The latest CPU cooler air cooler from Taiwanese manufacturer Montech PC is the NX600, a budget air cooler that incorporates six copper heatpipes to transfer heat from the CPU to the fin plates.

What sets the NX600 apart from the competition is the inclusion of two high-performance, thick E28 fans. And the price is right, at less than $30, which makes the purchase arguably worth it even if you’re only interested in the fans (and not the heatsink).

Let's take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks so you can decide if the NX-600 deserves to make our list of the best CPU coolers.

Cooler specifications

Features of Montech’s NX600 air cooler

● Dual-tower heatsink with six heatpipes

Six copper heatpipes transfer heat from the CPU contact plate to the fins of the heatsink. The heatsink features serrated edges – an engineering choice which generally results in lower noise from turbulence as air enters and exits the fin stack. There are interlocking “zipper” tabs on the sides of the fins, which improve structural rigidity and prevent the plates from squishing together to ensure proper airflow.

● Dual 120mm E28 performance fans

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink. The included fans directly impact on noise levels and cooling performance. The E28 fans are especially powerful, as we discovered in our review of Cooler Master’s Hyper 212 3DHP – dropping temperatures by over 3 degrees C compared to the default fan included with the 3DHP air cooler!

● Color scheme options

The color scheme of the NX600 model included in this review is black, grey, and silver, which might appeal to users who prefer old-school designs. There’s also a white option, shown below. ARGB and non-ARGB fan options are available with both heatsink designs, for about $5 more.

The top covers of the heatsink are mainly decorative, and can be removed if you so desire – as shown in the picture below.

● RAM Clearance

Standard-height DDR5 sticks 40mm tall fit well under the NX600 with the E28 fans installed, but taller sticks won’t fit perfectly underneath. Our current CPU cooler test bench incorporates TeamGroup’s Sakura Rose T-Force Xtreem DDR5-7200 sticks, 48.8mm (1.92 inches) tall.

If you also use taller RAM DIMMs, you’ll have to raise the intake fan’s placement by a few millimeters for things to fit properly. This might result in slightly lower cooling performance in certain scenarios, particularly those where the fans’ speeds are limited to ensure lower noise levels.

● Packaging

The heatsink towers are protected by soft coverings and foam inserts, with the fans and accessories packaged in cardboard. Included in the package are the dual-tower heatsink, two high-performance E28 fans, mounting hardware for Intel and AMD platforms, fan clips, and a small tube of thermal paste.

● AM5 Installation

You’ll need to first remove the default AM4/5 retention mechanism and then place the mounting studs around the exposed screw holes.

The next step is to place the mounting bars on top of the studs, securing them with the included screws.

Then, apply Montech’s thermal paste. If you’re not sure how to do that, we have a hadny thermal paste application guide that covers the different methods you can use. Afterwards, place the heatsink tower against the CPU and mounting bars, and use a screwdriver to secure it.

Once the heatsink is secured, attach the high-performance E28 fans to the cooling tower with the included clips. Lastly, connect the PWM and (optional) ARGB cables of the fans to the corresponding headers of your motherboard.

Real-world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform:

We’ve tested coolers with both the Ryzen 9950X3D and its non-V-Cache sibling, the 9950X. There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events. While the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D is relatively balanced, the 9950X I used has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

We’ve since returned to using a 9950X3D for cooler testing, as it has a more balanced heat profile, and is almost certainly a more widely adopted CPU.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I emphasize results that are comparable to real-world use. This means I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods.

Many reviewers test coolers on an open test benches, which have a combination of lesser airflow needs and lowered ambient temperatures. This results in making weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have also used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect real-world cooler conditions.

Our latest testing setup uses the FLOVA F50 computer case from Tryx.

This case features a unique “crossflow” fan that pulls air from the side, which the company claims is more effective than traditional intake fans. For air cooling tests, we’ve added a single Noctua NF-A12 G2 intake fan.

PBO Performance and maximum noise levels

We’re going to start this review’s benchmark section by focusing on a traditional maximum performance test, with the CPU cooler’s fans allowed to reach their fastest speeds, for the best cooling possible.

Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D to stretch its legs to an extent, and all air coolers I have tested with PBO enabled using MSI’s X870E Carbon Wifi motherboard reach the maximum CPU temperature of 95 degrees C (203 F) and thermally throttle to some extent.

Results from the liquid coolers we’ve recently tested aren’t shown above because they are able to keep AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D under TJ Max – and as such, power consumption figures aren’t quite comparable.

Montech’s NX600 does fairly well in this test. While it is technically beaten by Sudokoo’s SK700V & DeepCool’s AK620 G2, it only falls behind by a few watts. This means benchmarks will basically be the same, as any scaling gained from raising power consumption to 251W (compared to 248W) would be so small as to be irrelevant.

To give a wider variety of comparison examples, I’ve included a chart of the same tests from our last AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D cooling test bench. But keep in mind these results aren’t 100% comparable, due to a different case and fans being used. Our newest test bench used for this and other recent reviews incorporates a Tryx crossblade intake fan as well as a single Noctua NF-A12 G2 intake fan, which results in better air cooling performance.

Montech’s NX600 performs well, but a large part of that comes from the inclusion of its flagship E28 fans, which are a bit overpowered compared to the included dual-tower heatsink. As such, at full fan speeds, this cooler does not run at all quietly – with a measurement of 50dBA, it is the loudest air cooler I’ve ever tested.

200W thermal benchmarks

For the next thermal test, I leave the motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23.

The result here was curious, as with a “stock” power profile, its thermal performance was not as strong as our previous test.

150W + GPU thermal results, noise levels

Our next test runs Cinebench on the CPU with a 150W power limit, while also running Furmark on MSI’s RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3x OC. This causes the GPU to consume ~295W of power. This test is designed to emulate the thermals of games, which primarily stress the CPU and GPU.

Montech’s NX600 did particularly well with this combined CPU and GPU thermal test; the included E28 fans seemed especially effective in helping to push the GPU’s heat outside of the case.

But again, the cooling potential provided by the E28 fans comes at the cost of noise – with the NX600 averaging 44.6 dBA. Between our current (shown above) and former (shown below) testing setup, this result is the third-loudest we’ve seen from any air cooler on this test.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of our MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers. This next test has the CPU cooler noise-normalized to 38.9 dBA, with PBO enabled for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU.

The results here were not impressive for the Montech. Perhaps the thermal transfer from the NX600’s CPU coldplate and copper heatpipes is not ideal, as performance should be better with these flagship E28 fans.

Another factor to consider when evaluating this benchmark is that my test bench utilizes DDR5 DIMMs that are 49mm tall – which requires lifting the front intake fan a few millimeters to fit. The particularly poor noise-normalized performance may be the result of reduced performance when the fans are set to lower noise levels and rotation speeds.

Karhu DDR5 RAM thermals testing!

Your CPU cooler does not operate in isolation. It has an impact on not just your CPU’s temperatures, but also the other components in your build, like your RAM and GPU. To that end, I’ve run the Karhu RAM stress test. This places a load of ~153W on the CPU and ensures system RAM (DDR5 in my case) is fully stable. In this type of scenario, most AIOs tend to produce worse results than air coolers.

The DDR5 temperature recordings from this test seem to be within expectations compared to other dual-tower air coolers, with Montech’s NX600 performing only 1.2 degrees C behind the best dual-tower air cooler in our setup.

Conclusion

Montech’s NX600 generally performs well, and has a very reasonable price of only $29.90, which makes purchasing this cooler worth it even if you’re “only” interested in the fans.

On the flipside, the included E28 fans seem overpowered compared to the heatsink, resulting in high noise levels during moderate to intensive workloads. If you’re looking for a quietly running system, you should consider alternatives like SAMA’s E360 air cooler instead.

The world is getting warmer every year due to worsening climate change. If you live in certain parts of the world affected by El Nino, you're likely seeing your devices overheat right now if you live without an air conditioner. So, what if you could devise a solution to keep your computer cool regardless of ambient temps? That's precisely what YouTuber TrashBench did by altering a standard countertop ice machine to work as a GPU cooler.

We've covered TrashBench's escapades before, such as that time they used car antifreeze to cool a GPU, or when they put the entire test bench inside a freezer, or even the video where they dunked the entire graphics card into transmission fluid. In this case, the idea of using an ice machine actually came from fellow modder MrYeester who already cooled a CPU with a smaller one — now, it was time to take the concept to another level.

The YouTuber began by disassembling an RTX 3060; he removed the stock cooler and mounted a custom retention frame over the die to fit the liquid-cooling tubes. He then put a submersible water pump inside the ice machine and simply filled it up with water to create the loop. The hot water from the GPU falls into the bucket where it should be cooled before being looped back to the card.

Just for the sake of it, the modder tested the GPU without turning the ice machine on and it actually achieved around 44°C in benchmarks. The temperature wouldn't stabilize because nothing is cooling the water, so he turns on the machine, and the temps actually fall by more than 10 degrees. However, the GPU is heating up faster than the water can cool it down because the ice machine is on a fixed clock cycle.

Basically, the compressor only runs for a few seconds at a time before turning back off once the ice has been discharged into the water. This interval is controlled by a thermostat that can't be adjusted, so it was time to rip it out entirely and replace it with another one. TrashBench luckily had another one that will bypass the internal logic and force the compressor to stay on perpetually.

But just running the compressor longer doesn't result in better cooling. The evaporator coils are responsible for facilitating the heat exchange and they weren't submerged enough in the water. To fix this, the YouTuber simply put a small plastic bowl under the coils to the point they were completely drowned. Hot water coming from the GPU will now hit the evaporator, which helps improve the cooling efficiency, while the new thermostat ensures the compressor doesn't turn off.

Once everything was ready, TrashBench ran the numbers once again and the results were a success, to say the least. Before the modding began, the RTX 3060 was reaching around 60°C in Cyberpunk 2077. Now, it was casually chilling at 22-23°C, and it was stable. The GPU hot spot was sitting at 75°C before, while the modified ice machine brought it all the way down to just 34°C.

There were some leaks in the middle that the YouTuber dealt with, and the entire modding process was a bit too involved for a quick and fun experiment. Not to mention, messing with the internal componentry of an electrical device that's carrying water isn't exactly the safest thing to do. Still, the results speak for themselves, and we can only wonder how far you could take this RTX 3060 now with extreme overclocking.

For a very long time, many of us have been begging Noctua to build a liquid cooler. In a time when CPUs are becoming ever more powerful, their power consumption is also rising, and air-coolers are often no longer up to the task. However, this was a problem for Noctua’s customers, as the brand has stubbornly not built a liquid cooler – at least until now. Meet the NL-LC1-36, Noctua’s first liquid cooler.

Today we’re reviewing the 360-mm variant, but it also comes in 240mm and 420mm flavors.

Let’s start with the elephant in the room: At its core, this is not a liquid cooler designed 100% in-house by Noctua – it’s an Asetek cooler with some Noctua touches. This may be a bit of a let-down, especially for Noctua purists – up until now, every product that had a name in Noctua’s nomenclature, such as NL-LC1-36, or NH-D15 G2, or NF-A12x25 G2, was 100% designed and built in-house by Rascom and Kolink, the two owners of the Noctua brand.

Keen readers will note that there is a Noctua case, Noctua PSU, and Noctua GPUs, but that’s not entirely accurate. The Antec Flux Pro Noctua Edition, Seasonic Prime TX-1600 Noctua Edition, and Asus Noctua Edition GPUs are all, as their name implies, Noctua-Edition products, which are not strictly speaking a core part of Noctua’s own lineup, and they do not carry Noctua’s typical nomenclature.

What’s really going on here is something we’ll get into later, but for now, let’s dive into the box and see what we’ve got on the test bench.

Specifications

Product Walkthrough

The cooler comes packaged in a typical Noctua box with a matte finish and product details written on it. Noctua also sells an auxiliary fan, the NL-ACF1, which can clip onto the pump block to cool the area surrounding the CPU.

Open the box, and we’re presented with a nice appetizer – the large Noctua plaque that can later be installed onto the pump block if you’re not using the auxiliary fan.

This is a truly beautiful plaque, and quite large too – a bit unusually large for Noctua. Is Noctua trying to emphasize its own brand to distract us from Asetek?

An included accessory box contains the mounting brackets, cleaning wipe, instructions, TIM guard, and the classic Noctua Torx screwdriver. Both the AMD and intel mounting brackets come with -7mm offset holes so that the cooler is better placed over the CPU’s hotspots.

The three fans come in their own box too. Here we have three NF-A12x25 G2s, two of which are the PPA variant and one PPB, which have 50 RPM offsets to prevent harmonics from forming between them. These fans spin at such consistent speeds, that if you mount two next to each other on the same fan splitter, they can sing in harmony.

The fans all come equipped with the full rear gasket for a perfect seal on the radiator.

Moving on to the pump assembly, here we find the pièce de résistance, the NL-PNA1. PNA stands for Pump Noise Absorber, and this is a custom pump cover designed by Noctua that features multiple layers of foam, sound barriers, and silicone mounts, all to quiet down the pump.

At its heart, the NL-CL1 is based on Asetek’s Emma Gen8 V2 pump platform that, although very powerful, isn’t the quietest pump on the market. However, the combination of its power and the PNA1 cap means that Noctua is happy to stand behind the product, and we’ll see in testing whether this stance is justified.

This pump cap isn’t only engineered to absorb and deflect noise, however – it’s also a tuned mass damper. Sitting on silicone mounts, its own mass and positioning is engineered such that it dampens mechanical noise. This damping essentially shifts the higher, more annoying frequencies pumps typically produce toward deeper, more pleasant frequencies that typically bother human hearing less.

The cold plate is beautifully milled, and the exposed copper should do a great job at transferring heat.

Hidden between the two tubes is a dip-switch with three positions. They’re not marked, but it’s easy to tell whether you’re in the quiet, balanced, or unrestricted mode. These limit the pump’s RPMs to 2100 or 2600 for the quiet and balanced profiles. Within these profiles, you can use the motherboard’s PWM control to guide the pump. However, the pump’s internal coolant temperature sensor will override the PWM signal at certain duty cycles or beyond certain coolant temperatures and push to 100% duty anyway, which may lead to the pump running louder than you want. In practice, however, we haven’t found this to be a problem.

For full control, you’ll want to use the unrestricted mode, where you have the pump’s full 3700 RPM at your disposal.

What I find a bit of a let-down here, is that there is no two-pin thermal probe output. I have a lot of experience with custom water cooling, and my preferred method of managing pump and fan speeds is by using the coolant temperature as the source value. It’s great that this AIO’s pump will manage itself and I’m stoked to see this feature finally coming to numerous AIOs, but I’d like access to the coolant temperature so that the fans can be controlled by this too.

The AIO’s radiator is a relatively standard aluminum type, but it’s 30mm thick which is an improvement over thinner 25mm radiators on more budget-friendly coolers.

Lastly, the loop is filled with Glycol, and is not user-serviceable.

Optionally, for $20, you can add an auxiliary fan to cool the VRM and memory surrounding the CPU, but this honestly feels like an afterthought and doesn’t look very charming compared to the rest of the cooler. I don’t doubt that it works, but it’s not nearly as neatly integrated into the pump block as we’ve seen with much of Noctua’s premium competition.

Testing Part 1: Pump speed vs. dBA

To test the NL-CL1, we decided to deviate from our usual procedure. Usually, we take AIO’s as they come and pit them against each other in a real-world scenario using a closed case and standard onboard fan curves. However, with the improvements Noctua has made to the pump assembly, we wanted to really focus on the impact of this different pump on both acoustic and thermal performance.

To do this, we’re pitting the NL-CL1 against the Phanteks Glacier One M25 G2 and the Lian Li Hydroshift II LCD-C 360N – but instead of using their included fans (the Lian Li doesn’t come with any), we’re installing the three NF-A12x25 G2 fans that come with the Noctua.

The reason we’re testing this way is because I feel that the primary audience that would be interested in this AIO, is also the type that would fan-swap an existing cooler. It’s also to take the fan variable out of the equation – we know Noctua’s fans are better than any other (they sit atop our Best PC Fans list just for that reason), and what we really want to know is how much better this pump unit really is.

These two competing coolers cost about $150 each, and if you were to install three NF-A12x25 G2’s on them, that brings the total cost to about $250, which is in-line with Noctua’s pricing. So, what do you get for the same money with the old method, vs the new, official Noctua cooler?

Meanwhile, for the purists among you, we’re also adding the legendary NH-D15 G2 air cooler to the test at the end. The main reason to contemplate a Noctua AIO is to minimize pump noise – and for a few, up until today, that simply meant not using an AIO at all, rather sticking to air cooling with fewer moving parts.

Test Setup

We’re using an MSI Godlike X870E motherboard with a 9950X3D CPU and some Kingston Fury Renegade DDR5-6000 memory. We also have a PNY RTX 5080 installed, though it’s there only for display purposes and will be kept at its zero-RPM mode.

We’re doing these tests on an open test bench, as to expose as much of the pump as possible.

Testing Part 1: Pump speed vs. dBA

For the first series of tests, I ran the three AIO’s pumps through their RPM ranges independently, by themselves. To get the system quiet enough, we ensured the GPU’s fans were not spinning, there was no load on the CPU (and thus no whining VRMs or PSU fan), and disconnected the CPU fans – the only moving part was the pump itself – that’s all we’re trying to figure out here.

What’s clear from the results is that the Noctua pump is notably quieter at most speeds, right up until about 2300 RPM, where Phanteks’ Glacier One becomes quieter, and Noctua’s pump actually makes a big jump up in noise levels.

What’s also interesting is that up until about 1900 RPM, the pump on Noctua’s cooler is almost indistinguishable from the noise floor of the room. That’s very impressive if you consider that the dB meter was placed at a mere 20cm from the pump, at night, in a room treated for acoustics.

I debated testing with dB-C weighting, as this is more sensitive to low frequencies, but decided against this. C-weighting spans across a wider range of frequencies, which technically speaking, would offer results more representative of the entire sound spectrum.

However, dB-A weighting is geared more toward the sensitivities of human hearing – and Noctua specifically engineered the pump cover to shift the pump’s sound profile towards lower frequencies, where they would be less bothersome.

With that in mind, I do want to mention that the dB reading alone really doesn’t tell the whole story. As mentioned, the Noctua pump ends up louder than the Phanteks, at least as far as decibels are concerned.

