3-Way Low Profile CPU Cooling Shoot-Out: Reeven, Phanteks, & Noctua
by E. Fylladitakis on January 18, 2017 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- Noctua
- Phanteks
- Cooler
- Reeven
Testing Results, Maximum Fan Speed (12 Volts)
We'll start things off with a look at cooling performance with each cooler's fan running at their maxiumum 12V fan speed.
Right off the bat, when it comes to thermal resistance we can see that Noctua's NH-C14S cooler is well ahead of the rest of the pack. Which isn't too surprising given just how much larger it is than the other coolers we're looking at today.
| Core Temperature, Constant Thermal Load (Max Fan Speed) |
At a 60 watt load - roughly the TDP of most desktop CPUs these days - the results roughly mirror thermal resistance. That said, even the weakest cooler is only 13C over ambient, which is a good result here.
Ultimately with every cooler’s fan running at its maximum speed, the Reeven Steropes and the Phanteks TC12LS perform similarly, with the former showing a little better thermal performance despite its low profile 120 mm fan. This small advantage of the Reeven Steropes is being achieved via brute force, as its low profile fan is faster and disproportionally louder than Phanteks’ PH-F120MP. Comparatively, when compared to other advanced coolers that we have reviewed to this date, both the Reeven Steropes and the Phanteks PH-TC12LS can only be compared to the stock AMD Wraith cooler, and even then the Wraith outperforms them both. However, they do significantly outperform standard stock coolers.
Noctua’s NH-C14S is in an entirely different league. The comparatively huge mass of the cooler and the excellent NF-A14 fan offer the NH-C14S a tremendous performance advantage. As a matter of fact, the NH-C14S is a threat to many large tower coolers, outperforming the Cooler Master EVO 212 by a significant margin and touching the performance of the Grandis and the Dark Rock Pro 3, all while maintaining reasonably low noise levels.
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wolfemane - Wednesday, January 18, 2017 - link
This is from my personal experience only, but the L9i didnt cool much better than a stock Intel cooler. It just did it much quieter. I had one on an i3-6100 in a node 202 build and in a Bitspheonix prodogymitx case. I then swapped the 6100 for a 6600k and that was beyond the l9is capabilities in either case. But that was to be expected. Even noctua doesn't recommend the L9i for anything more than 65w unless in a very well ventilated case.
xenol - Wednesday, January 18, 2017 - link
I would've liked to see the heatsinks installed on a system in order to gauge how it might look on my own builds. Cooling performance is important, but I'm willing to sacrifice that if these coolers make it a pain to work on my computer.bigboxes - Wednesday, January 18, 2017 - link
I've got an AXP-200R in my HTPC. I didn't need to go that low of profile, but the huge fan is super quiet and perfect for my application. At 73mm of height clearance I'd think that the Thermalright model would have been in your review.AXP-200R website: http://thermalright.com/product/axp-200r/
AXP-200R in use: http://i256.photobucket.com/albums/hh175/bigboxes/...
stlouis1 - Thursday, January 19, 2017 - link
I've been using AXP-100's as my go to for small form factor builds. It would have actually been nice to see the AXP-100/200 in this review for comparison as the Thermalright options have become hard to acquire in Canada (not sure about elsewhere)genzai - Wednesday, January 18, 2017 - link
Can you add a bit more pertinent info? Like full socket compatibility. (2011.3?)Also can you talk about Rack U height as that is another place LP coolers are used. What is the minimum RU these coolers would fit?
Thanks
Ranger1065 - Thursday, January 19, 2017 - link
Good heavens Anandtech, a new article! Don't overdo it now. It seems to me more effort is expended on Tweets these days. Interesting read though.colonelclaw - Thursday, January 19, 2017 - link
A word of caution to those of you putting together a mini-ITX build - I had to return 3 coolers as they wouldn't fit on an Asus MAXIMUS VIII IMPACT. In all 3 cases, it wasn't because the cooler was too tall (I did measure the height available), but because the cooling pipes or whatnot would hit components on the motherboard.I can't speak for other motherboards, but the components on the Asus are so tightly packed in and all around the CPU socket, that available width is just as important.
zodiacfml - Thursday, January 19, 2017 - link
awesome performance but too big and pricey. the Reeven seems to be good value here as it is tiny compared to a Hyper 212 evo.Voldenuit - Thursday, January 19, 2017 - link
Any VRM temperature measurements? And comparison to tower coolers? One of the advantages of top down coolers compared to conventional towers is their cooling of motherboard components, so would be interested to see.losonn - Saturday, January 21, 2017 - link
Any chance of updating this roundup with results from the significantly more relevant Noctua NH-L9x65?The NH-L9x65 is a comparable size / weight / height / price to both the Reeven & Phanteks coolers featured here where the NH-C14S is *double* the height and price of the other coolers...