best cooler for silence and stuff

[tmcthree]

Hi, I'm a noob so apologies in advance,

I'm sick of how loud my computer is so I want to buy a cooler (obviously). I'm not so concerned about overclocking as such, it would be nice, but I value noise reduction much more, I don't care about aesthetics and I can't be bothered with water cooling.

So in order my priorities

Silence

Cooling

Price

aesthetics.

My research so far has brought up these

Thermolab trinity

Dark Rock advanced

Coolermaster 612s

Noctua D14

Gelid Tranquilino

I'm also a little concerned about whether these would fit my system/ram etc, which seems to be a common concern. I use this generic ram

http://www.eclipseco...e=ME-D3-4096D13

and the rest of my system is

Biostar A770E3 AM3, PCI-E, GBLan, ATX 1 AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition AM3 Processor - Reta 4Gb (2X2Gb) Dual Channel DDR3 1333Mhz Memory 1 4Gb (2X2Gb) Dual Channel DDR3 1333Mhz Memory 1 1024Mb nVidia GeForce GTS 450 PCI-Express VGA Card 1

EZCool V625 Black 9 bay ATX Case With 500W PSU

Obviously I have a tape measure at the ready so if anyone can tell me what sort of clearances are required to make them fit...

Thanks all

 

[SavageCupcake]

even though the nh-d14 is overkill for that rig it is the quietest cooler on your list. it is also the best performing. the mount is so simple its incredible. only thing is the fans might not be to your colour tastes but if you want silence than the noctua is the way to go

 

[sheroo]

If you haven't got any heatspreaders on your ram then cooler clearence shouldn't be an issue. Rule of thumb is that if your case has a rear 120mm fan then the D14 will fit. The more cooling overhead that you have got the lower you can run the fans. My vote would be for the D14 or Silver Arrow. The phanteks is also worth a look.

 

[Ru5ty_t00l]

I've got a dark rock and it seems to be very effective

it's also very nice looking

 

[DanielSK]

I would go with a Noctua NH-C12P it`s cheaper and would be more than enough for your system

 

[Computer crazy]

As has already been said, as you have no heat spreaders on your RAM, clearance isn't an issue.

If you want quiet I would get the Noctua NH-D14 or the BeQuiet Dark Rock Pro, both would be an overkill, but they allow for upgrades in the future and are both really quiet coolers. Personally I really like the BeQuiet Dark Rock Pro purely for aesthetics over the DH-D14 however the Noctua is the best performing air heat sink on the market.

Hope this helps.

 

[tmcthree]

[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]Thanks everyone, so now I'm torn between the...

d14 and the dark rock advance

The d14 is definitly the better cooler, but probably more than I need, on the other hand, (as mentioned above), this would be more "future proof" if I upgrade later.

The dark rock advance, on the other other hand is quieter.

Overall noise level (dB(A)) @ 900/1250/100% (rpm)

6.6 / 14.4 / 18.8

I'm not really sure how loud a "dB(A)" really is, but there doesn't seem much difference with the two upper values for the d14[/font]

[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif]Acoustical Noise 19,6 / 19,8 dB(A) Acoustical Noise with U.L.N.A. 13,2 / 12,6 dB(A)

But then the lowest value for the Dark rock Advance (6.6dB(A)) seems very quiet indeed. To put it in context the Dark Rock Pro is

Dark rock pro

Overall noise level (dB(A)) @ 900/1250/100% (rpm)

13.50 / 19.80 / 26.40

I'm leaning toward the dark rock advance because of the 6.6 rating. Can anyone,(and this is absurd I grant you) describe what 13 dB sounds like?

[/font]

 

[SavageCupcake]

i run my d-14 with the low noise adapters in and its just silent. my hard drive makes more noise than the d-14 here are ttl's reviews on both coolers,

D-14: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKHRPJfZ5Y8

dark rock advance:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9j0WKPNWFpM&feature=relmfu

draw your own conclusions

there both amazing coolers either way but the mount of the noctua is extremely simple compared to the dark rock but on the other hand the dark rock looks nicer. entirely up to you mate

 

[tmcthree]

i run my d-14 with the low noise adapters in and its just silent. my hard drive makes more noise than the d-14 here are ttl's reviews on both coolers,

draw your own conclusions

there both amazing coolers either way but the mount of the noctua is extremely simple compared to the dark rock but on the other hand the dark rock looks nicer. entirely up to you mate

Cheers Savagecupcake. Yeah those reviews are very helpful.

On a related noob note.

I take it when you install a cooler, of whatever flavour, you can significantly turn down the other fans installed on your system (which on mine are very loud indeed).

 

[sheroo]

A silent/quiet system normally runs a bit hotter. There is usually a trade off between noise and heat. If you get a decent fan controller, you can just dial them down for some quiet surfing and then turn them up when you need the extra cooling for gaming or folding or whatever.

 

[WYP]

i'm currently using a thermolab trinity on my 1090t clocked at 4ghz.

it is a very quiet cooler and keeps my cpu very cool, i have never seen my cpu temps go above 43 degrees.

i will also recommend you stay away from the coolermaster, i have a friend that bought that cooler with the same cpu as me at the same volts and clock but much higher temps.

 

[tmcthree]

Ok so Thanks everyone,

Just bought the D14 for £58 incl.

I'm sure it will be quiet enough, I'm going deaf in my old age anywoo..

 

[Ru5ty_t00l]

but the mount of the noctua is extremely simple compared to the dark rock

I had never mounted a cpu cooler until I mounted the dark rock advanced that I won in a contest.

it wasn't hard at all to mount it even if it was my first time doing this.

once I saw that it's very quiet I disabled the automatic fan control and the fan is always running at its maximum speed. I can hardy hear it though

 

[SavageCupcake]

ive never mounted a dark rock but in toms review it seemed a bit of a pain compared to the d-14 but that might just be me

EDIT: ok scrap that it was the dark rock pro that seemed a pain not the advanced, sorry)

Ok so Thanks everyone,

Just bought the D14 for £58 incl.

I'm sure it will be quiet enough, I'm going deaf in my old age anywoo..

you wont be dissapointed with the d-14

it even comes with low noise adapters if its still to loud

 

[arnzzz]

Hey, i just received my Noctua NH-D14 and i am going to be completely honest that i nearly didn't buy it because of the colours of the fans

which we all know you either love or hate

and its the first build i've done so fitting such a big cooler was going to be quite a task but after doing

it i am gob smacked, it was sooooo easy, and that's with it in the case as i did not want to remove the motherboard.

I am running an AMD fx6100 at the stock 3.3GHz (controversial cpu choice i know lol, but i like it

)

These are my temps:

Stock Cooler (degrees celsius)

Idle for 30 minutes = 28

100% Load for 30 minutes = 64

Delta under load = 44.6

Noctua NH-D14 (degrees celsius)

Idle for 30 minutes = 22

100% Load for 30 minutes = 34

Delta under load = 14.2

So as you can see these temp differences are amazing. I am in love with this cooler and will be recomending it to

whoever is in the market for a new air cooler. I believe that to get better cooling a full blown water cooling setup

would be needed. Oh and i dont mean one of those all in one units you can get like the Corsair H60 etc

thats

just my opinion

For those that dont know, "Delta Temp" means the temp minus the ambient temp(room)temp. For those that do know

please does hate me

its just i didnt know what that was till recently so if it helps anyone else its worth mentioning

Thanks peeps

 

[garih]

Ok so Thanks everyone,

Just bought the D14 for £58 incl.

I'm sure it will be quiet enough, I'm going deaf in my old age anywoo..

jammy git, mine cost me £75 back in January. still worth it tho