As I was testing, I saw these numbers, and I thought: that’s not right. How can that be? The Noctua sounded much quieter to my ears.

So, I went back, re-installed the Phanteks, and lo-and-behold, it put out the exact same figure it did before – quieter than the Noctua on the dB meter, but my ears told a different story.

Using dB(A) weighting should have compensated for that difference, but it didn’t. So, perhaps my dB meter is wrong, or Noctua knows more about human hearing than dB(A) weighting accounts for.

However, what may also play a role is the differences in pump assembly and how they impact flow rate. If, for example, the Phanteks pushes more fluid per rotation than the Noctua, then it’d be only logical that it’s louder too – but I doubt it does.

Either way, we’ll be going back and testing with subjective noise levels in addition to these objective figures for a complete picture.

Testing Phase 2: AIO Objective Noise-Normalized, + Min and Max

In order to account for the pump’s engineering, I’ll be running a noise-normalized test that has the NF-A12x25 G2 fans spinning at the same 1200 RPM speed on each cooler, on every test. I’ll be running the three pumps at speeds that have matching noise levels, which we’ve figured out in the previous testing phase with the dB meter.

This is not a test meant to simulate real-life performance -- we run the fans at a fixed speed of 1200 RPM, and keep the CPU at stock settings to limit power draw to exactly a hair under 200 watts under all scenarios, so that all coolers make it through the test and to remove any variables. The only factors influencing the thermal results are the pump, its mounting offset, the flow resistance, and the radiator – all factors over which we ultimately have no influence.

This is where things started to get very interesting. Let us start with the minimums and maximums – you’ll note that at the minimum pump speed, the Noctua has the CPU running much hotter than the other two coolers. I’d like to clarify that the minimum and maximum tests are not noise-normalized, but have the pump running at their minimum and maximum speeds. Noctua’s LC1 has an extremely wide RPM range to work with, which the other two coolers don’t. And running a 200W workload with a pump running at just 750 RPM isn’t going to do great things for thermals. It does, though, mean that in low-load situations, the pump can run completely quietly.

However, in the noise-normalized test between 29 dB(A) pump noise and 32 dB(A) pump noise, we saw some shocking results. Noctua’s cooler, even when it has its pump running at a barely perceptible noise level of just 29 dB(A), still runs significantly cooler than both the Glacier One and the Hydroshift with their pumps running at full speed.

Of course, it must be noted that there are more factors at play here than just the pump – the LC1 offers a 7mm offset mount for Ryzen systems which we used, a different cold plate design, and a radiator that’s slightly thicker than its competition.

Testing Phase 3: Subjective Noise-Normalized

As mentioned earlier, according to my ears, some of the pump’s acoustics don’t match up with what my dB meter shows. For this reason, I’m repeating the previous batch of tests, but instead of looking at the dB meter, I’m trusting my ears to guide me in picking an RPM setpoint for each pump that I deem fits the description. If you see a result missing, it’s because the criteria weren’t met. The RPMs of the pumps are in the chart below.

To determine the RPM levels, I first ran the pump at the highest speed at which it was still completely inaudible. I then figured out a middle point where I was happy to tolerate the noise level under load. And finally, I pushed the pump speed up further, and found the lowest value at which its noise started to annoy me.

To give some additional context, I’d like to emphasize that I have highly sensitive hearing, and I’m someone that likes to run their gear as close to inaudible as possible. This is also a very subjective test – you may hear something where I didn’t – but on the flipside, what annoys me, you may be just fine with, so do take these findings with a grain of salt.

Then, with those numbers, I ran the thermal tests again, all with the fans at 1200 RPM to remove any other variables.

Here, the Noctua started to really stand out from the crowd. Even pushing the Glacier one to annoying noise levels couldn’t make it keep up with the thermals produced by Noctua pump running inaudibly. That’s honestly quite staggering.

I contemplated for a moment whether to adjust the fan speeds in this test to match the annoyance factor, but this would make comparison difficult, and I really am trying to focus on the difference the pump makes here, and nothing else.

What’s really important to note here, though, is that from my experience, I can truly say that the dBA figure means almost nothing in practice. The subjective noise profile of the pump matters way more than the dBA, and whereas the Noctua might, strictly speaking, be louder than the Phanteks at higher speeds, it’s also far smoother. Whatever they did with the PNA1, it’s working.

Meanwhile, though, from the results it’s also clear that there is no need to run the Noctua at these higher pump speeds, as there is very little additional benefit.

And that’s not to even mention the Lian Li pump, which is always audible. Consequently, I had to omit it from the inaudible category entirely, and I can tell you from experience, there are many AIOs that are unable to run their pumps at inaudible levels. This is not an isolated case.

Testing Phase 4: Air vs Water (Noise-Normalized)

As mentioned, we also added the NH-D15 G2 to the mix, as it is Noctua’s most powerful air cooler and the most surefire way to avoid pump noise entirely, and I’m sure many of you who want nothing except Noctua, actually want to know how the new liquid cooler compares to Noctua’s finest air cooler – not a bunch of AIO’s you wouldn’t buy anyway.

TheD15 air cooler has – as its name implies – much larger 150mm fans. Consequently, to test fairly against the NH-D15, we decided to set two noise targets, based on the AIO’s internal pump limiters selected with the switch on quiet and balanced.

The test we’re performing here is more representative of real-world performance than the previous bunch. For the quiet and balanced pump profiles, I set the AIO’s fans to a speed that I felt matched up nicely, where the fan and pump noise blended smoothly. I measured the total dB(A) produced, then figured out which fan speed the NH-D15 G2 had to run at to produce the same overall noise level.

For the maximum speed test, dB(A) figures were ignored – all gear was run at full speed.

The results speak for themselves. Noctua’s NL-LC1-36 offers vastly superior performance to the NH-D15. Even with the NH-D15 G2 air cooler running at full tilt, producing a highly annoying 43.9 dB(A), it still runs 6 degrees hotter than the LC1 running in the quietest profile with the fans barely even trying at just 1000 RPM, producing only 29.6 dB(A).

Noctua has been defeated. Long live Noctua.

When I first heard that Noctua’s first liquid cooler would be an Asetek unit with some Noctua sprinkles added to it, I had some major doubts about its efficacy and, quite frankly, Noctua’s business decisions.

I grew up knowing Noctua as a company that prides itself on its standards, and designing its products entirely in-house. With that in mind, the Noctua NL-LC1 is a bit… unlike the classic Noctua that we know and love – at its core, it’s not a Noctua cooler in any way we’ve seen before.

However, if you look at the history of companies that have tried to build their own AIO’s, you’ll be met with a very long list of fallen soldiers -- whether that’s due to being unable to build a reliable pump, or because of litigation from Asetek when their patent was still valid. If history has taught us anything, it’s that it’s surprisingly difficult to build a good AIO with no liquid cooling experience.

In that sense, I somewhat doubt whether the LC1 is the liquid cooler Noctua actually wanted to build. The company is also still working hard on its pumpless Thermosiphon cooler. But in the meantime, the market still wants what the market wants.

With CPUs becoming ever-more powerful, and consumer demands increasing, Noctua either had to find a way to give the people what they wanted, or get left behind in the CPU cooling space – a space they once dominated.

With all this in mind, I believe that the LC1 is the result of Noctua making a compromise – they won’t design the cooler entirely in-house, but instead work with Asetek for the pump and radiator, but adding their own pump cover, mounting bracket, and fans to bring the total package to a new industry standard.

However, this compromise is proving to pave the way to greatness. From my brief testing, I can safely say that this is an absolutely fantastic AIO – and I’m glad to finally see somebody making a liquid cooler that focusses on what really matters: noise and performance.

Priced at $220 to $280, it’s not the cheapest AIO, but certainly isn’t the most expensive either. So, despite the fact that it’s not 100% Noctua, this one comes highly recommended to anybody looking for a high-quality AIO with fantastic performance and a stellar 6-year warranty.

So, as much as I may not feel like this AIO appeals to me as a Noctua purist, as a hardware enthusiast, I really quite like it, and it’ll certainly be finding its way into a personal system.

Noctua’s highly anticipated AIO cooler is finally available, and PC builders can get it in three sizes — 240mm, 360mm, and 420mm. These all-in-one water-cooling solutions start at $219.95 on Amazon for the smallest 240mm two-fan solution. The larger 360mm version costs $249.95, and is slightly more affordable than the converted European price of US$289.95 (based on the current conversion rate for EUR 250), while the largest 420mm, equipped with three 140mm fans, is priced at $279.95.

• Get the Noctua NL-LC1-24 240mm Quiet All-in-One Water Cooler on Amazon
• Get the Noctua NL-LC1-36 360mm Quiet All-in-One Water Cooler on Amazon
• Get the Noctua NL-LC1-42 420mm Quiet All-in-One Water Cooler on Amazon

Given that this is a Noctua cooling solution, you can expect it to stay silent while still offering performance. It achieves this with the NL-PNA1 pump noise absorber — a mass damper that sits on top of the pump and water block featuring multiple layers of acoustic foam, a dense sound barrier, floating silicone mounts, and an outer shell with a metal faceplate. The pump itself also has three available speed profiles; it’s set by default to quiet mode, ensuring that it remains inaudible during operation. You can set it to balanced mode if you want additional performance headroom at the cost of some noise, while veteran users can switch to manual mode for full control over the AIO.

You can also purchase the optional NL-ACF1 80mm auxiliary cooling fan that mounts directly on the water block. This small add-on can make a big difference to other components, as we saw in Noctua’s booth at Computex 2026. It claims a VRM temperature reduction of nearly 40%, allowing your case fans to run at a slower RPM and further reduce noise. You can check out the Noctua video below if you want to see the company’s deep dive into its first AIO cooling solution.

Aside from these new innovations, the company also includes its legendary A-series fans with the AIO coolers. The 240mm comes with two NF-A12x25 G2 PWM 120mm fans, while the 360mm model boasts three of these fans, which are also found in our best PC case fans of 2026. The larger 420mm AIO trades in the 120mm fans for three NF-A14x25 G2 PWM 140mm fans. All three AIO models are equipped with the SecuFirm2+ mounting system, allowing you to use them on the latest and current-gen sockets on the market, including AM4, AM5, LGA 1700, and LGA 1851. This also means that you can easily swap a Noctua air cooler with this AIO solution if you already use a brown and beige air cooler like the Noctua NH-D15 G2.

The Noctua NL-LC1 series of AIO coolers is admittedly quite expensive, with its starting price of $219.95 on Amazon. This is especially true as there are numerous more affordable options out there, with the best AIO coolers starting at around $120. But if you’re either going for an all-Noctua PC build or want to have a silent PC at all costs, then the Noctua NL-LC1 AIO is your best bet for achieving that.

The latest liquid cooler from MSI to land on our test bench is the new MPG Coreliquid P22 360. While it packs a budget price of only $129.99, it doesn’t cut corners, featuring good thermal performance, low noise levels in common scenarios, and a fancy 2.1-inch IPS display.

Let's take a look at the specifications and features of this eye-catching AIO, then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks, and decide if MSI’s MPG Coreliquid P22 360 deserves to make our list of the best CPU coolers.

Cooler specifications

Features of MSI’s MPG Coreliquid P22 360

▶️ Frame compatible with both AMD and Intel systems

Usually when you purchase an AIO, there’s at least one frame included, designed for a specific AMD or Intel socket.

MSI has simplified the install process here, with a single-frame design that’s compatible with both AMD AM4/AM5 and Intel LGA 1700/1851.

▶️ 2.1-inch 540x540 IPS display

A 2.1-inch IPS display with a resolution of 540x540 is included with this AIO, allowing users to observe performance metrics by glancing at the screen. Four preset backgrounds are included with the AIO’s software, and custom images and videos up to 500MB are supported.

To customize the AIO, you’ll need to download MSI’s EZ Display software, which is simple to use but a little rough around the edges. You can set it to use one background by enabling the “repeat” button, or you can have it alternate between the images and videos you have loaded in the software.

My biggest complaint here is that you can’t disable or remove the preset images, which means they’ll be included in the rotation of images displayed unless you’ve set the AIO to show only one image or video by selecting the “repeat” button.

▶️ RAM Clearance

As with most liquid coolers, the design of thisAIO is such that the CPU block doesn’t overhang or interfere with the DIMM slots in any manner, ensuring that all sizes of RAM, no matter how tall, are compatible.

▶️ 120mm fans

There’s more to a cooler than just the radiator and pump. The included fans have a direct impact on aesthetics, noise levels, and overall thermal performance. Conveniently, the trio of fans here arrive pre-installed, saving a few moments during installation. They also feature a daisy-chaining quick-connect system, designed to eliminate cable clutter.

▶️ Packaging

The outer packaging is a bit flashy, at least, in comparison to your normal AIO box. It features a rendering of the cooler against a background of black, blue, purple, and pink.

The inner packaging is typical of most liquid coolers, with molded foam, cardboard, and plastic coverings protecting the contents during shipping.

Included with the package are:

• Mounting hardware for AMD and Intel platforms
• Aesthetic cover for mounting hardware
• A small tube of thermal paste
• 360mm radiator and pre-installed 120mm fans
• 2.1-inch display

▶️ AM5 Installation

This section assumes you’ve already mounted the 360mm radiator. Installation of AIOs is much easier when you have already secured the radiator to your case.

To begin putting things together, you’ll first need to remove the default AM4/5 retention.

The next step is to screw in the mounting studs, followed by an application of thermal paste to the CPU. If you’re not sure how to do that, we have a handy thermal paste application guide that covers the different methods you can use.

After thermal paste is applied, take the CPU block and press it against the studs, using the included screws and a screwdriver to secure it in place.

There are two final steps. First, place the aesthetic cover on the CPU block. Then attach the USB, PWM, and ARGB connections to their corresponding motherboard headers.

Real-world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform

We’ve tested coolers with both the Ryzen 9950X3D and its non-V-Cache sibling, the 9950X. There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events. While the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D is relatively balanced, the 9950X I used has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

We’ve since returned to using a 9950X3D for cooler testing, as it has a more balanced heat profile, and is almost certainly a more widely adopted CPU. The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I emphasize results that are comparable to real-world use. This means I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods.

Many reviewers test on open test benches, which have a combination of lesser airflow needs and lowered ambient temperatures. This results in making weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some have also used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect real-world cooler conditions.

Our latest testing setup uses the FLOVA F50 computer case from Tryx.

This case features a unique “crossflow” fan that pulls air from the side, which the company claims is more effective than traditional intake fans. For air cooling tests, we’ve added a single Noctua NF-A12 G2 intake fan.

PBO Performance and maximum noise levels

We’re going to start this review’s benchmark section by focusing on a traditional maximum performance test, with the CPU cooler’s fans allowed to reach their fastest speeds, for the best cooling possible.Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D to stretch its legs to an extent and consume over 260W. Enabling PBO incrteases max power consumption and heat output. We use MSI’s X870E Carbon Wifi motherboard, and often the CPU will reach its TJ Max (peak temperature) of 95 degrees C (203 F) and thermally throttle to some extent with most coolers. When this throttling occurs, I’ve measured the average power consumption to determine performance.

High-end AIO liquid coolers, however, are expected to be able to keep AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D under TJ Max during the duration of the benchmark – in these cases, we compare the CPU’s actual temperature.

Today’s review is a bit unique, in that we have the results from a prototype and final version of the AIO being reviewed today – giving us some insight into how these products evolve during the design and manufacturing process.

Both the prototype and retail versions of MSI’s MPG Coreliquid P22 360 handle this test with ease, with an average temperature of 84.7C (184.5F) – one of the best results we’ve seen on this test bench.

Some coolers perform well in maximum-strength tests, but run loudly at full speeds. Noisy fans in this scenario aren’t necessarily a bad thing; some folks prefer to hear them as a way to be aware when the CPU is getting hot.

One issue I raised when I tested the prototype of this AIO was that it ran louder than it needed to. 48.9 dBA is pointlessly loud for most users. MSI took that feedback to heart, and the fans included with MSI MPG Coreliquid P22 360 reach 44.9 dBA at 100% RPM, a moderate volume level that is much quieter than the maximum noise levels of competitor liquid coolers. Those who prefer to implement speed restrictions for silent operation need not worry; our noise-normalized benchmarks show good performance even when the fans are set to run quietly.

200W thermal benchmarks

For the next thermal test, I leave the motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23.

In this test, with a standard power limit enabled, MSI’s Coreliquid P22 performs in the middle of the results we have from other liquid coolers – 1.2 degrees C behind our best result, and 3.6 C cooler than the worst result from another AIO.

150W + GPU thermal results, noise levels

Our next test runs Cinebench on the CPU with a 150W power limit, while also running Furmark on MSI’s RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3x OC. This causes the GPU to consume ~295W of power. This test is designed to emulate the thermals of games, which stress the CPU and GPU.

In this test, designed to emulate the thermal conditions of a CPU-intensive AAA game, MSI’s P22 continues to deliver outstanding performance – the result of 37.1 C over ambient (59.1 C actual temperature) is our third-best result, and an improvement of one degree compared to the prototype of this AIO.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of our MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers. This next test has the CPU cooler noise-normalized to 38.9 dBA, with PBO enabled for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU. Most coolers will not be able to keep the CPU from reaching its peak temperature (TJ Max) in this stress test. So we’ll look at this in terms of average CPU power consumption, which averaged 255.8 watts.

This test is especially difficult, because in addition to the reduced noise from the CPU cooler, our current test bench’s system fans are configured to run extremely silently, below the floor of the noise meter I use to measure dBA.

While I prefer to look at the power consumption in a scenario where the CPU reaches TJ Max (the processor’s peak temperature), I’ve also included the average CPU temperature in the chart below.

Karhu DDR5 RAM thermals testing

Your CPU cooler does not operate in isolation. It has an impact on not just your CPU’s temperatures, but also the other components in your build, like your RAM and GPU. To that end, I’ve run the Karhu RAM stress test. This places a load of ~153W on the CPU and ensures system RAM (DDR5 in my case) is fully stable. In this type of scenario, most AIOs tend to produce worse results than air coolers.

DDR5 temperatures were excellent in this test, on par with ASRock’s Steel Legend, which features an integrated VRM fan. The only result showing better performance is from Silverstone’s IceMyst Pro, with fans that directly cool system DIMMs.

