to have been dominated by the resident photographer. It hasn’t yet delved into the all-important aspects of performance that a $50+ CPU cooler has to meet up to, to be deemed worthy. There’s some top competition for simply air cooling a CPU in 2025 , and some models can do a great job for a fraction of this price. Having said that, we hope Zalman Zet-series samples start to arrive in the West shortly.
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