Socket-A & Socket-370 Cooler Roundup - March 2001

The Global WIN WBK38 is the FOP38's successor. Just like the FOP38, it features the same 7000rpm Delta fan, but a different heatsink design, with more - and finer - fins.

Performance

Even though the WBK38 looks more modern than its predecessor FOP38, it does not perform substantially better. Still, the performance is good - but the price for this is an excessively loud fan.

The price of the WBK38 is not yet known; since Global WIN usually offers their coolers at attractive prices, and since no exotic materials or manufacturing techniques are required for producing the WBK38, we can expect that it will have a very good price/performance ratio.

Installation

As all current Global WIN coolers, the WBK38's clip provides very high pressure, and therefore is a little hard to install. We recommend to push down the clip with a screwdriver; this will make things easier.

Motherboard compatibility is very good; the WBK38 should fit most current motherboards.

Unfortunately, GW ships the WBK38 with a thermal pad. This is really a nuisance; previous models came with thermal compound. For the test, we removed the pad and used compound. Probably the WBK38 is mainly targeted at OEMs; companies that usually prefer thermal pads over compound - since pads are more convenient for mass-production.