Conclusion

MSI is back in the AIO game with the MPG Coreliquid P22 360. This AIO has a relatively low price tag while featuring a 2.1-inch IPS display, excellent thermal performance, and low noise levels in common scenarios. It’s a solid choice if you’re after a cooler with a round display that cools well. Just note that if you can live without a display, there are excellent options that cost quite a bit less, like Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro, which sometimes sells for less than $85.

So many PC cooling companies copy each other’s designs and features – I must have seen a dozen AIOs at Computex with curved screens and / or unified fans. But at Levelplay’s event last week, I was struck by a couple of concepts the company is working on. First was the MagBracket fan design, where the RGB lights are housed in a mounting plate, which connects via a USB-C cable that unifies PWM and RGB connections.

This allows the fans themselves to connect magnetically to the plate, and electrically via pogo pins. Drop them on the powered plate, and the fan lights up as it begins to spin. That would make cleaning your case fans exceptionally easy, and it also means the spinners are reversible, with connectors on both sides. So you can pop a fan off, flip it over, and put it back on to go from intake to exhaust.

That also means you can install the brackets on their own, and pop the fans on after your system is more or less built. Anyone who’s ever put a fan on a radiator or case in the wrong orientation (that has to be everyone who’s built more than one PC, right?) can rejoice at how easy that situation would be to fix here. Grab the offending fan, flip it over, pop it back on, and you’re good to you. You wouldn’t even need to reboot.

We don’t know pricing or availability yet, and the orange crossbars probably aren’t doing the airflow any favors. But I love the simple modularity of this design.

Next up, the Newtro 360 is a retro-styled cooler that puts a big tactile knob on top of an AIO, letting you adjust the fan speed, with a max cooling rating of 350W.

It’s certainly a more unique take than adding a screen or a VRM fan on top of the cold plate, but I’m personally not certain how often I’d be willing to pop my side panel off to tweak my AIO’s performance. I do like the orange accents on the sleeved cables and the old-school metal fan grilles, though.

Like the magnetic fans, the Newtro AIO is a concept, so we don’t know if or when the company will release the cooler, but it’s certainly the most tactile AIO I saw at Computex 2026.

Frore Systems is showing off its LiquidJet Nexus at Computex 2026 in Taipei, Taiwan. The LiquidJet Nexus is a monolithic water block with innovative coldplates, designed to cool two Blackwell GPUs and a Grace CPU, that can replace the complex water block used today. Based on tests conducted by an ODM, the LiquidJet Nexus outperforms the default cooling solution used today and reduces GPU temperatures by around 6ºC, which increases token generation by 10%. Frore intends to build LiquidJet Nexus for Nvidia’s Rubin platforms and is ready to produce them for other accelerators, too.

Earlier this year, Frore introduced its LiquidJet, a coldplate for AI accelerators, tailor-made for exact models of processors using tools originally meant to make semiconductors, in a bid to maximize cooling performance. The LiquidJet Nexus water block builds upon these principles, integrating them into a monolithic unit designed to cool down both GPUs and a CPU inside a server tray. For now, Frore is demonstrating LiquidJet Nexus for Nvidia’s Grace Blackwell superchip, though a version compatible with Vera Rubin is also incoming, we're told.

Frore’s LiquidJet coldplates are made using tools designed to produce semiconductors — using etching and bonding steps — and are architected in accordance with actual thermal maps of CPUs and GPUs they are meant to cool. As a result, they remove heat precisely from hotspots of these processors, and therefore enable better cooling performance than coldplates made using traditional milling methods. Based on tests conducted by a major ODM, Frore’s LiquidJet Nexus reduces the temperature of Blackwell GPUs by 6ºC compared to default cooling solutions, which in turn increases their token generation by 10%.

While a 6ºC temperature drop and a 10% performance improvement may sound humble, these performance improvements impact billion-dollar deployments, where such improvements could mean hundreds of millions in savings. Also, since Frore’s Liquid Jet Nexus is monolithic, it is less prone to leakage. This means less downtime and fewer damaged servers, which means more profits and fewer losses for their owners. Again, since we are talking about billion-dollar deployments, there are significant amounts of money at stake when it comes to cooling and efficiency.

Frore says it is working with the majority of hyperscalers to build LiquidJet-based cooling solutions for their custom hardware. Since LiquidJet is designed to remove 400W – 600W of thermal energy per square centimeter, it can cool down very hot components. Furthermore, since these components tend to scale horizontally, it is not a problem to scale LiquidJet’s performance by increasing its dimensions.

In addition to being more performant and potentially significantly more reliable than existing liquid-cooling solutions for Nvidia Blackwell, Frore’s LiquidJet Nexus also weighs 65% less than rivals and is twice as thin (17 mm vs 34 mm), according to Frore.

While this may not be a significant advantage today (unless you ship your servers by plane), this will be a dramatic advantage for Nvidia’s next-generation Kyber chassis that places servers on their edge rather than horizontally, which will make the importance of LiquidJet Nexus’s weight a bigger factor, as the cooler must adhere to the cooling surface of the integrated heat spreader thoroughly. Meanwhile, it is hard to adhere a massive cooler to a vertically standing motherboard, so one with a lower weight should be easier to attach to the motherboard and chassis without worrying about longer-term deformations.

Speaking of Nvidia’s Kyber chassis, it is worth noting that they are designed for the Vera Rubin Ultra platform, which ups the TDP of GPUs all the way to around 3kW per unit, making its cooling a challenge. Meanwhile, Rubin Ultra GPU scales horizontally by employing a quad-chiplet design, so Frore can address its TDP by reinventing its coldplate, which is easy assuming the company is provided a thermal map of the unit. The same method can be applied to other processors, which is why Frore is indeed working with hyperscalers with custom silicon, in addition to other merchant silicon providers, aside from Nvidia.

Tom's Hardware got a chance to visit Noctua's booth at Computex 2026, and we went deep on two key products for the company. The first is the NL-LC1 all-in-one liquid cooler, which we've already covered separately. The second regarded the company's ongoing efforts to develop a passively circulated thermosiphon liquid cooling solution.

A thermosiphon CPU heatsink works on a simple principle: a working fluid in a closed loop is exposed to a heat source, changes phase to a gaseous state, enters a condenser, sheds its heat by changing back into a liquid phase, and then naturally falls back toward the low point in the loop.

This simple principle encounters all sorts of challenges on the way toward use in a practical CPU heatsink. And Noctua is both characterizing and combating those problems with its typical thoroughness.

Noctua's problem-solving to this point has included developing a finned evaporator surface that helps ensure that the fluid flow in the evaporator is not turbulent, which causes warm vapor to mix with the colder fluid further from the evaporator surface, reducing the effectiveness of the system.

Noctua showed off how it's further improved the performance of its evaporator by applying a thin layer of sintered copper to its surface. Because of the high surface area created by this rough, porous wicking layer, capillary action draws more cool liquid towards the evaporator surface as the fluid already nearest the surface vaporizes.

This sintered layer avoids the formation of insulating bubbles or films over hot spots, as might happen on a smoother surface, which would negatively affect both the thermal performance of the heatsink and the convection of the working fluid through the system.

Noctua demonstrated the performance of this most recent thermosiphon prototype by putting it side-by-side with a 360mm version of its NL-LC1 AIO, both cooling an identical Ryzen 9 9950X3D test system running at a PPT of 230W. Accounting for some variance in the workload, both test systems showed a CPU temperature of just over 80 °C, suggesting that the passively circulating thermosiphon is able to deliver cooling performance similar to that of an AIO with an active pump.

Beyond the sintered evaporator coating, the inlet and outlet hoses of the cooler now sit on the same side of the evaporator, much like those of an active AIO pump, for better motherboard clearance and compatibility. The tubes on this prototype also feature a new material that reduces permeation, seals better at the connectors, and achieves full regulatory compliance.

Overall, the unit now looks much like a typical AIO and much closer to a retail-ready product versus the somewhat rough-and-ready prototypes of years past.

Between the internal and external refinements evident in this latest version of the thermosiphon, Noctua is confident enough in the performance and manufacturability of the product that it has set a potential launch window for the unit, and it tentatively expects a retail version to arrive sometime in Q3 2027. While that's still a ways away, it's typical of the company's dogged pursuit of near-perfection, and it seems safe to say that we should expect an even further refined version of this product at next year's Computex.

Noctua originally announced and showed off its first liquid cooler last year, promising to bring the same performance and aesthetics of its iconic air coolers to AIOs. Today at Computex 2026, the company has officially unveiled the NL-LC1, putting a name on the lineup that features 240mm, 360mm, and 420mm variants. The NL-LC1 will hit store shelves two weeks later, on June 16, starting at 220 Euros (around $250).

This AIO was originally intended to launch in Q1 2026 but was delayed to Q2 late last year. Hence, we already know most of the details about this product, including the available sizes, mounting, pump solution, fan setup, and more. Most importantly, the NL-LC1 uses Asetek's Emma V2 platform for its pump rather than an in-house solution, but Noctua has developed a custom noise-suppression system around it.

There are three layers of insulation meant to ensure quiet operation, and an integrated mass damper called the "NL-PNA1" (Pump Noise Absorber) to reduce vibrations. Noctua is not only limiting the amount of noise but also ensuring the pitch isn't annoying, even for what little you might be able to hear. The company's own charts show a notable difference with and without the top cover that provides this soundproofing.

The cooler comes with Noctua's legendary NF-A12x25 G2 (120mm) fans for the 240mm and 360mm models, while the 420mm features the NF-A14x25 G2 (140mm) fans instead. Similar to Silverstone's IceMyst Pro coolers we reviewed a couple of months ago, there's also an option for an additional auxiliary fan that can channel airflow to motherboard VRMs, RAM, or M.2 SSDs. It's called the "NL-ACF1" and costs 20 EUR ($23).

Noctua has equipped the NL-LC1 with its SecuFirm2+ mounting system, which supports all current-gen and recent CPUs on the market — AM4, AM5, LGA 1700, and LGA 1851. If you're already using a brown and beige air cooler, it should be a simple swap for you without needing to replace the mounting bracket. Lastly, there are three pump profiles corresponding to different fan speeds and noise levels.

By default, the pump runs at a minimum of 750 RPM, but it can be dialed up to 3,400 RPM manually, using the "Manual" profile. The "Quiet" profile limits the speed to 2,100 RPM, while the "Balanced" profile lets it reach 2,600 RPM. The moment the liquid temperature exceeds 30°C, the Balanced profile will dynamically increase the pump speed up to 3,400 RPM at 45°C to maintain a balance between cooling and noise.

Available from June 16, the NL-CL1 will cost 220 EUR for the 240mm version, 250 EUR for the 360mm version, and 280 EUR for the top-end 420mm version. Converted to USD, that's a ~$250 starting point. Today, you can get high-quality Thermalright AIOs for $50, and spending a bit more will get you their fancy LCD options, too. The 420mm variant comes out to $325 — Arctic's Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 costs around $100, and we gave it a positive review earlier this year.

Even if reviews paint the NL-LC1 in a glowing light, that pricing is a tough pill to swallow for anyone but hardcore Noctua fans. Moreover, it's important to mention that this is different from the pumpless AIO that the company has been showing off. That's still in the prototype stage and not intended for mainstream markets, though the company did say that in the "Quiet" profile, the NL-LC1 is beaten by the pumpless model.

Cooler Master had a lot of things to show off at Computex 2026. The keynote, held at their headquarters just up the road from the Nangang Exhibition Center, talked about their AI data center cooling and eventually delved into the consumer side of things where we live. After the keynote, we headed downstairs to a huge room showcasing not only the consumer side of things but also the CDUs (Cooling Distribution Units) they’ve developed. It was quite a display if you’ve never seen them before.

But alas, we’re here to talk about a couple of new cases in the HAF II 500, and Silencio 600, the new V8 air cooler, and the all-aluminum Masterfan A series fans debuted here.Starting with the HAF II 500, this High Airflow mid-tower chassis is purpose-built for high-end systems, including gaming, creator, overclocking, and even AI systems that may require better cooling. Two huge 220mm intake fans at the front, purpose-built for the case (may sell separately), and a large 180mm exhaust fan (all from the Mighty 40 family), the case helps live up to the HAF name. While we don’t have any cooling metrics, I can tell you that you could feel the airflow from behind the case from a few feet away, and we couldn’t hear it (admittedly, over the hum of the crowd). But don’t worry, we’ll get in the lab as soon as it's available and put it through its paces.

HAF II 500

Internally, it supports up to E-ATX motherboards, so you can put just about anything inside and keep it cool without making much noise. The ribbed front panel’s low airflow resistance helps air enter the chassis and exit the rear with minimal restriction. A portion of the bottom fan cools the PSU chamber, while most of the airflow is directed by a curved baffle to cool the GPU, where it’s needed most. On top of that, it uses an evolution of the Freeform 2.0 platform and sliding rails, called the MasterRail System, a convenient way to support multiple fan and radiator sizes without blocking airflow.

The HAF II 500 supports dual-GPU setups up to 3.6 slots thick across the eight expansion slots. In other words, there’s plenty of room to put whatever you need inside. The outside is your typical chassis with a tinted glass side panel to show off the internals. It uses split-level cable management with zoned routing space, integrated straps, and a cable cover that swings out for ease of installation or part swapping. The front panel’s ribbed design allows for ample airflow. We should see the HAF II 500 around July, priced between $179.99 and $209.99.

Keep an eye out for a review in the coming weeks. The next case we saw was the updated Silencio 600. As the name implies, this mid-tower case is made for silence. Take a look at the unique front panel, and you can instantly see that it’s different from most other cases and from the previous Silencio 600. This unique design closes the gaps with a soft-form sound-deadening material to keep internal system noise in while maintaining front-panel airflow. Behind the panel are two pre-installed 180x40mm fans to keep the air moving and your internals cool, even at lower RPMs, with less noise. The silent case is Fit for shared spaces, home offices, studios, or anywhere else that needs a quiet case.

Silencio 600

We don’t have many other details on the chassis, including internal specs, but it will be available around October of this year (no MSRP, either).

Metal fans seem to be a theme at Computex 2026, and Cooler Master wasn’t missing out. The new MasterFan A series uses an aluminum frame and blades to increase performance. Due to increased material rigidity, the blades have less flexibility, enabling higher speeds and CFM. The blade-to-top gap on the A120 is 0.6mm and 0.8mm on the 140mm. While that doesn’t trump Noctua’s tolerances, it’s a lot closer than most and still yields improvements both acoustically

Masterfan A

The A120 boasts over 80 CFM and 6.1 mmH2O, while the A140 moves 104 CFM at almost 3.5 mmH2O, which is a fair amount of static pressure, especially for the A120. The fan comes in two flavors: the base model, which runs up to 2,500 RPM.. It uses a three-phase motor with dual ball bearings. Just keep your fingers away from the blades! These should be available soon, rolling out globally, with pricing around $24 for the A120.

Last but certainly not least is the V8 Ace 3DHP. Keeping the same bold, automotive engine aesthetic from the original V-series, the new flagship cooler gets updated 3DHP (3D Heatpipe) technology from the data center side of the house, said to improve heat transfer and maintain performance during intensive workloads. Cooler Master says its single-stack, dual-fan configuration is still competitive with much larger, dual-stack towers like the Noctua NHD015 G2, but at a lower price point (not listed yet), making it an attractive offering when available (soon!).

V8 Ace 3DHP

There are two versions, one for AMD and one for Intel, and they work a bit differently. The AMD version has less internal water volume in the heatpipe than the Intel SKU, which uses more water to stave off temperature spikes from the higher-wattage chip below. Both use the ‘trident’ heatpipe configuration, with a heatpipe rising into the middle of the fin array, reducing the thermal dead zone found in typical “U”-shaped heatpipe designs and increasing heat extraction by 30%, according to Cooler Master.

All in all, we saw a lot of ‘cool’ things at Cooler Master HQ at Computex 2026, and I personally can’t wait to test them.

Noctua is making its debut in the thermal pad market through a new partnership with experienced manufacturer Carbice. Noctua has announced it will be the exclusive distributor of Carbice pads for the retail market, starting with the NT-CP1 AM5/4 Carbice carbon nanotube thermal pad. Noctua will be presenting the NT-CP1 at Computex starting tomorrow and will launch the product in September.

As the name suggests, the new Noctua-branded thermal pad is optimized specifically for AM5 and AM4 AMD Ryzen CPUs, featuring a surface area that perfectly matches the IHS of CPUs that fit in both sockets.

The pad is made from carbon nanotubes that are designed to improve thermal conductivity over “hundreds and thousands of thermal cycles”. The carbon nanotubes achieve this by slowly conforming to the microscopic crevices of a CPU’s IHS. The pad is reinforced with an aluminum backbone that is sandwiched between the carbon nanotubes and protected on the surface with a nanoscale polymer coating.

Similar to outgoing thermal pads, the NT-CP1 is a maintenance-free solution that will last the lifetime of the CPU it is cooling. This is optimal for PC builders who want a permanent solution, unlike thermal paste, which typically needs to be replaced every three to five years. Thermal paste loses performance as it ages because repeated thermal cycles causes the paste to dry up.

The NT-CP1 represents the first thermal pad that Carbice is bringing to the DIY market. The company actively makes thermal pads for satellites, aerospace, and pre-built PCs (through a partnership with CyberPowerPC). It also recently announced a partnership with AMD, and is supplying its Ice Thermal Pad with the re-released Ryzen 7 5800X3D. Dr. Baratunde Cola, CEO of Carbice, notes that the company chose Noctua specifically to partner with due to the company’s widespread trust in the DIY community. Noctua will also assist Carbice in developing future thermal pads, suggesting that we could see an Intel version of the NT-CP1 in the future.

Chinese PC hardware manufacturer Tryx gained popularity back in 2024 when it launched its first all-in-one liquid cooler featuring a unique panoramic curved OLED display. The company is now preparing a new model called the Tryx Holo that appears to take things a step further by integrating a holographic-style effect display built right into the pump block.

According to the official product listing on its Chinese website, the upcoming AIO cooler features a special system that creates a virtual image with physical depth similar to a hologram. Instead of using a display and mirrors, the holographic effect is achieved using professional-grade beam splitters that are said to improve image visibility, brightness, and contrast while also eliminating the electronic layering effect commonly associated with conventional LCD screens. The pump block also has an adjustable hinge that supports 60-degree angle adjustments to ensure the optimal viewing angle.

