Cooler Master Hyper N520 Heatsink

Packaging
 
The packaging for the N520 looks quite familiar, sticking with CM’s theme of white and purple which we’ve become accustom to. The front of the box shows off the cooler itself with a few graphics informing the viewer of the retention CPU’s  it’s compatible with. The sides of the box sport the specification of the product on one, and the phrase ‘CPU Cooler, Please visit our website for further details’ in 18 different languages. Lastly the back shows the schematics of the cooler, as well as detailing its features along with a few close up pictures to illustrate the points its trying to draw your attention to.
 
Box_Front Box_Back
Box_side1 Box_side2
 
While the packaging may not jump out at you form the shelf of a retail outlet, you can tell its a CM product at a mere glance due to the design printed on the box, and that alone should warrant a second look.
 
Packaging_closed Open_Box
 
Moving inside the cooler is held loosely in place by a double skinned cardboard package that should do an adequate job of protecting the cooler. It would have been nice to see something a bit more substantial such as Styrofoam to give the N520 that extra bit of piece of mind. But the shaped cardboard should protect it from all but the most ham handed of individuals
 
Accs
 
The accessories were supplies in a zip lock bag tucked under the base of the cooler. Inside the bag we find the mounting brackets, back plates and the screws to fit it all together. As well as the mounting hardware CM give us a 3 pin splitter that allows the two fans to be driven from a singe header.
 
 
Appearance
 
Moving on to the cooler itself. You can see that it’s based on the very familiar U shaped heat pipe design that has become somewhat of a standard among performance heat sinks. Over the top of the aluminium fins Coolermaster have seen it fit to add a plastic jacket. As well as protecting the fins it has the possibility of acting like a shroud to allow the fans to direct air more efficiently. The two 92mm fans themselves are offset form one another. Presumably this helps eliminate the ‘dead spot’ in the centre of the heat sink that doesn’t get any airflow.
 
Over Top
Side Angle
 
The base of the cooler is covered by a sticky plastic tab that protects it’s ‘Mirror finish’. Removing the cover you can see that the base is pretty smooth and not far off that claim of a mirror finish. As someone who regularly swaps out heat sinks across various different set ups I was quite happy to see a solid base. This won’t concern a lot of people who intend to install the sink a leave it to run for months on end, but for those who change hardware regularly it means no digging out old TIM from the little gaps between the heat pipes and the base (a la the Vendetta II).
 
Base
 
So it’s a reasonable looking, mid-weight cooler, time to get on and see how it performs…Â