A free cooling unit with a pump-driven loop heat pipe was designed for internet data center (IDC), and its components and working processes were described. The experiment system for the developed prototype was built and the comprehensive studies were conducted. The experimental results demonstrate that the coefficient of performance (COP) of the unit can reach to 5.88 when the temperature difference between IDC indoor and outdoor is 10℃, and it will be 10.41 when the temperature difference is 18℃. When mass flow rate of the working fluid in the unit changes within a certain range, namely the gasification rate of the fluid being between 2% and 50%, there is no significant changes for the heat transfer capacity. And there is an approximately linear relationship between the capacity and the temperature difference. Meanwhile, with the increase of the system resistance, both temperature difference of the fluid between inlet and outlet of the evaporator and the proportion of the sensible heat to the capacity also increase.