Notably, the projected holographic image will have a limited resolution of 640 × 480. Users will be able to configure the holographic display using the Kanali software, with options to showcase system statistics alongside personalized content in JPG, MP4, and GIF formats. Additionally, the software will offer a regularly updated built-in GIF library powered by Giphy, while an audio linkage feature for video playback is also listed as part of a future OTA update.

The Tryx Holo will be using the latest pump solution from Asetek, capable of dissipating heat up to 280W with an operating rate of 800 to 2800 RPM. The AIO also comes with three 120mm FOBR fans with ARGB lighting and a single frame solution to reduce cable clutter. These new fans feature SLF (Silent-Lubricating-Fluid) bearing technology that is claimed to reduce high-frequency shaft noise and extend the mechanical lifespan of the fan compared to ordinary hydraulic bearings, achieving an MTBF (Mean Time Between Failures) life of 50,000 hours. As for CPU compatibility, the Tryx Holo will support Intel LGA1851, 1700, 1200, and 115X sockets as well as AMD AM4 and AM5.

Currently, the AIO liquid cooler is listed as a 360mm option, with 240mm and 280mm options expected to launch at a later period. Pricing and availability are yet to be confirmed; more details may follow at Computex 2026 next week.

If you’ve followed Arctic over the past few years, you probably think of oversized radiators, VRM fans, and thermal domination. The company's Liquid Freezer III Pro 360mm AIO is a favorite of ours, providing top-tier performance while retaining a relatively affordable price tag.

But not every system needs a thick 360mm radiator, and many smaller cases can’t fit radiators at all. And let’s be honest: While having the strongest performance is great if you’re pushing CPU limits with overclocking, more basic cooling options are sufficient for most consumers.

That’s where Arctic’s latest cooler, the Freezer 36-S, comes in. This is an entry-level air cooler available for less than $30, featuring only a single fan and tower connected by four direct-touch heatpipes.

Let's take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks so you can decide if the Freezer 36-S will make our list of the best CPU coolers.

Cooler specifications

Features of the Arctic Freezer 36S

● Four direct-touch heatpipes

Four direct-touch copper heatpipes, slightly staggered to ensure even heat distribution and transfer heat from the CPU into the tower’s fins.

The backside (shown above) is mostly flat, whereas the fan-touching frontside has a “chainsaw” design to it.

● Anti-bending CPU contact frame for Intel systems

Arctic includes an anti-bending CPU contact frame for Intel systems, which can help ensure consistent thermal performance – it’s especially useful for those who run high-intensity workloads, which subject the chip to more frequent thermal cycles.

However, using one of these frames is not without risk during the installation process. Improper installation can lead to RAM instability and other problems. It's not the best option for novice builders.

● High-speed 3000 RPM P12 Pro fan

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink; the included fans have a direct impact on noise levels and cooling performance. Arctic includes its high-performance P12 Pro fan here, which reaches up to 3000RPM and features 77 CFM (cubic feet per minute) airflow rating, with an impressive maximum static pressure of 6.9 mmH₂O – on paper, that's two to three times stronger than most fans on the market.

● Premium MX-7 thermal paste

Arctic includes a small 0.8-gram tube of MX-7, its newest thermal paste. We haven’t tested this paste independently (yet), but Arctic’s MX-6 already performs very well in our thermal paste testing, with performance similar to the most effective competitors on the market.

● Packaging

The heatsink and fan are in a cardboard-only package, reducing waste by forgoing plastic bags.

Included below is a picture showing all of the parts included: mounting bars for AMD systems, a contact frame for Intel systems, screws, the heatsink tower, and a 120mm fan.

● AM5 Installation

Intel systems require the use of a contact frame, but if you’re installing on an AMD Ryzen system, the process is much simpler. You’ll need to first remove the default retention mechanism, and then replace it with the included mounting bars.

The next step is applying the MX-7 thermal paste. If you’re not sure how to do that, we have a thermal paste application guide that covers the different methods you can use.

Place the heatsink tower against the CPU and mounting bars, then use a screwdriver to secure it.

Lastly, attach the 120mm P12 Pro using the fan clips and connect it to your motherboard headers to complete the installation process.

Real-world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform

We’ve tested coolers with both the Ryzen 9950X3D and its non-V-Cache sibling, the 9950X. There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events. While the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I’m using has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

We’ve returned to using a 9950X3D for cooler testing, as it has a more balanced heat profile and is almost certainly a more widely adopted CPU.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods. Some people test coolers on an open test bench, with lowered ambient temperatures. This can make weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have also used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect real-world cooler conditions.

Our latest testing setup uses the FLOVA F50 computer case from Tryx.

This case features a unique “crossflow” fan that pulls air from the side, which the company claims is more effective than traditional intake fans. For air cooling tests, we’ve added a single Noctua NF-A12 G2 intake fan.

PBO Performance and maximum noise levels

We’re going to start this benchmark section by focusing on a traditional maximum performance test, with the CPU cooler’s fans allowed to reach their fastest speeds, for the best cooling possible.

Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D to stretch its legs to an extent, and all air coolers I have tested with PBO enabled using MSI’s X870E Carbon Wifi motherboard reach the maximum CPU temperature of 95 degrees C (203 F) and thermally throttle, to a small extent.

Most of the coolers in this comparison are dual-tower, with two fans. As such, it isn’t a surprise that the single-tower Freezer 36S is outperformed by most of the competition here. What is interesting is that despite being only a single-tower, single-fan air cooler, it still manages to perform very closely to the larger heatsinks – falling only 6W behind DeepCool’s AK620 G2.

To give a wider variety of comparison examples, I’ve included some data of the same tests from our last AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D cooling test bench. But keep in mind these results aren’t 100% comparable, due to a different case and fans being used.

Arctic’s Freezer 36S performs rather well for a single-tower cooler, and part of the reason for that is the included fan – which features speeds of up to 3000RPM, about 50% faster than most fans included on consumer CPU coolers. These faster top speeds come at the cost of noise levels, though, with the 36S reaching 47.4 dBA.

200W thermal benchmarks

For the next thermal test, I leave the motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of about 200W when running Cinebench R23.

With a “stock” power profile enabled, Arctic’s latest single-tower air cooler averages 54.3 ΔC (76.5C/169.7F) – less than 2 degrees C from the best result we have from dual-tower air coolers.

150W + GPU thermal results, noise levels

Our next test runs Cinebench on the CPU with a 150W power limit, while also running Furmark on MSI’s RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3x OC. This causes the GPU to consume ~295W of power. This test is designed to emulate the thermals of games, which primarily stress the CPU and GPU.

All of the air coolers here perform similarly, with a range of just 2.7 degrees C between the best dual-tower air cooler and the worst-performing result. Let’s take a look at the noise levels now, as that will be more important to most users in this scenario.

I measured 42.4 dBA from Arctic’s Freezer 36S with a Pyle PSP25 soundmeter. This isn’t exactly what I would call “loud,” but it certainly ain’t quiet, either. If you’re particular about noise levels, you might want to implement a custom fan curve.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of our MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

This next test has the CPU cooler noise-normalized to 38.9 dBA, with PBO enabled for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU. Our results have it near the bottom of the list, which makes sense considering that it’s only a single-tower, single-fan cooler.

With this review, we have another noise-normalized benchmark, measuring the amount of time the cooler is able to keep AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D under its peak temperature (TJ Max) of 95 degrees C while running Cinebench R23 multi-core, all while the fan is noise-normalized to 38.9 dBA.

Karhu DDR5 RAM thermals testing!

Your CPU cooler does not operate in isolation. It has an impact on not just your CPU’s temperatures, but also the other components in your build, like your RAM and GPU. To that end, I’ve run the Karhu RAM stress test. This places a load of ~153W on the CPU and ensures system RAM (DDR5 in my case) is fully stable. In this type of scenario, most AIOs tend to produce worse results than air coolers.

The results here are extremely interesting. I had expected DDR5 temperatures to be worse than dual-tower air coolers, but both Arctic’s Freezer 36S and DeepCool’s AK400 G2 single-tower air coolers performed better than all traditional results – being outperformed only by Silverstone’s IceMyst Pro 360 when equipped with VRM fans.

Conclusion

Arctic’s Freezer 36S punches above its weight and price class, offering performance comparable to many dual-tower air coolers with only one fan paired to a single-tower heatsink – all with a price starting at just $28.49. It’s not the quietest cooler, and it requires installing a contact frame for Intel systems (which makes it a poor fit for novice builders), but if you aren’t trying to overclock and you don’t want to overspend on cooling to get something a bit quieter, it’s worth considering.

Innovative London-based PC cooling firm Billet Labs is back with another water-cooled system, this time aiming for a completely passive, fanless build. The video below explains why this interesting build was conceptualized, how it was built, its benefits and drawbacks, and how it performs, all with an eye on thermals.

Felix from Billet Labs starts the video presentation standing next to another of the firm's special projects – Walley. This machine is wall-mounted and shows plenty of Billet Labs signature flair. Its multiple powerful fans can get rather noisy when the system is under duress, though. If the fan speeds are scaled back, things start to get uncomfortably warm. The new custom build, therefore, targets a gaming PC that is much quieter.

Regular readers may be familiar with Billet and founder Felix on YouTube, most recently for ‘Raddy,’ the Victorian radiator PC. However, Raddy proved to be a bit noisy for a living room gaming machine, and it included some fans, so its performance components are being reused here.

Felix reveals that the hulking cast-iron radiator cooled beast known as Raddy wasn’t silent due to cavitation bubbles in the pump, which necessitates radiator flushing once a week. Not a trivial task. Also, Raddy wasn’t a fully passive design as it incorporated fans.

So, the new PC and Raddy share a lot of the same components, particularly the performance parts like an AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D processor, an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080, and an Aorus Pro B850 motherboard.

The new build used a trio of radiators in different sizes, ranging from large to very large. They were arranged above the heat-generating components, taking advantage of what Felix describes as a convection chimney effect.

For about the next 30 minutes of the video, we get to witness the skills behind the Billet Labs build process. The main stages roughly consisted of building the platform (based on an 8mm aluminum plate), mounting the PC parts, adding cooling, and then plumbing. From about 33 minutes in, we get to see the new living room gaming PC fire up Windows 11 for the ‘first time,’ and performance / thermal testing commences.

Felix isn’t satisfied with the silence of the building at first. So he had to turn off the motherboard fan and also adjust the pump speed to 80%. The machine was then tested until temperatures began to level off, over various workloads. Testing began with idling for half an hour, playing Peggle for a while, and then running Cinebench for half an hour. Things got serious as Halo 3 was fired up for a session. In the real gaming tests (Halo 3, Expedition 33, Cyberpunk 2077), the GPU never thermal throttled, but the CPU would a little as it hit 95 °C or more.

More stress testing was initiated, culminating in running Cinebench and FurMark simultaneously. This pulled over 450W of power and brought the radiator water temps up to 60C+, which is the maximum rated level for the pump. A throttling CPU was observed again in these tests. A full table of tests, power output, and temperatures is shared in the Reddit post embedded below.

Fan-less gaming PC - 5080/9800x3d/32gb/2tb - Yes I’ll probably add fans next from r/pcmasterrace

In conclusion, Felix reckons passive water cooling alone isn’t really enough for a powerful modern gaming rig. Even a single case fan would probably be enough to make a world of difference. So, stay tuned for a follow-up video where you can see how the same Billet Labs PC performs with a 120mm fan atop, pulling air upwards, accelerating that chimney effect.

For anyone who has built their own PC, you probably know that incredible feeling of accomplishment when you finish. For an enthusiast, there’s just nothing like it. Flipping on the power switch, then pressing the power button on the case, and that sense of relief once you actually see the BIOS screen and watch it all come to life, accompanied by a swathe of RGB lighting illuminating the chassis like a warehouse rave.

There's the added benefit of hearing the machine finally take its first breaths, the fans spin up, creating a rush of air through your case. But then there’s that ever-constant hum in the background of those fans and the wind noise and other vibrations that make up the whole of the noise coming from your PC.

There are a few people out there, masochists perhaps, who don’t care about noise. The rest of us strive to have a quiet PC. Why a silent PC, some may ask? A silent PC helps with immersion if you’re a gamer, or can improve productivity by not being a loud distraction. You may be thinking, “I’ll just buy quiet fans and be OK.” And, in part, you’re not wrong.

But noise comes from a variety of sources. Be it fans on your case or on your AIO/CPU Air Cooler, a video card, or even chipsets and VRM heatsinks; fans are everywhere. There’s also noise from hard drives, pumps in an AIO or custom loop coolers, the ever-annoying coil whine, and even resonant vibrations from the chassis.

The good news is that, aside from coil whine, everything else is something you can mitigate in some fashion. Unfortunately, coil whine is something you simply have to tolerate, unless you want to apply clear nail polish to the chokes/inductors. You may be able to RMA the product due to coil whine, but you could be in the same boat after if it's a problem that plagues you later down the line.

Noise in your PC is, in fact, a byproduct of heat and airflow, and achieving the quietest PC possible requires balancing multiple competing factors. You also have to consider the tone versus loudness. Specific frequencies, like the high-pitched squeal of the chokes, can be more unappealing than lower-frequency noises. Building a quiet PC is not just about fans and buying better parts, but about working within the physical limits of your setup and figuring out how much money you’re willing to spend on silence.

Why it's challenging: the physics problem

The higher your processor or video card’s TDP/TBP (Thermal Dynamic Power/Total Board Power), the louder it gets, or the more cooling area you need to keep things quiet. The more powerful a system is, the more headwinds you face to keep it cool and prevent thermal throttling. In other words, it requires more effort to remove the heat from a fire-breathing 600W RTX 5090 and a 200W Ryzen 9 9950X3D2 than it does from a 250W RTX 5070 and a 120W Ryzen 7 9800X3D.

Thermal density on the dies themselves has also increased dramatically over the last several years. As more transistors are packed into a tiny space and stacked on top of each other, it becomes physically harder to remove the amount of heat generated within the same space. Because of this and other factors, keeping today’s high-end processors at or below their throttling points has become increasingly difficult, requiring larger coolers and more airflow to keep them running at peak performance.

Ideally, you want laminar airflow where air moves uniformly, parallel, and in the same direction at a constant velocity, but that’s nearly impossible inside a PC case. Moving air creates turbulence, which generates sound. Turbulence in fans can come from many sources, including the shape of the blades and the air passing over them, as well as being in front of or behind mesh panels, grills, heatsinks, or radiators. In short, when airflow encounters obstructions, it becomes audible as it weaves through and around them. There’s also the consideration of how multiple fans react together. If some are running at slightly different speeds, they can produce a rhythmic, off-putting resonance.

Since we know that more power and performance mean more heat, and that fans need to move more air to cool, more airflow means louder operation. And there lies the rub. If you cherish silence more than anything, something has to give. Between high-performance, cooling, and silence, you need to pick two. One will almost always be compromised for another.

Another noteworthy point is that diminishing returns of silence are also very real. While in general it’s easy to reduce noise from loud to moderate, it’s harder to go from moderate to very quiet, and even more difficult to move from very quiet to ‘near silent.’ Each small improvement requires disproportionately more effort, compromise, or cost. Massive AIOs or custom water-cooling loops aren’t cheap, and most silent fans and cases aren't either.

What can you do about it?

The first thing to be reminded of at this point is that it’s all a balancing act. You can only make a machine that outputs 750W so quiet without thermal throttling, losing performance, or spending a lot of cash. Therefore, setting your expectations is key, especially if you’re running a high-power machine. Even though it can be an uphill battle with some hardware, there are ways to get a quieter PC, at a cost or for free, even if your PC matches the output of a personal space heater. The good news is that everything below applies to any machine, be it an HTPC or a monster full-tower gaming rig.

What you can do for free

One of the first things you can do without spending any money is clean out the dust in your case, especially your dust filters, and from the components, like the CPU and GPU heatsinks and power supply intake. The more they get clogged with dust, the less air passes through to cool your system, lowers usable thermal dissipation surface area, and the more turbulent (and louder) the airflow can get, and the faster your fans need to spin to keep temperatures down.

Case placement is another factor you can easily change and matters for both dust and noise. Under the desk, or further from ear level, is ideal, so long as it’s not sitting directly on carpet (the worst place for dust!) and has access to cool air for the intakes. Proper cable management also helps, though it is often a minor detail, as most cables are tied up in the back and out of the way of fast airflow.

Another good way to reduce noise is to optimize your PC’s airflow and adjust your fan speeds. If you can run them slower, adjust it via the BIOS or through your motherboard’s software, like Armory Crate, Gigabyte Control Center, etc., and keep an eye on temperatures afterward to make sure you’re not starving any components for cool air. In the linked article, we discuss the importance of airflow, the good and bad of positive versus negative air pressure, and how to achieve those states, and it is, without a doubt, worth a full read.

At a high level, intake CFM (Cubic Feet /Minute - it’s not just fan count!!) greater than exhaust CFM is a positive-pressure environment, while more CFM exiting the case than coming in yields a negative-pressure environment. There are pros and cons to both configurations, but positive-pressure tends to be the most commonly used.

With positive airflow, the increased ‘pressure’ inside forces air out of the exhaust fans and vents, preventing dust from entering through cracks and crevices. Positive pressure is ideal for preventing dust build-up. It makes sense to use it with a high-airflow case with front mesh, a tower air cooler, and optimal for blower-style graphics cards, as it creates a balanced airflow pattern inside your chassis and keeps the temps of your core components in check.

Negative pressure is the opposite, where, at the cost of increased dust inside your chassis, it’s getting air out of the case at a greater rate. It’s good for preventing hotspots due to the vacuum effect, to use with restrictive front panels, and for small-form-factor PCs where clean airflow is hard to come by. It can even offer lower video card temperatures in specific cases, such as a restricted front panel, where heat is quickly removed from the chassis.

On the hardware side of things, starting from your CPU, you can adjust the voltage, called Vcore, through your BIOS or via overclocking software to use less power under load. Typically, you do this by using an offset that reduces voltage globally across all speeds and loads. On many AMD processors, this is even a good way to get more performance, as you can undervolt and overclock, raising the CPU multiplier for higher boost clocks. For many Zen 4 and Zen 5-based processors, you can often undervolt by 10-20mv and still boost your peak clock speed by 100-200 MHz.

On my personal Ryzen 9 9900X3D, I achieved a stable -15 mV undervolt and a +200 MHz overclock. It isn’t a night-and-day difference performance-wise, but if we can get more from less, why not? Obviously, your mileage may vary, but this reduced the maximum load temperature by several degrees and lowered the part's power consumption by up to 2%.

