Best cooler <165mm?

[EvanJackPenn]

Hi there,

I'm looking at snapping up IVB next month for my first build, and I'd like to overclock it reasonably for gaming purposes - presuming it'll get me reasonable frame gains? However, I'm not really sure what heatsink to get...

I'm pretty dead set on getting the Fractal Arc Mini as my chasis which only allows coolers upto 165mm, which is my key limitation.

I was looking at the Hyper 212 Evo which has some great reviews - however, today I stumbled upon some info regarding the fan: the EU version is only upto 1600RPM, not 2000RPM like the US model. I presume this would mean that temperature would be higher.

So, are there any good alternatives (or is the 212 still a good choice)? I'm willing to pay no more than £50, and although I'm not a silence-freak I don't want a jet taking off under my desk just for 1oC less!

Many thanks!

[KeyboardDemon]

Is there enough room at the top for an AIO water cooling like a Corsair H60/H80 or maybe even an H100?

[EvanJackPenn]

Yes there is. I did kinda contemplate it, but I've heard they don't offer overly superior cooling+noise to air and would I have them intake or exhaust? Because if they are intake then they get cold air.

I did consider going all out and just sticking a H100 in the top! :O

[KeyboardDemon]

My H50 gives me results that are very similar to the A50 which is far too big for that case. I've just been looking at your case and if you remove the middle drive bays you might be able to find a way to fit the rad in that space and go push pull with two 120mm fans, which is how I've mounted my H50. Also I would look at a thicker rad than the H50 to get better results, if I knew at the time I'd be rocking an H60 now.

[EvanJackPenn]

The thing is, I'm not overclocking like mad - I just want more frames, not the best SuperPI ever.

My main problems with the H100/H80 are the price, the noise levels, and that I can get similar performance <£50 on air.

The problem I have with the 212 EVO is the fact that the reviews which give it good figures are mostly American, therefore mostly at up to 2000RPM...

[andy572]

Is your system still in the planning stage? If it is, perhaps I can offer something of use regarding what to expect.

You're assuming that it will need to reach those levels to maintain cooling and appear to be looking at the fan in isolation. I have a Hyper 212 Plus in this PC. As I type this, I'm encoding video and the fan is reportedly turning in the mid-1400 RPM range (in a warm room). I wouldn't expect it to get anywhere near that level at other times. In fact, until I had to replace the fan, the included original ran considerably slower than this one outside of encoding (by a few hundred RPM). In low-demand situations, the original fan would be turning only a few hundred times each minute. There's lots of headroom available should demand warrant it, but I can't say if it's ever needed much more during my occasional sessions with games (I only remember the noise from the graphics card!).

Isn't the RPM variation due to the differences with the electricity supply between Europe and the US? In any case, it's a question of whether you'll ever reach those heated heights in your typical use.

I have a fairly quiet system, by the way. The noise levels of the room and the system are low enough that the fans do bother me - but that is not because they are noisy! It's down to the design of the case with its top-mounted fan and it's me! It's just that my hearing's okay and when you like quiet and are around them long enough, you notice the changes in RPM or the differences between fans. Other than the sounds you'll always get, the key thing is that there's no crazy whine as the speeds increase. Given that it's moving air, you will get noise; but it's nothing unpleasant like I'd describe the fan on my video card or Xbox. It's an order of magnitude better than the stock AMD sink-fan combo, too! Now that did whine!

[KeyboardDemon]

Isn't the RPM variation due to the differences with the electricity supply between Europe and the US? In any case, it's a question of whether you'll ever reach those heated heights in your typical use.

The differences between the power supplies across different countries/regions are eliminated by the PCs PSU which takes whatever AC frequency you might have supplied at the wall and turns it into a continuous DC supply. RPM on fans is normally in response to temperature, where higher temps will require more cooling, this can be controlled by the BIOS, third party fan controllers or controlled by the user.

[dfour]

The 212 woudl still be a good choise and you could always add another fan to make it a push/pull configuration to lower the temps more. Chances are the 2000 rpm fan would cool slightly better but at a chance of higher noise levels.

[Lee H]

Yes there is. I did kinda contemplate it, but I've heard they don't offer overly superior cooling+noise to air and would I have them intake or exhaust? Because if they are intake then they get cold air.

I did consider going all out and just sticking a H100 in the top! :O

Get one... go on.

I've the H100 myself and if I am going to be using my PC for media or xbox 360 pass through purposes as opposed to gaming I drop the OC from 5-4.8 GHz to 4.5 GHz and drop the fan speed on the H100 from medium to low.

This then makes my PC very quiet indeed with only the white LED flashing when drives are accessed and then I just open the side panel which is a doddle on the corsair case, press the button to switch the fans to medium and then reapply the OC to the speed I want to run it at.

[chates]

If you're really serious about keeping your system quiet and cool while overclocking and you have the budget to stretch then why not get a slightly larger case and do a custom watercooling loop?

It depends how much of a project you want on your hands. I've just finished my first watercooling loop covering CPU only and its really quiet! It's made the graphics card sound really noisy so just ordered a dual fan 7870 with a view to adding the GPU into the loop once EK release a 7870 block.

But it is much more involved and relatively expensive compared to air cooling so it depends how bothered you are and how much you like to tinker

[timread]

I built an SB i5 2500K system about a month ago - I'm currently using a Thermalright HR-02 Macho on an i5 2500K running at 4.4GHz. Chassis is the Fractal Design Define R3.

Like you I was looking for about the best quiet CPU air cooler I could find with good performance, sub 165mm since that's the maximum CPU cooler height supported by the Define R3.

The HR-02 Macho is quite a hulk of a cooler, but it fits in the Define R3. IMHO does a great job and is very quiet. It's currently £39 at Scan, and usually drops to ~£37 on TO. Great performance for the price. Core temps are around 37-42C (idle) last time I looked (running in standard configuration, but you can add a second PWM fan for push-pull). Core temp under full load (Prime95 across all 4 cores, In-place large FFTs) is 69C.

I also added a couple of Nexus 120mm Real Silent Basic fans (additional roof exhaust and bottom intake). All the fans are connected to the Define's fan controller, running on just above the minimum setting. Keeps my rig cool and quiet.

[EvanJackPenn]

Hmmm.... What would the difference be in terms of a tower cooler vs a top-flow coolers? Does it disrupt case airflow? I'm thinking either Noctua NH-D14 or NH-C14....

[Bagnaj97]

The 212 would be fine, it was able to (just!) keep my old q9300 cool passively. In push-pull with high throughput fans it was only 2-3 degrees behind my H100, but the H100 does only have 1 fan on it.

[andy572]

If I'd been feeling more together at the time, I'd have mentioned notional rotation speeds. The coincidental differences immediately struck me and I was thinking of it away from the regulation of a power supply - seeing what might be a reason (even if an apparently odd one) for the variation between the US and Europe. It might have been a distraction (to me)!

That HR-02 Macho looks good, Tim - in the sense of aesthetics and a fair balance of low noise levels and from a quick look around, cooling.

Evan, perhaps you could give a sense of what you meant by "reasonably" regarding overclocking? That'll give a better foundation for the guys here to offer opinion and cooling suggestions. I like simplicity but if you're into this more as a hobby or will be pushing the clocks, water might prove to be an easy choice. Air still looks good to me, but everyone above has a lot of experience to share if you're looking at the alternative.