Best heatsink under 120mm high?

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tgrech

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Feb 23, 2013
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Hi, I'm looking for an aftermarket heatsink to OC my FX8320 a little, it's on an M5A97 PRO R2. My budget is around £30 max.
I know the Hyper 212 EVO is supposed to be the best for this price range, but the problem is, my case only has around 120mm of room from the motherboard to the top(About the height of a PCI slot/GPU). Just above where the heatsink would go there is a vent with fan mounts that would support an 80mm for added ventilation for the heatsink.

As far as tower heatsinks go, I'd presume I'd have to go with a 92mm fan, and all side mounted heatsinks should fit, but what would be the best option for my budget?
 
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jpoos

jpoos

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Mar 11, 2011
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personally i feel that anything small enough to fit within those dimensions & budget isn't going to be adequate and won't provide the performance boost you're hoping for - especially with summer just round the corner. i'd just live with your current speed & cooler until you can up to budget to £50-ish, then invest in either a far superior noctua top-down cooler or a closed-loop water cooler.
 
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tgrech

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Feb 23, 2013
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I'm not too worried about summer ambient temps, I live in Manchester, and this is typically the hottest time of the year from memory(Don't quote me on that), I have a well ventilated room and I doubt ambient would go that much above 21C.
As far as a closed loop water cooling set up goes, I'm not so sure it'd fit, I have no 120mm or higher fan mounts, so unless I can do most of it externally, it wouldn't work. I wouldn't mind doing a custom loop if it were cheaper, as long as it can be done mostly externally(I have a single 5.25" drive bay for a pump/reservoir) I'd be fine with spending upto £75.
Also, say my budget were £50, what air cooler would be best to go for then? Would I be able to reach say H212 levels or performance?
Fan noise is no problem, I have a fairly large fan/heater in my room running almost 24/7 anyway so it'll be drowned out by that.
 
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tgrech

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Feb 23, 2013
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I've found I could probably fit a Noctua NH-U9B-SE2 in the case, though it'd be tight. For the same price as a new case and a 212, I could get a NH-C14, which from what I've read should easily out perform the H212, and would fit nicely wit a single fan(Allowing me to make some money back on the spare). But then, I'm only using a 6+2 power phase with a 550W PSU, and just want a little boost in gaming for a CPU I'll probably keep for a max of 2 years, is it really necessary to go with that level of cooling?
 
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