You can also limit your GPU's power usage by manually adjusting the voltage, the voltage curve, or by lowering the power limit. I find it easier to lower the power limit on very powerful and power-hungry cards, since it's a simple slider. You can also set an FPS limit to match your monitor’s refresh rate, so the card won’t try to produce any frames past that limit, whether it’s 120, 165, 180, or 240 Hz, thus saving power.

For example, I set a couple of my games, mainly esports titles, to a 240 FPS limit, and with my graphics card, an RTX 5090, it rarely breaks 400W. Whereas, when left to its own devices, it will try to output every frame it can, and use the full 600W+ power budget, assuming you don’t have any other bottlenecks. Graphics cards also have variable-speed fans you can adjust via software (MSI Afterburner, for example), and this is another good way to hear the sounds of silence. But be careful here, as video cards will drop ‘boost bins’ as temperature rises until it’s below a threshold. The cooler your card, the longer it stays at maximum boost clocks.

Paying for the premium of silence

You can buy a new case with sound-dampening materials like the be Quiet! Silent Base 802 ($199.99) or other silent options such as the Dark Base Pro 901 ($199.90), Fractal Design Define 7 ($204.99), or even the old Antec P101 Slient, if you can find it. The downside of these cases is that you lose the front mesh and airflow, so if you have high-power components, the internals could run warmer than in a more free-flowing design, raising your internal temperatures and, thus, fan speeds and noise. If those options won’t work, you can take a look at our Best PC Cases article to see what we picked out across a wide variety of sizes.

Often, cheap stock fans that come with cases, especially off-brand chassis, are often noisey and inferior to those you purchase from popular quiet fan brands like Noctua, be quiet!, or Arctic. Buying quiet fans based on their specifications is a good start, physically, and will allow you to go from loud to moderate with just a little effort. Our Best PC Fans article can certainly help with that endeavor. If money is no object, we liked the Noctua NF-A12x25 G2 (2x @ $64.95, or one @ $34.95). If these are too expensive, our pick for best budget silence-optimized fans is the Arctic P120 Pro. Also, the larger the fan, the more air it can move, and generally quieter while moving the same amount of air.

When picking parts for your PC, you can choose quiet parts from the beginning, such as CPU coolers, like the Noctua NH-D15 Chromax.black ($129.95), the be quiet! Dark Rock Elite or Dark Rock Pro V (both are $84.90), or the Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120SE ($39.90) for a budget-friendly air cooler option.

In the world of AIOs, one of the best for silence is the be quiet! Silent Loop 3 (360mm $129.50), or the budget Montech HyperFlow Silent (360mm $76.00 - though our review said it wasn’t the quietest on the market). If you need a high-performing AIO with silence in mind, the Corsair iCue Link Titan 360RX RGB AIO ($159.99) and its magnetic bearing dome fans had “chart-topping noise-normalized performance” and the “Lowest noise levels in common scenarios” according to our review. Custom water cooling is another way to reduce noise compared with air coolers or AIOs. While you can replace the fans on those devices, a custom loop lets you pick your own radiator, fans, and pump to optimize for performance, quiet, or a balance of both. While this cooling method costs more than the other options, you have complete control over the parts that make noise and greater control over the pump and fans. You can also expand it to add more radiators for more cooling capacity and reduced fan noise.

Major contributing parts to noise out of the way, other things matter too. When silence is golden for your build, consider moving to SATA-based SSDs to eliminate noise if you're using HDDs for anything other than cold storage, where they’re inactive/sleeping most of the time. Another potential upgrade that could save some decibels is your power supply. Most of these days run in a ‘hybrid’ mode, where the fan stays off until a certain temperature or load is reached. But the more efficient it is, think Gold/Platinum/Titanium 80 Plus or Cybenetics certifications, the better chance it remains silent at light to medium loads. The be quiet! Dark Power 13 ($111.90) is a solid choice for quiet operation and reliability. If that doesn’t work for you, please check out our Best Power Supplies guide for other options.

Takeaways

Building a quiet PC can be quite challenging, especially if you’re trying to make it ‘near-silent’, as there are many considerations that go into making something that quiet. If you have a power-hungry system, it’s going to be that much more difficult to knock off some decibels compared to a low-power system, as it has less heat to evacuate. Still, there are plenty of things you can do to improve your acoustic performance from obnoxious to tolerable without emptying your wallet or losing performance.

• Dust and clean out your case
• Adjust fan curves
• Undervolt your CPU or GPU
• Set FPS limits in your games
• Move your PC away from ear-level
• $ - Rubber isolation for fans/HDD/pumps
• $$ - Upgrade to a more efficient power supply
• $$$ - Replace fans/coolers/case with ‘silent’ models

In the end, making a quiet PC isn’t as easy as slapping “silent” fans in your case and calling it a day, though that is a start. Every watt of power your system uses becomes heat, and that heat has to go somewhere. Between fan turbulence, pumps, vibration, coil whine, and even the way air moves through the mesh on your case, countless factors are working against true silence.

The reality is that building a quiet PC is one massive tightrope walk, balancing performance, acoustics, and cooling. The closer you get to silence, the more effort, money, and compromise it tends to require. You may never eliminate noise, especially with today’s high-powered hardware. Still, with the right expectations, some tuning, and perhaps a bit of cash, you can turn an obnoxiously loud system into something more pleasing to the ear.

You’ve probably seen a few examples of PC DIYers installing figurines in their elaborate, RGB-infused fishtank builds. Chinese TechTuber Soda Baka has scaled this phenomenon up to create a tower PC large enough for a human to work and play inside. What looks like a figurine in some of these PC pictures is actually the TechTuber posing. The video is shared on China’s Bilibili.

We aren’t 100% sure of the purpose of this build, other than spectacle, due to things getting lost in translation. However, a short skit in the video (machine translated) indicates the build was influenced by Baka’s little cousin being barked at by his mom “You play computer games all day, why don’t you just live in a computer!” Something like that.

We also get the feeling this is a canny video sponsorship deal as air conditioners start to become highly desirable, now that we are moving into warmer months in the Northern Hemisphere.

The human-habitable PC tower project gets underway with Soda Baka sketching and modeling before the construction begins in earnest. We see various huge components being fabricated, that look like case fans, GPUs, AiO CPU coolers, RAM sticks and so on. The TechTuber doesn’t forget to add splashes of RGB lighting, of course.

Some real-PC stuff is installed in the mega-PC, so there’s something to do once the side panel is put on… You can see Soda Baka sitting at a compact desk playing a game on the screen attached to the AiO – how modern.

Now things heat up, literally, as to simulate PC-scale heat at this large scale some hot-coal sauna installations are used. We see the TechTuber boosting the heat/humidity levels with a bottle of water. Apparently it doesn’t take long for the enclosed computer room (in the PC) temperatures to rise above 100°F (38 degrees Celsius).

Because all the huge fans and coolers are fake, our trapped TechTuber has to turn on the installed 12kW AC unit, which boasts 820m³/hr air circulation to cool the ‘PC system.’ Quickly enough the atmosphere changes to become “like a spring evening in the North [of China].” Was it all an elaborate Midea 3^rd Gen Pro AC unit sponsorship promotional video? Maybe it was.

Peltier liquid cooling has always been exotic and niche, but only CPU coolers have adopted the technology, leading to the question of whether or not GPUs can benefit from this cooling solution as well. TrashBench on YouTube answered that question in a recent video, putting an RTX 4060 and RTX 3070 to the test using a homemade Peltier liquid cooling system using AIOs, a custom loop, and homemade DC controllers. Sadly, testing revealed that despite having thermoelectric properties, the results were underwhelming.

For the uninitiated, Peltier liquid cooling takes advantage of the thermoelectric effect to achieve sub-ambient temperatures. A semiconducting material is attached to a liquid cooling system and an electric power source. Electricity cools one side of the semiconducting material but generates heat on the other side. In practice, liquid coolers with this tech rely on the semiconducting material to cool the chip, while the liquid cooling portion is largely focused on removing heat from the semiconducting material itself.

TrashBench's homemade Peltier cooling solution was comprised of a complex arrangement of controllers, radiators, tubing, and even AIO liquid coolers. Two Arctic 360mm AIOs were used to cool the Peltier units alone, and two homemade DC controllers were attached to the Peltier units to regulate power. Waterblocks were attached to the other side of the Peltier units to cool the liquid coming from the GPU waterblock. Both Peltier coolers together consumed 360 watts of power.

To start, TrashBench benchmarked an RTX 4060 with the Peltier coolers active to get a baseline, achieving 38 °C on the GPU core, and 24 °C liquid temperature with 23 °C ambient air. With the twin Peltier coolers active, the RTX 4060's GPU temperature dropped by 10 °C to 28 °C, and liquid temperatures dropped by 10 °C as well, down to 14 °C after 20 minutes of load in 3DMark Time Spy. These temperatures were taken after the Peltier coolers were given 20 minutes to cool the loop before activating a GPU stress test.

The YouTuber also ran a "warm start" in which the Peltier coolers were turned off, then back on, to see whether the loop could cool itself back to the same temperatures. Temperatures were slightly warmer with this method, achieving 32 °C on the GPU core and 18 °C liquid temperatures after 20 minutes running 3DMark TimeSpy. Regardless, both tests saw the GPU achieve sub-ambient temperatures.

Next, the YouTuber tested a more power-hungry RTX 3070 to see if his homemade Peltier cooling solution could handle the higher thermal output. Baseline results for the RTX 3070 test saw the GPU reaching 40 °C on the core and 29 °C liquid temperatures. With the Peltier coolers engaged, the RTX 3070's GPU core reached 33 °C and the liquid temperature 21 °C after 20 minutes in 3DMark Time Spy.

TrashBench's testing reveals that Peltier liquid cooling is not worth it, despite its potential to achieve sub-ambient cooling. The YouTuber's testing demonstrates the Achilles heel of Peltier cooling solutions: extreme power inefficiency. To achieve effective cooling, the cooler alone has to consume almost as much power as the chip it is cooling. The cherry on top is that the liquid cooler responsible for cooling the Peltier material has to dissipate that same amount of wattage as well for the system to be effective.

This is why Peltier coolers have not received much attention. The last cooler we reviewed with this technology was the Cooler Master ML360 Sub Zero, which we rated three stars, criticizing its cooling performance and power consumption. The cooler achieved inferior multi-core performance to regular AIOs while consuming nearly 200 watts on its own.

Once every quarter, we’ll be publishing a build here at Tom’s Hardware Premium, intended to showcase the best of our building abilities. After much deliberation, we decided that for this second ‘showstopper’ build, we wanted to push Mini-ITX to its absolute limit, not as buying advice, but as a test, to see whether doing so is remotely viable.

Why are we doing this?

For the first Tom’s Hardware Premium build, I went all out and spent three months building a wooden PC that I called The Stout Owl. This was a full-ATX, 100% air-cooled machine centered around Noctua’s brown-and-beige colorway. A few months have passed, and I’ve been busy cooking up something smaller.

I’ve built many PCs in my life, but there’s one challenge I’ve never taken on: an ultra-high-end, custom-cooled ITX system. After looking around the options available, I spotted the NCase M3, and instantly saw a vision for it.

I’ve seen many NCase builds, and although I can attest to it being a fantastic case, there’s one issue I always had with many of the builds, even my own from many years ago: they hide so much of the hardware with side-mounted radiators, fans, & mesh covers.

The demands of the challenge

This led to the demands of my self-imposed challenge:

• Use an NCase M3.
• Cram in the most powerful hardware on the market.
• Retain the glass side window (and thus, no side-mounted radiator)
• Don’t use any externally-mounted hardware.

I was especially adamant about the side window, which had to be implemented. It’s easy to take a small case like this and resort to the mesh panel to keep thermals under control, but that would be a cop-out. Externally mounting hardware would be too – as tempting as it may be to use the space behind the case, so that I could add another fan or radiator, I wanted to keep the challenge confined to the borders of the 19-liter chassis.

Custom cooling this system was no longer optional, but practically mandatory in order to achieve this goal. Vertically mounting a GPU would obstruct the view of all other hardware, and you wouldn’t be able to use the glass side panel, as it would block the air intake. Keeping it mounted in the PCIe slot, you’ll see the other hardware if you use glass. However, using a glass panel when you have an RTX 5090 spitting 600 watts into the case is simply asking for problems – you’d still choke the 5090 with the size restrictions, and you’d be needlessly exposing the motherboard, memory, SSD, and power supply to a ton of heat.

With the Ncase M3 at the workshop, I started figuring out exactly how to go about tackling this challenge. With a build like this, it’s pertinent to have the case on-hand when selecting the rest of the components, because the tolerances between a part fitting, and not fitting – there were situations in which I had mere millimeters to work with, which could make-or-break the entire build.

Parts selection

For components, we decided to almost go all-out on this build. Since the goal was to push Mini-ITX to its limits, it only made sense to go with an Nvidia RTX 5090 and an AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D.

MSI was kind enough to provide the MPG X870I EDGE Ti Evo motherboard and an RTX 5090 Suprim. We’d like to thank them for coming on board this build, as we’d been transparent with them from the beginning about the extravagant plans of custom cooling within the minute size constraints.

Powering this system was going to be a challenge. Thankfully, there are now a small handful of SFX power supplies available with a 1000-watt envelope, and I decided to go with a bit of an underdog: the Silverstone Extreme 1000Rz Platinum.

For storage, we’re using a Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus in the 1 TB flavor. Now, I’m aware that this is only a PCIe 4.SSD, and just 1 TB, a bit paltry in comparison to the rest of this system. However, the one PCIe 5.0 SSD I have on-site is currently installed in another PC. Besides, it’s not as if the Rocket 4 is a slouch in the slightest, and 1 TB is plenty for testing purposes here.

For memory, Greyscale uses a 48 GB (2x 24GB) DDR5-7200 memory kit from Team Group. I’ll detail the selection for cooling this system later when we get to building the actual cooling loop, but for now, let's build the system up ‘dry’ to make sure everything works before figuratively dunking it under water.

But first, let’s talk about NCase for a moment

NCase is quite a special brand in that it’s not a large-scale commercial organization. Rather, the founders, once known as Necere and Wahaha360 on the [H]ardForum, were dissatisfied with the offerings available, and set out on a mission to build a better ITX case than they could buy on the market.

After many design iterations, Dan and AJ finally came out with the ‘first edition’ NCase M1 back in 2012, and I can say that I’m the proud owner of number 0149.

Production was outsourced to Lian Li, largely because Lian Li excelled in the manufacturing of high-quality aluminum PC cases, but also because Lian Li was actually willing to work with the just-founded NCase. Such a partnership is always a gamble, and building the tooling for a small production-volume case, especially when it isn’t your own product, isn’t particularly profitable.

However, the partnership worked out, and now, almost 14 years later, NCase has become a thriving small business complete with support, marketing, and PR staff, and crucially, they’ve sold a lot of cases.

Before building any water-cooled PC, it’s good practice to make sure all the components actually work together. Finding out there’s a compatibility or DOA (dead-on-arrival) issue after building and filling the entire cooling loop is one of the most frustrating issues one can face that far in the build process, partly because it’s a lot of work to take the system apart, but more so because it’s entirely preventable.

To begin, I assembled a big chunk of the flat-packed NCase M3. Later, I learned from the manual that the way you’re supposed to build it is by building much of the system onto the motherboard tray first, and then installing the panels onto the case later, but I’m too stubborn to read manuals from the get-go, so here we are.

Next, it’s time to prepare the motherboard. I started by installing the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D into the AM5 socket. I chucked the Sabrent Rocket 4 SSD into the M.2 slot. And popped the two 24 GB DDR5-7200 modules into place. Now, I’m aware that the color theme on this motherboard and memory doesn’t totally match, but there’s a good reason for that: the economy – I’m using what I have available to me.

Let’s pretend that the reason why is that we’re going with the theme ‘Grayscale’ and thus we need to cover all parts of the gray spectrum.

Popping the motherboard into place was interesting, largely because NCase has done something I’ve never seen on any other case: screws at the back of the standoffs.

Because of the modular design where the motherboard can be mounted all the way at the top, close to the bottom, or almost anywhere in between, it doesn’t make sense to tap threading into each of the mounting holes – it wouldn’t look good, would collect dust, and cost too much to produce. So, the standoffs are held in place by a screw that affixes to the rear side.

I then mounted the Silverstone power supply. For my plan with liquid cooling, I’d have to lower it later on, but at this stage, I mounted it higher up so that it would clear the GPU area and leave room for the cables to come out.

Then, it was time to install the GPU. This was going to be a tight squeeze. The original NCase M1 was not designed to accommodate these kinds of graphics cards, and even in the larger M3, it’ll be a close shave.

I was unable to shim the GPU into place with the case assembled as it was, so I removed the front “grater” panel and popped the GPU into place. This is only a test fit after all, and the cooler will be removed in the final build. This was also a good time to install the cables for the power supply, as it’s easier to access without the front panel in the way.

I contemplated not re-installing the front panel at all, but this left the case a bit structurally unstable, and I did want to bring it back upright for pictures. The GPU still fit, but I wouldn’t need an anti-sag bracket to keep it up – the fitment was so tight that the clamping force of the front panel held the GPU up right where it belonged.

For the CPU, I reached for an old unused AMD Wraith Prism cooler, which is grossly underpowered for this CPU, but at this point, it was more about having some mass on the CPU than actually giving it adequate cooling for sustained loads.

In fact, generally for a test-run like this, it’s fine to just use the CPU waterblock, bare, without hoses attached or coolant – I wasn’t going to run the system much further beyond post, and all it would have to do is soak up the brief bit of heat generated in this brief timeframe before shutting down the PC again.

It turns out, though, that the SSD still had an old Windows installation on it from a previous test, and since there’s an actual cooler on there, I let the system boot.

Everything checked out. Time for the good part!

To cool “Grayscale,” we’d turned to Alphacool. We’ve never done a build with Alphacool watercooling gear, so were eager to try their range out.

Because we’re cramming a 9950X3D and an RTX 5090 into a system the size of a shoebox, we would be needing full-copper radiators, as these are highly effective at dissipating heat. For this purpose, Alphacool’s HPE series perfectly fit the bill.

The plan was quite straightforward. At the bottom of the NCase M3 would be a regular 30mm 280mm radiator with two of Phanteks’ new 14omm T30 fans (the company finally released them last month, five years after the 120mm version.) These fans are 30mm thick, which is 5mm more than the industry standard, and built with LCP, they are true high-performance kings.

