The 140mm Slim Tower CPU Cooler Roundup: Thin & Light Done Just Right
by E. Fylladitakis on May 24, 2017 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Cases/Cooling/PSUs
- be quiet!
- Noctua
- Phanteks
- Cooler
- Thermalright
Testing Methodology
Although the testing of a cooler appears to be a simple task, that could not be much further from the truth. Proper thermal testing cannot be performed with a cooler mounted on a single chip, and this is for multiple reasons. This includes the instability of the thermal load and the inability to fully control and or monitor it, as well as the inaccuracy of the chip-integrated sensors. It is also impossible to compare results taken on different chips, let alone entirely different systems, which is a great problem when testing computer coolers, as the hardware changes every several months. Finally, testing a cooler on a typical system prevents the tester from assessing the most vital characteristic of a cooler, its absolute thermal resistance.
The absolute thermal resistance defines the absolute performance of a heatsink by indicating the temperature rise per unit of power, in our case in degrees Celsius per Watt (°C/W). In layman's terms, if the thermal resistance of a heatsink is known, the user can assess the highest possible temperature rise of a chip over ambient by simply multiplying the maximum thermal design power (TDP) rating of the chip with it. Extracting the absolute thermal resistance of a cooler however is no simple task, as the load has to be perfectly even, steady and variable, as the thermal resistance also varies depending on the magnitude of the thermal load. Therefore, even if it would be possible to assess the thermal resistance of a cooler while it is mounted on a working chip, it would not suffice, as a large change of the thermal load can yield much different results.
Appropriate thermal testing requires the creation of a proper testing station and the use of laboratory-grade equipment. Therefore, we created a thermal testing platform with a fully controllable thermal energy source that may be used to test any kind of cooler, regardless of its design and or compatibility. The thermal cartridge inside the core of our testing station can have its power adjusted between 60 W and 340 W, in 2 W increments (and it never throttles). Furthermore, monitoring and logging of the testing process via software minimizes the possibility of human errors during testing. A multifunction data acquisition module (DAQ) is responsible for the automatic or the manual control of the testing equipment, the acquisition of the ambient and the in-core temperatures via PT100 sensors, the logging of the test results and the mathematical extraction of performance figures.
Finally, as noise measurements are a bit tricky, their measurement is being performed manually. Fans can have significant variations in speed from their rated values, thus their actual speed during the thermal testing is being acquired via a laser tachometer. The fans (and pumps, when applicable) are being powered via an adjustable, fanless desktop DC power supply and noise measurements are being taken 1 meter away from the cooler, in a straight line ahead from its fan engine. At this point we should also note that the Decibel scale is logarithmic, which means that roughly every 3 dB(A) the sound pressure doubles. Therefore, the difference of sound pressure between 30 dB(A) and 60 dB(A) is not "twice as much" but nearly a thousand times greater. The table below should help you cross-reference our test results with real-life situations.
The noise floor of our recording equipment is 30.2-30.4 dB(A), which represents a medium-sized room without any active noise sources. All of our acoustic testing takes place during night hours, minimizing the possibility of external disruptions.
| <35dB(A) | Virtually inaudible |
| 35-38dB(A) | Very quiet (whisper-slight humming) |
| 38-40dB(A) | Quiet (relatively comfortable - humming) |
| 40-44dB(A) | Normal (humming noise, above comfortable for a large % of users) |
| 44-47dB(A)* | Loud* (strong aerodynamic noise) |
| 47-50dB(A) | Very loud (strong whining noise) |
| 50-54dB(A) | Extremely loud (painfully distracting for the vast majority of users) |
| >54dB(A) | Intolerable for home/office use, special applications only. |
*noise levels above this are not suggested for daily use
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JoeyJoJo123 - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
For online comments, there's shills, then there is everyone else. Shills which are just trying to spread around this meme that X company's products are the best thing sliced bread.Just buy whatever you want, regardless what anyone else thinks. Don't pay brands any particular attention, just buy the best product you can for the best price you can and pocket your savings.
mgilbert - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
Nice, mature response, with the name calling and all. Grow up, then read the actual review. The reviewer said the same thing I did. Now, go read a few more reviews of coolers, and you'll find that virtually all of them agree with this review. Noctua is expensive, but worth it. Generally I agree with you - it doesn't pay to go by brand name - but there are exceptions, and Noctua is one of them.close - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
Noctua also costs a lot more than the competition. So when you're adding 35% to the price tag of any of the other products tested then you usually expect better performance (not mandatory though). So drawing the conclusion that Noctua is king of the hill in general isn't that useful.So... there are expensive products, then there are cheaper products :). For some people 35% markup might not be worth the extra performance.
WinterCharm - Thursday, May 25, 2017 - link
So? If you want the best you often have to pay more for it.The "best" is the best.
If you want the "best within a price bracket" THEN you can finagle and weigh things against each other.
JoeyJoJo123 - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
Does Noctua pay you in stock, dividends, or a salary to promote their products online? If not, why do you go out of your way to promote free advertising to another company who you owe nothing to? You made your trade; your money for their product, there's no stipulation that you have to continue to sing praises for their company for other people to be more negotiable to give that same company more money for more products.Likewise, if you're upset about being called out on literal shilling, then it's really you that needs to grow up.
Additionally, the performance roundup review written by E. Fylladitakis doesn't have anything in common with your post, which you attribute as stating that "(t)he reviewer said the same thing I did". Fylladitakis makes no catch-all branding statement. They evaluate the four products, they make the measurements, they compare the measurements, then make a conclusion about the products based on the measurements.
YOU, however, are making a blanket statement about all performance CPU cooling products developed by Noctua being "superior in virtually every respects, especially quality and support."
Those statements can't be anymore unalike in any way. The former was a controlled experiment to evaluate product performance followed by an analysis of the products, the latter (your comment) is an opinion; void of any metric of data or analysis.
If you look at the thermal performance in this roundup, it shows that the Thermalright cooler (at $47, the cheapest of the four measured in this roundup) to have the best thermal performance at low temperature loads (where most performance PCs, the target audience of these $50 tower cooling solutions, stay outside of gaming or benchmark loads), theorized by Fylladitakis to be due to the direct contact design of the heatpipes, and a close-second (literally 16.6 vs 16.8 degrees Celsius delta over ambient, figures well within a margin of error of measurement) at 150W loads (where most overclocked mainstream CPUs will sit at full load), and still competes closely at completely unrealistic synthetic 340W loads.
So given a $47 price for the Thermalright vs $65 price for the Noctua, given similar performance figures, it's pretty apparent which has the better value for mainstream performance PCs.
Ryan Smith - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
I love a vigorous discussion, but you guys need to cool it, please. There is no place for profanity here on AnandTech.mgilbert - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
Yet, my post gets deleted, but not his, despite its divisive, hateful, argumentative, obtuse, disrespectful, inappropriate nature. Sounds like four letter words aren't the only thing not allowed on Anandtech. Fairness has no place, either.Ryan Smith - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
I have made my ruling. I give you guys exceptional leeway as I believe you need to be free to discuss technical matters, but I draw the line at profanity and pointless ranting. You guys are done, please move on.If you wish to discuss it in private please email me.
fanofanand - Thursday, May 25, 2017 - link
We love you Ryan! Even when we complain, whine and moan about x, y, or z not being tested the specific way WE would do it, we love you!Ruh-roh, now I"m shilling for Anandtech! Don't worry, my username checks out.
JackNSally - Wednesday, May 24, 2017 - link
I have to agree, Noctua is the best. I do recommend the Hyper 212 for budget builds though.