Cooler Master Hyper 212+: Why buy anything else @ 95W??

[woomba]

I just built a new gaming rig for around 2 grand. I spent $25 on a Cooler Master Hyper 212+ and some of my friends wonder why I didn't go for something "higher end". They think I've made a grave mistake.
The problem, is it's not just my friends that think this. The enthusiast community on forums seems to think the same way a lot of the time. So let me set the record straight here.

At 95 watts, even when overclocked, there is NO reason to waste money on anything other than something with the same performance/noise/price ratio or better as you get from a Cooler Master Hyper 212+. Anything more is just bragging rights.

So why do I see people going out and pairing a NH-D14 with a i7 2600K???

At this very moment I'm stability testing to figure out the best voltage level for my 2600K / Hyper 212+ OCed @ 4.5Ghz. I'm averaging a core temp of about 59C with 1.25V. I could go higher easily and not have to worry about temps. I've pushed a 2600K to a 4.9GHz stable at high voltages with a Hyper 212+ no problem with comfortable temps. Best of all, its still quiet.

The only reason I could justify watercooling like a H80 (must be better than H50 performance) or a high end cooler like a DH-14, a Silver Arrow, or any of those other monster coolers is if you are running a hot part like a 870, a 900 series, or basically anything that is 125W or higher. The only other reason for watercooling is is you're a fan of high profile RAM and are worried about it not fitting under your cooler.

EVEN then, if you can find it, people should be getting a Thermalright HR-02 Macho over the other massive air coolers for $50 regular price or lower. Seriously people, do your research and stop wasting your money.

If you feel the same way, awesome, if not, tell me why not cause I don't get the reasoning.

My background:
- I don't work for Cooler Master or any hardware company
- I've built and done some serious performance testing on over 50 custom made computers including overclocking 775, 1336, 1156, 1155, AM2, AM2+, and AM3 based chips. Highest OC achieved was 5.1Ghz stable with some serious cooling.
- I've used personally tested acoustic and cooling performance on many coolers including some of the popular ones like:
Noctua NH-D14
Noctua NH-U12P SE2
Noctua NH-U9B SE2
Thermaltake Frio
Corsair A70
Corsair H50
Corsair H70
Coolit ECO
and several others

 

[we1shcake]

agreed i spent £20 on a freezer 13 there was no need for anything better, it has my overclocked phenom 2 in check easily and is near silent

 

[davcon]

I totally agree 100%
There is absolutely no reason to spend more then $50 to cool a SB processor.

 

[beenthere]

The Hyper 212+ is an excellent HSF and a steal of a price.

It does depend on what CPU you are using and how many watts it is sucking if you need a better HSF or not. A larger/more efficient HSF may still lower the temp more than the Hyper 212+ and for some CPUs that may allow higher OC'ing or not.

The link below has objective test data on all the popular HSFs and some H20 closed loop coolers. I do not recommend the closed loop H2O coolers as they are typically inefficient, a poor value and noisy in many instances compared to high end air cooled HSFs. More importantly however is that H2O coolers can and do leak and when they leak they can destroy other PC hardware, as many have reported.

http://www.frostytech.com/

 

[13thmonkey]

There should be a number that describes how good a cooler is, and I think it should be decibels per watt, although it isn't linear with airflow and therefore DB. But there should certainly be a wattage that can be disipated at 30db @ 21C that should be easy to prove. Toms - the challenge is on...

Really like the frosty method, I can see a similar method for cases, 3 heat sources (gpu/cpu/psu) each outputting a std wattage through std vents (i.e. a cpu hsf, a gpu hsf shroud and a psu) you'll then get an idea as to what each case can cope with for a given wattage for a given temp rise for a given DB @21C then all tests are the same.

 

[spentshells]

If you need more cooling then you get a better heatsink.
Pretty simple, You seem to have a good setup.
If you want to keep going with your overclock upgrade then.
Sounds like you have built a few maybe drop another 70 bucks if you want to hit 5ghz