At the rear exhaust, there would be a 120mm pump/res combo unit. This unit would be installed on its standoffs to ensure air could still escape through the vent it’s mounted on by means of positive pressure in the case. So, although there would be no fan there, I did plan on a 120mm intake fan on the side of the case, between the PSU and the motherboard.

At the top of the case, the motherboard would stop us from being able to install a 280mm radiator, so it would have to be 240mm; however, we did have vertical space, so this would be a 45mm thick radiator, again with Phanteks T30 fans installed, for a total combined thickness of 75mm. With better breathing space, this radiator would be doing most of the heavy lifting.

Lastly, the system will use soft matt-black tubing, in a thick 16/10mm (OD/ID), for nice chunky-looking tubes. Although they would be inflexible due to this thickness, which is particularly challenging in a small case such as this, they have a chunky, utilitarian look. Hopefully, this is not a choice I’d regret later.

Installing the CPU Block

To install the CPU block, we first prepare the CPU by cleaning the old paste off it, and swap the factory bracket for the mounting screws included with the block kit. Then, we give it three dots of thermal paste, and chuck the Alphacool Core 1 Aurora Silver into place.

Although it’s ‘just’ a CPU block, these copper blocks are quite weighty.

Radiator & fan install

After the CPU block, I installed the two radiators. The slim 280mm unit at the bottom of the case, and the 45mm 240mm radiator at the top. Although there’s an option for taller feet from NCase, I don’t find that lifting the chassis up any further looks particularly charming, but it also means the lower radiator wouldn’t be able to get a lot of air. This meant the top rad would be doing most of the heavy lifting.

Then, I dropped the Phanteks T30 fans into place. One immediate issue was that the CPU block’s intake port was blocked by the corner of one of the fans. This was going to be a problem later on, but we’ll get to that in a bit.

Reservoir & Pump Install

The Alphacool Core 120 pump-res combo unit is a beautiful bit of kit that slots right onto a 120mm fan mount. I debated for a few moments whether using this reservoir would be a wise choice – it did mean sacrificing the rear exhaust fan slot, but I really did not want to turn to a tubular reservoir in the middle cavity of the build – I didn’t find that it would look cohesive, and in all truth, I find that cylindrical reservoirs look a bit dated.

Unfortunately, mounting the reservoir wasn’t as straightforward as I had hoped. The NCase M3 is built from beautiful, thick, anodized aluminum, and the screws to mount the push-pin system with spacers weren’t long enough.

With the gear I had, I could have opted to mount the reservoir flush against the case, but this presented three issues:

• The side drain port would be unusable
• The chipset fan on the motherboard would get zero airflow
• It would leave the rear exhaust fully obstructed, so even positive pressure wouldn’t work so well here.

Thankfully, the vast majority of screws used in PC builds are standard M3 threading, so I ran over to my local hardware store and grabbed four M3x10 screws.

With these, I was able to mount the reservoir in place, and all was good in the world again.

A 3D game of Tetris

Now that the radiators, fans, power supply, and pump-res unit were installed, it was time to evaluate the viability of the layout.

The first revision made was flipping the top radiator to feature the ports on the rear instead of the front of the case, as in the previous configuration with the ports at the front, the fans would make the inlet port of the CPU block inaccessible.

Making this change did mean that I would be cramming a ton of fittings into a very small space, but there was no other way of making it work. I also pulled the radiator as far forward as possible. This gave me just enough clearance for both ports on the CPU block.

I also contemplated adding a third radiator. I have a few extra 120mm radiators that I use for fan testing, so I test-fit one of them, to see if it’d work.

Unfortunately, it would mean the top radiator wouldn’t fit in the intended spot anymore, and I was about 10mm short on clearance. If I were to use a 25mm thick fan, and a 25mm thick radiator, it could save 5mm on each and it would work, but I didn’t have a 25mm 120mm radiator at my disposal, so it sadly wasn’t going to happen.

I also experimented with every possible alternative for positioning the power supply. In the position I had it originally, the motherboard and GPU cable were long enough to tuck away tidily, but the 8-pin cable EPS cable to power the CPU wasn’t long enough to route out of sight. But, there was no better layout, so the CPU's power cable was going to remain visible. I should have measured this all out before and placed a CableMod order, but alas.

I placed the GPU block without the graphics card in, and pictured above is the final layout I decided to go for, but there was one crucial factor looming. As much as I wanted to use them, it did not look like I was going to have space for the Phanteks T30-140 fans on the bottom radiator.

But before going out and finding regular 25mm thick fans, I decided I had to install the GPU. Who knows, we may get some extra clearance with it installed.

For many, the most daunting part about building a custom looped system is installing a GPU block, and there are a few reasons why. Getting a stock cooler off a graphics card can be quite a convoluted process, you often need to go through a ‘warranty void if damaged’ sticker, and unlike a CPU which has a heatspreader to protect the die, GPUs don’t come with heatspreaders at all.

Now, personally, I really like that GPUs don’t come with heatspreaders – in a custom loop where the CPU is not delidded, a GPU always runs about 20 degrees cooler than the CPU. That’s a huge temperature difference that’s entirely to blame on the IHS (integrated heat-spreader.) However, it does mean you have to be careful removing the cooler, because you do not want to accidentally crack the GPU die.

To remove the cooler from MSI’s RTX 5090 Suprim, we begin by removing the backplate, which, as expected, features a warranty void if damaged sticker on one of the screws.

It’s amusing to see modern graphics cards exposed, as their PCBs are comically tiny compared to the full size of the end product with the cooler. I suppose this is why even cheaper GPUs come with backplates nowadays – to mask how small the PCBs are.

Here came the delicate part of the operation. One does not simply pull the PCB upwards from the cooler – doing so would put heavy strain on the GPU die.

In the case of this particular graphics card, this was especially so. The thermal paste was bone-dry and had all but glued the GPU to the heatsink.

To prevent any damage in cases like this, you can rotate the PCB slightly clockwise, then anticlockwise, and repeat the movement until it starts to give way. Once that happens, you can gently pull on the PCB a little while continuing the shimmying motion. After a little while, it’ll come off without using much force.

Now keep in mind, this particular graphics card is a media sample that’s been in rotation between various outlets since the beginning of the RTX 5090’s launch – it’s flown all over the world, been in many PC’s, and although it’s not been taken apart yet by anyone, even the packaging made it clear that this is a GPU that’s been passed around extensively.

You never truly know what these media samples have gone through, so perhaps it’s a good thing it ended up in my shop for servicing at this point in its life.

The same gentle approach applies to the connectors that wire the fans and RGB to the PCB. Whereas most connectors in the rest of a PC build are sized for human hands to be able to undo the clips, the connectors here are much smaller. Now, I could probably pull on them to get them to disconnect – the clips are quite small and would probably be overcome by force. But, this is a loaner card from MSI, and I absolutely did not want to call them to let them know I destroyed one of their precious 5090’s, especially in this GPU market.

With that, the GPU was disassembled successfully.

What’s interesting here is that pictured above are all the parts you need to remove to get to the 5090 Suprim’s PCB. I’ve taken apart quite a handful of GPUs in my time, and of course, there were simpler ones, but for a flagship GPU with a large, intricate cooler, this was actually really quite easy. As long as you take the proper precautions, it’s actually really quick and straightforward – I’ve had GPUs where I had significantly more steps involved in getting the PCB separated from the cooler.

Let’s take a moment to admire this GPU

Even here at Tom’s Hardware, it’s not every day that we get to witness a bare GPU die, especially not from an RTX 5090. Of course, we’re free to do what we want with our own GPUs bought with our own money, but with media samples, we’re often not allowed to tear them apart, even for some GPU reviews.

The RTX 5090 Suprim is really something to behold once undressed and cleaned up. Of course, seeing the spec of 750 mm² was the first giveaway that this was going to be a big GPU, but seeing it up close, like this… I had to grab a CPU to give a reference point you can relate to.

My father-in-law used to sell lithography machines before he retired, and I showed him this – he was in awe that a single chip could be this big. “No wonder the prices are so high – you can’t fit a whole lot of those on a single wafer.”

Generally speaking, I like to take the “X” approach to applying thermal paste to GPUs, letting the mounting pressure spread it evenly over the die. However, with the size of this GPU, I decided not to take any chances and followed Alphacool’s instructions, using the spatula to ‘plaster’ the paste over the die. I’m not sure if this is really a better approach, but the thermals in testing later were spectacular, especially on a cold loop.

Then, I placed the GPU block on a soft detailing rag so that the acrylic wouldn’t scratch, and applied the thermal pads.

I carefully placed the GPU onto the block, and placed the thicker thermal pads on the rear of the memory modules and the power connector. This is so that these can cool via the backplate.

I then placed the GPU over the edge of my desk so that the I/O bracket would fit, installed the backplate, and secured all the screws, cross-hatching them for even mounting pressure to ensure all were tightened up correctly.

With that, we have a GPU block installed on a 5090. That was surprisingly easy.

Because I wouldn’t be able to get to these later, and because I really didn’t want to forget, I installed the plugs. One of these didn’t go in as deep as the other, though. Fingers crossed that’s not a problem in the future.

With the GPU installed into the system, it confirmed my biggest fears: I did not have space for the Phanteks T30-140’s.

Leaning on the port plugs, the GPU was perfectly level. This here was maybe two mm of breathing space.

With how much the GPU was covering the fans, this was a blockage that even the almighty T30’s wouldn’t be able to overcome. I really wanted to use these fans, but this build was already pushing the limit for cooling capacity, and this here would be asking for problems.

This situation called for Noctua to come save the day, and although the 120mm variant of the NF-A12x25 G2 isn’t out yet in black, the 140mm flavor is, so I bolted over to my local PC parts store and grabbed an Sx2-pp kit.

This gave me 5mm extra breathing space around the edge of the frame, which, although still not a whole lot, would be a lot better than almost no breathing space at all.

Although the NCase M3 is small, this configuration left me with a handful of cavities for cable management. There’s one between the motherboard and the top radiator that extends over to the top of the PSU, a big one below the motherboard, in the space between the 280mm bottom radiator and the case, another behind this same radiator, and below the power supply.

I removed the heatsink from the SSD to run a few of the RGB cables out of sight through a gap between the graphics card and the motherboard. Of course, removing the GPU would be less tedious, but with how the NCase’s rear bracket is made, it would take longer, so I opted to do it this way and fish with tweezers to get them through.

I was able to tidy all up in the space between the motherboard and the top radiator, and at the bottom of the system behind the 280mm radiator, for a surprisingly tidy end-result.

I was happy with how it looked, even inside the main cavity. Yes, the CPU power cable was too short, but by angling it in a way to block the least amount of airflow, it also wasn’t all that bothersome visually. I also opted to route the GPU’s power cable over and behind, as although underneath the GPU would have looked better, it would have impacted airflow in that area.

This is what money is for right? To solve problems.

The GPU also needed an anti-sag bracket, but I had none in this size. I looked around my office, and grabbed a few coins from my coin jar that I could use as shims. Later, I cut a bit of leftover tubing to the right height and used that instead.

The system was looking sleek, and ready for tubing. However, there was one thing I wanted to do first.

Remember what I said about not running the system without coolant? Well, it turns out I’m not a man of my word. Once the cooling loop would be installed, fixing any issues would become a real pain, so I decided that it would be okay to run it for a few seconds, just to double-check that post appears on the monitor, and that all the RGB and fans were connected before proceeding.

Monitoring temperatures in the timeframe here is not something you can do – by the time you get into the right window in the BIOS, or windows, the system is likely already too hot.

Instead, you can listen to the fans – if they start spinning at full speed, you know the CPU, and by extension, likely the GPU, are too hot for comfort, and you want to shut the PC off right before this happens. This takes about 30 seconds though, which is more than enough to check whether everything is working as intended.

Loop Planning

During the planning phase, I had a pretty good idea of how to run the loop; however, things never go according to plan, especially with smaller builds like this. I had ordered a couple of extra fittings and extenders, just in case. I had four short extensions, four longer extensions, four 90-degree elbows with rotary ends on both sides, and four 45-degree elbows, also with rotary ends.

Rotary ends are particularly helpful, as although they cost a little more, they let you rotate a fitting without breaking the seal, which makes it much easier to get pieces to fit. A luxury in big builds, a necessity in small builds.

I had also ordered a drain valve, and a thermal sensor. I like running my fan curve based on the coolant temperature, because when all is said and done, the fans cool the coolant, not the CPU or GPU. Especially if both are contributing heat to the same loop, it can cause weird behavior to run the loop based on their temperatures.

However, the MSI MPG X870I Ti Edge Evo doesn’t have a connector to hook up a thermal probe, which put a damper in those plans.

It’s nice that I could lift up pieces of the case to get easy access. At first, I thought of running the reservoir’s outlet straight to the GPU’s inlet, but found that this would cause collisions with other routes.

After much puzzling, I decided to run the reservoir outlet (bottom port) straight to the CPU block’s inlet.

I installed the tubing, cutting off a few mm at a time until I was happy with the fitment.

I decided to get this pesky corner over with. In the plan, I wanted to run the GPU’s outlet straight to the upper radiator. As the 5090 would be spitting 600 watts into the loop, I wanted most of that heat to end up in the top radiator that I knew would be capable of dissipating tons of heat. I ran the outlet of this radiator back into the reservoir.

Getting these bits of tubing into place, although it may be soft tubing, was incredibly difficult. I’ll explain why in a bit, but first, let’s finish the loop.

I then ran over to the bottom radiator to the CPU’s outlet. The outlet of this radiator would go to the GPU, but the inlet of this radiator needed a more creative approach to access it.

Using a 90-degree elbow, I was able to run a stretch of tubing in a gap underneath the power supply, running through some cables, up into the main cavity.

Being a stretch that I couldn’t easily measure beforehand, I cut a longer piece so that I could cut it to size before popping the other end onto the outlet of the CPU block.

Cut to size, it fit beautifully and kink-free.

Finally, I cut a piece of tubing to run from the bottom radiator to the inlet of the GPU block.

The space I had to work with here was absolutely tiny, and the more tubes showed up, the more difficult it got to fasten the fittings. Pray for me that there are no leaks.

Leak testing

I popped the leak-tester onto the loop, pumped it up with air, and lo-and-behold – the loop was leaky. And not just a little. I was unable to pump it beyond 0.3 bar, and it would lose this pressure in a matter of 20-30 seconds.

There was good news and bad news. The good news was that I could hear the leak. The bad news was that it was the short tube run that returned the coolant from the thick radiator back to the reservoir.

Due to the magic of rotary fittings, I was able to get the top radiator surprisingly far out of position and could tighten up the problematic fitting. Because the tube run was so short, when I had done up the second fitting on this part, I had accidentally undone the first.

However, this wasn’t the only leak. The loop held pressure better, but it still wasn’t great, and although I couldn’t hear it, I suspected one of the GPU’s plugs may have been the culprit. I had tightened the fitting as hard as possible with the plastic fastener, and yet, the loop was still leaking. I pulled it out, flipped the gasket, but it was still leaking.

The point of these plastic fasteners is so that you don’t over-tighten plugs. Although not so bad here, when tightening plugs in acrylic, you have to be careful not to over-tighten, as it will crack the brittle acrylic material. These plastic tools are meant to break before the acrylic does.

But this wasn’t acrylic. So, I grabbed a screwdriver and gave it an extra shove – which worked. It seems there was something in the threading that blocked the plug from going in all the way. Once I got past that, it easily twisted into the exact same position as the other plug.

I was then able to pump the loop up to pressure, and it looked to be holding it well. I went for dinner, and two hours later when I came back, the pressure had dropped to about 0.4 bar.

Part of this was possibly due to pressure loss in the loop, likely due to microleaks, but another part was a problem these testers are known to have: if you tap them, the needle drops to the actual pressure. I had forgotten to tap it before I left to make the needle drop, so the 0.5 reading at the start may not have been entirely accurate – but with 0.4 after taps and two hours away, I had full confidence in the loop.

Even if there was a tiny leak somewhere, water is thicker than air, and thus less likely to escape, and the loop would certainly not be running at anything close to 0.5 bar anyway. I intended to run the loop hot, but not so hot to generate that kind of pressure.

Because I custom-cool PC’s fairly frequently, at some point in the past I’d made a draining hose. This is quite simply a hose that attaches to a G3/4’ port of your choice, usually one at the bottom of a loop or where you can easily get an air-bubble to appear.

I’ve found that simply opening a custom loop and letting water pour out into a sink leads to uncontrolled flow, which can lead to a big mess, and that a lack of control can lead to coolant entering the PC in places where it isn’t supposed to be.

The point of this hose is so that I can open and close the drain valve easily, and hose the coolant into a bucket lower down on the floor without making a mess of things near the PC.

First, we flush the loop

Because these are all new components, the first thing I want to do is give the loop a few flushes. Technically, you should do this to the radiators before mounting them, but I just give them a blast with compressed air in one of the ports, letting it out the other, which gets rid of most of the debris, if there even is any, without giving you drippy radiator during install. That’s also what they do in the factory, and why they install the plastic caps – to stop dirt ingress.

The flush here is mostly for peace of mind, to get rid of any oils and micro-debris that could eat away at finishes and eventually lead to clogged blocks. Though honestly, I doubt it really matters – especially in this system which will be getting dismantled in a few days.

Regardless, demineralized water doesn’t cost much, so I poured some into the loop, topping it up and cycling the pump until it was mostly full, and then used the drain hose and drain valve to clear most of it out.

If a loop is easy to fill and drain, I do this a couple of times, but this loop is more difficult. Due to the small size of the reservoir, filling it is quite tedious, as you can only add a tiny bit of fluid, and once you run the pump, it’s gone almost immediately. You don’t want to run a pump dry, and that meant starting and stopping the loop many times before the loop was full.

Consequently, what I opted to do instead was fill the loop fully, and then crack the drain valve, but only a tiny bit. Then, I kept the loop running, while it drained slowly, and squeezed the filling bottle just enough to keep the reservoir topped up, adding in water at roughly the same rate that it drained out.

This dilutes whatever dirt may be in the loop, and once I worked through about three liters of water, I drained the loop fully.

With the loop empty, I removed the drain hose, popped the plug back onto the reservoir, and filled the loop with clear coolant.

A time-consuming process, mostly

With a big PC that has a big reservoir, filling is easy: you fill the reservoir, and run the pump till the reservoir is almost empty. Then, you refill and repeat two or three times until the loop is full.

With this smaller PC, it’s a bit more complicated. The reservoir is tiny. I’m talking – less than two shots of espresso. I weighed it out, and this loop took about 850 ml of fluid. So, much of the filling I did by opening ports on the radiators to fill them up, only topping up the reservoir at a later part of the process.

Despite this, I had to top up the reservoir at least a dozen or more times, and because the filling port is right in the path of the return line, once the loop got fuller, I had to close the port while cycling the pump to stop water from sputtering everywhere. This of course, became very tedious.

Moreover, large air pockets could only be removed by picking the PC up and tilting it in all sorts of ways, even upside-down. With a big reservoir, you can just let the air move that way in due time, but because this reservoir is so tiny, if a bigger air pocket were to move to the reservoir, the chance of the pump running dry would be very high, so they all had to go.

Thankfully, because it’s a Mini-ITX PC, bleeding the loop is easy. Once full enough, close it all up, run the pump, and pick the PC up, shake it, tilt it, shake it some more, and really get all the air bubbles into the reservoir.

Top that up, repeat a couple times, and the system is bled and free of bubbles, suddenly running it much quieter. With a big PC that you can’t simply pick up and shake in all directions, it becomes a waiting game, and it can often take two to three days, or sometimes up to a week to bleed most of the air out of the loop. One of my other PCs still has a bubble near the top of the loop that I can see in the tubing, and it’s been there for years.

Before proceeding to test the PC, we must run it through its paces a few times to see how it runs currently, to see what needs to change in the configuration.

To begin, I updated the motherboard’s BIOS, and then we set the memory to the correct EXPO profile, which had it running at the intended clock speeds in a jiffy.

With that all done and Windows freshly installed, we proceeded to set the fan curves.

Because this motherboard has no thermal probe, I decided to use Fan Control to set up a custom virtual sensor – one that calculates the average temperature of the CPU and the GPU combined. From what I saw, the CPU would push itself to its 95 °C target regardless of what I did, whereas the GPU would continue to boost within its power target, and eventually settle on a maximum temperature of about 75 °C.

Now, to get a system like this quiet, it’s essential to be aware of the basic physics of cooling with radiators. Each radiator has a certain amount of heat it can dissipate, but this can be influenced by a handful of factors.

The first, and most obvious of these is which fans are installed, their RPM setpoint, and how restricted the airflow is through this setup. In the case of this PC, we’re using top-quality fans, and the radiator at the top, although 45mm thick, has tons of breathing space. The radiator at the bottom, however, is lacking breathing space, with the intake side very close to the desk, and the exhaust side largely obstructed by the graphics card.

However, there is one other factor that affects how many watts a radiator can dissipate: temperature.

A contradictory configuration

If the coolant temperature flowing through a rad is low, you can blast a ton of air through it, but you’ll really only be dissipating a few watts. On the other hand, if the coolant is nice and hot, you can run the fans at a very low speed, and yet, they’ll expel a ton of heat.

For this reason, I had chosen to route the outlet port of the GPU block straight to the upper radiator, which would be doing the heavy lifting – it’s got way more breathing space, it’s thick, and best of all – all the heat it expels goes straight out the top of the case.

To ensure the greatest temperature delta, the intake fan on the side would supply it with a healthy amount of fresh air.

What am I trying to get at with all this information: you don’t want to run a PC like this at 100% fan speed. It’s just too noisy, and although doing so does keep the coolant temperatures a lot lower, the level of diminishing returns is significant, and the user experience becomes quite unpleasant.

For context, here’s what I mean:

With the fans at 100%, total system power consumption sits at 930 watts with a combined synthetic load on the CPU and GPU.

Drop the fan speeds on a much quieter curve, and the system finds an equilibrium load at 867 watts. The RTX 5090 runs right on the mark, and the 9950X3D simply doesn’t hit its power target anymore, instead running at 150 watts as opposed to 200.

However, all of this is only when running a synthetic load. Under these conditions, the CPU will hit 95 degrees, and throttle to keep it at this target temperature of 95 degrees. The CPU will also always be the first to throttle, simply because it has an IHS that gives it a 20-degree penalty over the GPU.

Now, to fix this, we could lower the power target on the GPU, essentially manually throttling the GPU, so that the loop has the capacity to handle the CPU without throttling, but I don’t feel this is necessary at all.

Under real-world loads, there is no performance penalty. Gaming isn’t nearly as heavy on the CPU, so it can run at full boost regardless of what the GPU is doing, and productivity workloads are generally not as ‘never-ending’ as gaming, which means the cooling loop can soak up a lot of heat before any throttling would occur.

From testing, it’s clear that in a quiet fan curve configuration, the loop can dissipate about 850 watts. Go over that, and something needs to throttle. But if you look at the gaming and productivity tests above, it’s clear that even the heaviest gaming workloads don’t exceed this figure.

If you don’t want anything to throttle, you’ll have to boost the fans to full speed, but this increases the maximum noise figure from 38.6 dBA to 54.3, which is simply put, unacceptably loud, and not remotely worth the extra 50-75 watts of cooling capacity it offers. You really don’t need to be able to handle both the CPU and GPU not throttling under simultaneous synthetic loads.

When I was brainstorming build ideas for this second Showstopper at Tom’s Hardware Premium, the idea of pushing Mini-ITX to its absolute limit felt like more of a gag than something that could actually turn into a viable machine. In that respect, this build was more of a test to figure out “is it possible?” than actual buying advice. We aim to provide unique content, and hopefully this is what you came here for.

My thought was, nobody in their right mind would try to build this PC – to most, whether it would work is far too much of a gamble. However, that’s also what makes it such an interesting test.

Of course, I knew this wasn’t going to be a custom loop that runs cool and quiet; that much was obvious. What I didn’t expect, however, was that by accepting that it’d run hot, but not overheating under real-life workloads, that I’d still be able to get it to run relatively quietly, and that it’d actually turn into a perfectly pleasant PC for everyday use.

Truly: under gaming workloads with GPU and CPU temperatures hovering between 65°C and 85°C, noise levels hover between 34 and 35 dBA, with fan speeds of around 800-1300 RPM, all while not having touched power targets. If I may pat myself on the back, that’s downright impressive if you consider that in this little box we packed not only a 9950X3D, but also a beefy RTX 5090. With that in mind, the glass panel really is the cherry on the cake.

So, this is actually totally viable on any hardware, but how difficult is it?

If you’re truly interested in building a PC like this, I’d say that the biggest factor that affects the difficulty level is one’s state of mind. You have to be prepared for whatever it throws at you – whether a fan doesn’t fit, or you find a leak in the trickiest corner to get to – your mindset, the ability to accept that something isn’t going according to plan, and adapting, is the key to a successful build like this while enjoying the process.

In a way, that’s something that goes for any PC build – you have to be able to see the humor in preparing for the worst, and the worst then still happening. Laugh about it, enjoy fixing it, and carry on. Brutal acceptance is the only way, and better to laugh about it than to cry about it.

There are two more factors, though – you need small hands, that one doesn’t need a lot of explanation, and you need to be a bit creatively fearless.

If it can’t be done how it should, then it shall be done how it can

Not fearless in the careless kind of way – that will get you in trouble, but fearless in the ‘trust the process’ way. For example, let's talk about the fittings and tubing for a moment.

I had chosen to use this matt-black tubing, in the second-thickest size, because I like the chunky look and velvety finish. Let’s just say, that was a choice. It may technically be soft-tubing, but this stuff is rigid.

Consequently, when you try to get it around the tight bends needed in this build, the forces you have to put on some of the build are not for the faint of heart. In fact, you’ll often need angled adapters to make most of the bend you’re trying to make, using the soft-tubing to bridge the mostly straight distance between the compression fittings.

Getting the tubing onto the fittings isn’t that bad though. What’s tough is the force needed to twist the caps onto the fittings. I can’t stress how much force it took to get those to tighten up. Now, I am someone who’s prone to joint pain, especially when working on small detailed projects such as these, but I have to be real: the force that some of these took to tighten up was nothing short of huge.

If you have the tubing come in straight, with very little lateral pull on it, then it’s perfectly doable. But the moment you cut the end of the tubing at a slight angle, because you practically need to make part of the turn inside the fitting due to the rigidity of the tubing, they become incredibly tough to close.

It’s not recommended to work this way, you’re better off grabbing extra angled fittings, but this build had many elements of “if it can’t be done how it should, then it shall be done how it can.” Even moreso when it’s in the tight spaces of this build here. This was manageable at the start, but especially the corner pictured above, it was a real fight to get most of those fittings tightened up.

There were moments when I thought about getting out the pliers, simply because forces I needed to exert with my fingers became too painful. However, there were two problems with this – if my hands barely fit, getting pliers in there would be even more difficult, and even if possible, I didn’t want to scratch up the fitting caps.

The effort isn’t without its reward

However, what do you get in exchange? This PC is absolutely watertight, I have zero doubts about that. The fittings screwed into the blocks and radiators nicely with a clear “this is far enough, thank you” signal. And because they’re so incredibly strong, although tough to install, especially in the tight spaces, together with the rest of the components, have made the system so tough and rigid, I would almost classify this as rugged – if it wasn’t for the glass panel and the beautiful finish of the outside of the case. This is a PC you could confidently chuck in a suitcase and take on a flight, only removing most of the coolant so that it can deal with the pressure changes.

The level of confidence I have that this is a loop that won’t be developing any leaks, and can deal with a bump without it being cause for concern – this is truly wonderful.

With a 9950x3D, an RTX 5090, plenty of power and just the right amount of cooling capacity to still run quietly despite its form factor, this PC is ready to take on pretty much anything you could throw at it.

This was a tough build.

Ever fired up a high-end build only to hear loud fan noise ruining the experience? Would you like a cooler that looks as good as it performs, complete with a built-in screen showing performance metrics at a glance?

Well you’re in the right place, because we’re looking at two air coolers from manufacturer Sudokoo – a relatively new cooling brand that we first encountered at CES 2025. The SK620V and SK700V combine striking checkerboard aesthetics, rail-based fan installation, impressively low noise levels, and a unique digital display that actually shows useful information like CPU frequency, power draw, temperatures, and load.

Let's take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks so you can decide if the SK620V and SK700V deserve to make our list of the best CPU coolers.

Cooler specifications

Features of Sudokoo’s SK series air coolers

▶️ Supports AMD AM5 only, comes with a high-strength metal contact frame

The SK620V and SK700V we’re looking at today oddly only support AMD AM5 systems, and incorporate something you don’t see very often on Ryzen PCs: a solid metal anti-bending frame.

While a design like this has potential advantages, installation is more difficult (and riskier) because it requires complete removal of the default CPU retention mechanism.

▶️ Checkerboard Matrix fins and heatsink design

The engineering team seems to have been inspired by DeepCool, having incorporated a checkerboard matrix design into the heatsink fins, which is said to have an impact on overall static pressure.

Each heatsink (of course) utilizes copper heatpipes to transfer heat to the fin plates. The SK620V features six heatpipes in a traditional spacing split across two smaller towers, whereas the SK700V has seven staggered copper heatpipes feeding one wider tower.

▶️ Packaging

The heatsink and fan are protected by molded foam, with the remaining parts in a smaller brown box.

The box these coolers come in is designed to get your attention, with a photograph of the cooler in the middle and contrasting backgrounds on each side: white on the left, orange and dark pink stripes on the right.

▶️ Fans install via sliding rails

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink; the included fans have a direct impact on noise levels and cooling performance. While the fans on both the SK700V and SK620V are similar and installed via sliding rails, there are slight differences.

The SK700V includes only one fan, which runs at up to 2200 RPM while supporting a rated 66.29 CFM of airflow, and 3.74 mmAq air pressure levels.

The SK620V instead incorporates two quieter-running fans, with a lower air pressure of 2.93 mmAq, and each having airflow rated at 56.46 CFM. The rear exhaust fan can be lifted up and down as necessary, so it doesn’t interfere with your motherboard’s VRM heatsinks.

▶️ Digital display with CPU performance metrics

Both SK620V and SK700V air coolers have digital displays that show the frequency, load, power, and temperature levels of your AMD Ryzen CPU.

▶️ AM5 Installation

The installation process is both difficult and simple at the same time. It’s difficult because it utilizes a custom metal frame – which just like on Intel systems, requires removal of the entire default socket. To do this, I placed the motherboard’s backplate against my knee to keep it secure when removing the screws and socket and installing the frame.

After installing the custom metal frame, apply the included thermal paste. If you’re not sure how to do that, we have a handy thermal paste application guide that covers the different methods you can use.

The rest of the process is simple. Place the heatsink against the CPU block, and use the included screwdriver to secure it.

Once the heatsink is secured, all that remains is to slide the fans into place and connect the PWM and USB cables to your motherboard. Well, there is one last step: You’ll need to download and install Sudokoo’s MasterCraft software to configure the built-in display.

Real-world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform

We’ve tested coolers with both the Ryzen 9950X3D and its non-V-Cache sibling, the 9950X. There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events. While the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I’m using has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

We’ve since returned to using a 9950X3D for cooler testing, as it has a more balanced heat profile, and is almost certainly a more widely adopted CPU.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods. Many tes coolers on an open test bench, with lowered ambient temperatures. This can make weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have also used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect real-world cooler conditions.

Our latest testing setup uses the FLOVA F50 computer case from Tryx.

This case features a unique “crossflow” fan that pulls air from the side, which the company claims is more effective than traditional intake fans. For air cooling tests, we’ve added a single Noctua NF-A12 G2 intake fan.

PBO Performance and maximum noise levels

We’re going to start this review’s benchmark section by focusing on a traditional maximum performance test, with the CPU cooler’s fans allowed to reach their fastest speeds, for the best cooling possible.

Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D to stretch its legs to an extent, and all air coolers I have tested with PBO enabled reach the maximum CPU temperature of 95C (203F) and thermally throttle to a small extent.

We’ve tested three “600” series coolers and the SK700V for this review. Sudokoo’s SK620V trails slightly behind the competition, at 242W (compared to 248.3W for Montech’s NX600). The SK700V model is about on par with DeepCool’s AK620 G2, which is impressive for an air tower only using a single fan.

Results from the liquid coolers we’ve recently tested aren’t shown above because they are able to keep AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D under TJ Max – and as such, power consumption figures aren’t quite comparable.

Maximum noise levels of both coolers are rather reasonable: Sudokoo’s SK620V reaches 41.9 dBA, and the more powerful SK700V model reaches 43.4 dBA. That’s noticeably quieter than many competitors, and means you can actually enjoy using your computer instead of being annoyed by loud fans.

200W thermal benchmarks

For the next thermal test, I leave motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23.

With a “stock” power profile enabled, DeepCool’s lead over Sudokoo’s SK700V is a bit more apparent, with the SK700V running 1.3 degrees Celsius hotter. The SK620V’s temperature of 79.4 is warmer than the competing air coolers we’ve tested here, but it’s also worth noting that it runs quieter than all the coolers shown above – as we’ll demonstrate in the next section’s benchmarks.

150W + GPU thermal results, noise levels

Our next test runs Cinebench on the CPU with a 150W power limit, while also running Furmark on MSI’s RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3x OC. This causes the GPU to consume ~295W of power. This test is designed to emulate the thermals of games, which primarily stress the CPU and GPU.

All of the air coolers here perform similarly, with a range of just 1.2 C between the best and worst results. So let’s take a look at the noise levels in this test, as that’s going to be more important to most users.

Sudokoo’s SK620V and SK700V deliver extremely competitive performance when it comes to sound output. The SK620V’s noise levels registered at the lowest volume my noise meter is capable of measuring: 36.4 degrees C. This means that the cooler was likely running at a lower volume level – it was so quiet I had to double-check that the fans were spinning! If silence is your top priority, this cooler might just be the one for you. The SK700V ran just a hair louder, at 37.3 dBA. Both of these results are quieter than most competing coolers on the market.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of our MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

This next test has the CPU cooler noise-normalized to 38.9 dBA, with PBO enabled for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU.

We’ve got results of 241.9W (SK620V) and 246.2W (SK700V) in this test. The SK700V’s results are of particular interest, as it seems to be among the best air coolers when normalized for low noise.

Karhu DDR5 RAM thermals testing!

Your CPU cooler does not operate in isolation. It has an impact on not just your CPU’s temperatures, but also the other components in your build, like your RAM and GPU.

To that end, I’ve run the Karhu RAM stress test. This places a load of ~153W on the CPU and ensures system RAM (DDR5 in my case) is fully stable. In this type of scenario, most AIOs tend to produce worse results than air coolers.

These results are interesting, because this is the only test where the SK620V outperforms the SK700V thermally, due to the overall combined airflow of having two fans. This is great news if you prioritize RAM speeds above other factors, for overclocking competitors or competitive e-sports gaming.

Conclusion

Sudokoo’s SK620V and SK700V air coolers deliver premium style, near-silent operation, and solid performance. They’re also backed by a generous 5-year warranty, indicating the manufacturer’s confidence in the product’s longevity.

Many users will also appreciate the striking design of the heatsink, integrated display, and the decision to use a solid metal anti-bending frame for the installation process.

However, these coolers aren’t for everyone. With price tags starting at $74.99 for the standard version of the SK700, and going up from there. That puts them in competition with premium air cooler brands like Be Quiet and Noctua, and well into AIO territory. Still, if you like the look of these coolers, as well as the display, and prioritize silent cooling for your AMD AM5 CPU, they’re a solid option.

A TechTuber has constructed a bulbous 15x fan PC case side panel as a cooling experiment. If you think the mind-boggling design of the ‘Superdome’ is familiar, that’s probably because the fevered imagination of Major Hardware was also behind the custom domed 15x fans in the ‘Fanhattan Project’ we wrote about last month. How well does it scale to PC side panel use? Let’s see.

Major Hardware explains at the start of his new video that the Superdome was inspired by user comments on the prior project, suggesting the use of multiple standard NF-A12x25 120mm fans instead of tiny fans replacing a single unit. Thankfully, as the Noctua fans are $40 a piece, the cooling firm provided all the fans the project required — saving $600 for the maker. As a cherry on top, Noctua also generously provided spools of matching 3D printer filament.

The freebie Noctua fans arrived before the TechTuber had drafted the Superdome in 3D, but the idea was made to work with five fans around one on top of the dome, and nine surrounding them at the base of the dome, near the PC. Cabling routing was yet to be decided.

Next, we see Major Hardware 3D print the structure of the Superdome, and luckily, the Bambu Labs H2D and H2S build volume was just enough to prevent more design splitting than would be ideal. Still, it took days to output all the pieces.

The finished work looks great from the outside, but Major Hardware is the first to admit cable management is “a little bit of a disaster.” But it was “honestly pretty quiet,” as long as none of the cables swung into the fan blades. All the fans were configured to be intakes, so we guess that when attached to the PC, the build would have a soupçon of positive internal pressure.

Battlefield 6 gaming thermals test

The proof of any success from equipping the Superdome would come from an A/B Battlefield 6 gaming challenge, decided the TechTuber. With the standard glass panel equipped, he observed a top temperature of ~86°C in the Ryzen Master software. Swapping to the Superdome and playing a few more BF6 games, and Major Hardware saw that the CPU temps had dropped to approximately 67°C. “I dropped about 20°C just by putting the Superdome on the front of my PC,” noted the TechTuber. “This is pretty incredible, and it's not even loud.” However, sitting beside the PC, he felt “a constant breeze.”

Major Hardware has decided to share the 3D printing files on Thingiverse, so others with a Lian Li O11 case and a few spare fans can easily follow in his footsteps.

Introduction to Silverstone IceMyst Pro 360 Pro

SilverStone has been busy churning out coolers, power supplies, expansion cards, and other PC equipment since its founding in 2003. The company is perhaps best known for its computer cases, like the retro-inspired PC FLP02.

A few years ago we tested the company’s unique IceMyst 360 AIO with Intel’s Core i7-13700K. Since then, the bar for AIOs has been raised – we’ve seen improvements in affordability and performance of high end AIOs, with the best liquid coolers becoming stronger and more competitive every year.

Today we’re looking at Silverstone’s IceMyst 360 Pro, which, like its predecessor, features the ability to add multiple VRM fans to provide direct cooling to specific motherboard components. This feature will be appreciated best by those who overclock their RAM, as DDR5 is more sensitive to temperature than older DDR4.

Will this liquid cooler make our list of the best CPU coolers? You betcha! But let's take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks so you can decide if this is the right AIO for your next build.

Cooler specifications

Features of the IceMyst Pro 360 AIO liquid cooler

● Packaging

The outside of the box is brown and blue, highlighting the cooler’s image on the top. As with most AIOs, the inner contents are protected with molded carboard and plastic coverings.

Included with the AIO are the following parts:

● 120mm fans

There’s more to an AIO than just the liquid pump and radiator. The fans included have a direct impact on noise levels and cooling performance. Silverstone includes three model CC12025H12S fans, which are 120mm in size and feature nine fan blades.

To simplify cable management, these fans feature a quick-connect that integrates ARGB and PWM into a single cable.

● 360mm radiator and liquid pump

The radiator is that it includes an accessible refill port, which will come in useful if you ever need to refill the liquid coolant after the unit’s three-year warranty.

This “Pro” version of the IceMyst 360 features a new pump with a three-phase, six-pole motor. Silverstone claims that this pump delivers twice the flow rate of its previous products.

● A small tube of thermal paste

● Hardware ARGB Control Box

Included with the AIO is a hardware ARGB controller that lets you control and power the lighting without needing an available motherboard connection.

● Mounting for modern AMD and Intel platforms, and even ThreadRipper Pro!

Like most other liquid coolers, the Silverstone IceMyst Pro 360 supports modern AMD and Intel consumer platforms. It includes a very large copper CPU contact plate, because the cooler also includes mounting hardware for Threadripper Pro systems.

● The killer feature: (Optional) IMF70 VRM/DDR5 fans

The feature that sets the IceMyst Pro 360 Pro apart from competitors is the ability to mount mulitple IMF70 fans on top of the CPU block.

You can install as many or few fans as your case will fit, and you can move the fans to cover different spots on your motherboard as appropriate. For the purposes of this review, we’ve tested the AIO in multiple fan configurations above our TeamGroup T-Force Xtreem DDR5-7200 RAM. And we’ve run the ultimate RAM stress test, Karhu, to benchmark thermals and determine how effective these fans are.

● AM4/AM5 Installation

The installation of this liquid cooler is simple, but it doesn’t come with the fans pre-installed. So first you’ll want to secure the fans to the radiator, and then mount the radiator to your computer’s case.

Next, you’ll remove the default AM4/AM5 mechanism, and then place studs on the mounting holes.

It’s time to apply the included thermal paste now. If you’re not sure how to do that, we have a handy thermal past guide. Once the paste is applied, simply place the pump block on top of the CPU and secure it with the included parts.

With that step completed, you have the option to install an optional IMF70 VRM/DDR5 fan.

The last step is to connect the PWM and ARGB headers and power on your system.

Real-world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform

The 9950X3D setup that we were testing coolers with last year has suffered an early death, likely caused by electrically defective equipment. While we were waiting for the CPU to be replaced, we tested coolers with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X instead and observed some interesting findings.

There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events – while the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I use has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing method. Many will test CPU coolers outside of a case, on an open test bench. Open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world PC cooler conditions.

Our latest testing setup uses the FLOVA F50 computer case from Tryx.

This case features a unique “crossflow” fan that pulls air from the side, which the company claims is more effective than traditional intake fans.

PBO Performance

We’re going to start our benchmarks section by focusing on traditional thermal tests, and at the end, we’ll cover DDR5 thermal tests with Silverstone’s IMF70 VRM fans.

While some of y’all prefer to run coolers at low noise levels, I know a lot of you just want maximum performance. This first test lets the fans run at their max speeds, to test the full potential of the AIO’s cooling capabilities.

Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D to stretch its legs to an extent. With the Ryzen 9 9950X (non-3D), the CPU will guzzle as much power as possible and hit TJMax no matter what cooler is paired with. However, at least with MSI’s X870E Carbon Wifi motherboard, power consumption averages ~250W with peaks of up to ~265W.

The result shown here of only 84.9 degrees C is one of the best on the market, providing cooler temperatures than the vast majority of competing liquid coolers. There have only been four AIOs I’ve tested capable of such thermal excellence. When I first tested Sudokoo’s Proteus 360 on our last 9950X3D setup and encountered similar thermal performance, I was first worried that there was something wrong with my system, because I had a hard time believing my own results!

I’ve included those results below, but keep in mind we’re using a different case for testing now – so thermals aren’t 100% comparable.

200W thermal benchmarks

For the next thermal test, I leave motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23. CPU temperatures averaged 68.4 degrees Celsius, which is again one of the strongest results from any liquid cooler I’ve tested.

150W + GPU thermal results

Our next test runs Cinebench on the CPU with a 150W power limit, while also running Furmark on MSI’s RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3x OC, which causes the GPU to consume ~295W. This test is designed to emulate the thermals of games, which primarily stress the CPU and GPU (but do not stress RAM).

With a CPU temperature of only 58.6 C, Silverstone’s IceMyst Pro 360 continues to demonstrate industry-leading thermal performance. I’ve included the results of this same test on our last 9950X3D testing system below, but please keep in mind they are not 100% comparable, as we’re using a different computer case.

Noise levels

To give you an idea of much noise this cooler creates when running, we’ve measured noise levels at full speed and in a scenario emulating high-intensity gaming.

Looking at this from a dBA perspective alone, you would think that the IceMyst Pro runs very loudly – but this chart doesn’t account for factors like the pitch of the fan noise. And regardless, it runs very effectively even when set to low noise levels, as you’ll see in the next section featuring noise-normalized tests.

In a scenario that emulates the thermal load of a high-intensity game, the noise level only reaches 38.9 dBA (when tied to my motherboard’s default fan curve). This is relatively quiet, and means that in most scenarios the cooler will run whisper-quiet.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of my MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

This next test has the CPU cooler noise-normalized to 38.9 dBA, with PBO enabled for the Ryzen 9 9950X3D CPU.

With a result of only 85C, Silverstone’s IceMyst Pro shows some of the strongest thermal performance possible – despite the fans running at low noise levels. What’s more is that there’s only a 0.1C increase compared to our full speed results, which means there’s no point in letting the cooler run loudly – at least with a consumer CPU. The IceMyst Pro features support for hotter, more powerful Threadripper Pro CPUs – which would likely benefit from the fans working harder.

Karhu DDR5 RAM thermals testing

One of the principles I’ve tried to explain in my reviews is that your CPU cooler does not operate in isolation. It has an impact on not just your CPU’s temperatures, but other components in your build as well, like your RAM and GPU. The optional Silverstone IMF70 fans, which cost about $25 each and can be added to this cooler, are designed to help cool your RAM and VRMs, ideal for users who prefer to overclock their memory to the fastest possible speeds.

To that end, I’ve run the Karhu RAM stress test. This places a load of ~153W on the CPU and ensures system RAM (DDR5 in my case) is fully stable.

In this type of scenario, most AIOs tend to produce poorer results than air coolers. Adding a single fan drops DDR5 temperatures by 9 degrees Celsius, which can significantly improve stability while overclocking. Using more than one fan doesn’t seem to make much of a difference, with temperatures dropping by only 0.1C.

But that’s not all – I’ve also tested Karhu while also running Furmark. This should be similar to a high-intensity gaming scenario that stresses the GPU and RAM, such as e-sports titles.

When you add the heat of a GPU to the mix, air coolers seem to lose the advantages shown in the previous chart. Adding the IMF70 VRM fans drops temperatures almost 9 degrees C here, which is important if you’re considering DDR5 overclocking.

Conclusion

Silverstone’s IceMyst Pro 360 is one of the strongest thermal solutions available for consumer CPUs – and it supports professional processor in the form of Threadripper Pro. It runs very quietly in normal scenarios and has excellent noise-normalized performance.

The optional IMF70 fans provide excellent cooling for VRMs or DDR5 RAM, dropping temperatures by 9 degrees C (21 degrees Fahrenheit) – a capability not offered by most competitors. Just note that you’ll need to pay extra for those IMF70 fans. They’re currently for sale at Amazon for $25 each, and that’s on top of the $189 cost of the cooler itself.

Noctua is known for building some of the world’s quietest and most reliable cooling fans. The brand is a partnership between the Austrian RASCOM and Taiwanese Kolink; RASCOM handles marketing, sales, and product management, whereas Kolink handles manufacturing, and together they handle product development. We delved into the interesting history of the brand late last year.

You most likely know Noctua for their signature brown and beige fans, but not everyone digs these colors – many of us prefer our fans in plain black, and although Noctua is happy to make these nowadays, their development isn’t something that happens overnight.

To manage expectations, Noctua keeps a published roadmap with the brand’s upcoming products, which is updated a few times per year. The most recent is from January 2026, and it details the products we can expect in Q1, Q2, and Q3 of this year.

Reliable Fans, Unreliable Roadmap

Now, before we dig into the details of Noctua’s roadmap, a disclaimer: The company is notoriously unreliable when it comes to sticking to its published roadmap. This is not without reason, however.

You see, there’s something you should know about Noctua: The brand prides itself on building quality products. Inevitably, this comes with unforeseen issues, and Noctua consequently finds itself delaying the launch of products to meet its own quality standards. There's more to it than just that, of course. Noctua didn't publish a roadmap until a few years ago, after facing much criticism from the public.

Q2 2026: Noctua is getting into water cooling

Noctua just released the Flux Pro Noctua Edition in partnership with Antec in March, which we’ve already built a system into. The Flux Pro case is made by Antec, and the Noctua Edition is the first case ever built to feature Noctua branding and a host of Noctua fans. But it's in Q2 where things start to get even more interesting.

Just like the brand was firmly against producing black fans for a long time, Noctua has also been firmly against liquid cooling. The reason is simple: pump noise.

Noctua has nothing against the power of liquid cooling. But when you pair the excellent NF-A12x25 G2 with a liquid cooler, under load the pump speed has to ramp up significantly, meaning its noise will stand out above the rest of the system. This is not an issue for PCs with cheaper fans (or not one most people care much about, anyway), but certainly an issue in a system designed for silence. But the market wants what the market wants. Noctua has been all about partnerships lately, and for building its very own liquid cooler, it teamed up with Asetek.

Asetek's history isn’t all too popular with the enthusiast community, but no one can deny that the company does have formidable experience making all-in-one liquid coolers. They’ll be pulling the EMMA (Gen 8) V2 platform out for optimal thermal and acoustic performance, and Noctua has made a handful of significant design choices that should make the pump significantly less obtrusive than other AIOs, among which is a tuned mass damper – similar to what the Taipei 101 skyscraper uses to keep the building upright in earthquakes, but much, much smaller.

Noctua has been talking about making its own liquid cooler for quite some time, and unlike many partnerships it has engaged in, the AIO will be a fully Noctua-branded product. With the Noctua brand always comes an industry-leading 6-year warranty. Reliability is often an issue with cheap AIOs, but with Noctua backing the product, I reckon we can be confident that Asetek’s new platform is due to stand the test of time.

The Noctua AIO will come in 240mm, 360mm, and 420mm sizes, all in the industry-standard 30mm radiator thickness. There's no specific price or release date quite yet, so keep your eyes peeled for any announcements.

Q2 2026: Finally, a Black NF-A12x25 G2

If you’ve been craving an NF-A12x25 G2, but don’t like the beige-and-brown colorway, your prayers will be answered: Noctua is unleashing the black variant of the NF-A12x25 G2 to the world in Q2 2026. Or at least, so says the roadmap.

The NF-A12x25 G2 is a fan that pushes the limits of what is physically possible in the 120mm x 120mm x 25mm form factor, and it does so by using Sterrox Liquid Crystal Polymer (LCP) for the impeller. This gives it extra tensile strength so that the blades don’t bow outwards at high duty, which is critical because the impeller is spaced at just 0.5mm from the frame.

But, the reason why it’s taken a while to come to market is that changing the color pigment in LCP has some funny ways of interacting with the molding process; you’d think, simply change the pigment, inject the substance into the same mold. Bob’s your uncle. But the reality isn’t that simple. With most fans, this wouldn’t be an issue, but due to the 0.5mm spacing, there is zero room for error.

Q2 2026: Pulsar Feinmann Noctua Edition

As a wrap for Q2, Noctua is teaming up with Pulsar for a Feinmann Noctua Edition gaming mouse. The Feinmann is a rather unique mouse — it’s built with a magnesium alloy shell that’s filled with holes to deal with sweaty hands. If you’re someone who suffers from Trypophobia, this mouse isn’t for you. But Noctua saw it and thought, “Hey, we can put a fan in there,” and so they did.

Due to the magnesium alloy shell, the Pulsar Feinmann is ultra light, weighing in at just 46 grams. The Noctua edition is probably a few grams heavier – the fan that’s due to be mounted inside weighs just under 9 grams without a cable. Even with that, less than 60 grams would still be extremely light. For context, anything under 100 grams is considered light. For comparison's sake, the Logitech MX Master 4 weighs in at 150 grams.

The sensor inside the mouse is the PixArt PAW3950, which offers a 39k DPI resolution, can cope with up to 50G acceleration, and tracks at up to 75 inches per second. With polling at 8,000 Hz, the Pulsar Feinmann is already an incredibly attractive gaming mouse as is.

Add some Noctua colorway touches, and this will be one of the most unique pointing devices to exist. Considering the original, non-Noctua edition costs $180, and adding some Noctua tax, it wouldn’t be surprising if this mouse costs north of $250.

As with other Noctua collaboration products, expect limited production of the mouse. The chances are that over time, this will gain collector value among diehard Noctua enthusiasts.

Q3 2026: A desk fans & co-branded PSUs

With all the releases slated for Q2, Q3 is set to be a little less exciting. We can expect a 140mm desk fan, a USB fan controller to pair it with, and last but not least, a Seasonic Prime PX Noctua Edition power supply.

The advent of the Seasonic Prime PX Noctua Edition is particularly interesting, as it brings a Noctua Edition power supply to a more mainstream power envelope.

Currently, Noctua is already selling a PSU in partnership with Seasonic – the Prime TX-1600 Noctua Edition, which, as its name implies, is a very beefy unit capable of delivering 1,600 watts nominal. That is a huge amount of power, and not everyone needs this.

The Prime PX HPD series will come in envelopes of 850 W, 1,000 W, and 1,200 W, which is much more appropriate for the masses.

To give some context to this statement, Even The Stout Owl, a fully handmade wooden PC with 100% Noctua G2 fans, which packs a Core Ultra 9 285K, 96 GB of DDR5 CUDIMM memory, 4 TB of SSD space, and a Noctua RTX 5080, only typically pulls around 500 watts under real-world loads. With synthetic loads, this figure gets pushed to 800-810 watts, meaning even that PC could make do with the smallest PSU of the lot.

But keep in mind that PSUs operate at peak efficiency around 50% load (generally speaking, this is a good rule of thumb to go by), which gives a good argument for slightly oversizing a PSU. Oversize too far, and you’ll end up with unnecessarily higher idle draw and never reach peak efficiency. For more on PSU bottlenecks and sweetspots, we've done our own testing last year with the RTX 5090.

The Prime PX series is also a short power supply, barely fitting a 120mm fan. This makes them fit in pretty much all but the smallest cases. Of course, the Noctua-Edition Prime PX’s will also come with an NF-A12x25 G2 fan installed, a brown shroud with Noctua’s signature intake-noise-reducing shape, and Noctua-themed cabling.

The Thermosiphon is still MIA, for now

One of Noctua's most anticipated products is the elusive thermosiphon cooler.

With Noctua’s take on pump noise, a thermosiphon cooler would be the perfect outcome, as it would need a pump. Instead of being filled with water, a thermosiphon cooler is filled with a phase-changing coolant, which boils when subjected to heat from the CPU, and condenses when cooled in the radiator.

Except unlike a heatpump or air-conditioner, this doesn’t happen under the mighty force of a compressor – rather, the coolant is one that’s engineered to evaporate and condense at temperatures typically seen in PCs, rising from the boil, and falling back down by gravity as a liquid – a passive, gravity-driven cycle. This is similar to the process that happens in heatpipes.

For something as complex as this, it’s no surprise we can’t find the thermosiphon cooler on the roadmap. It was first demoed at Computex in 2024, but has been in the works long before then, according to our own sources. The thermosiphon cooler is something Noctua is developing in partnership with Calyos, which has experience building computer cases that act as passive heatsinks, driven by phase-change cooling.

With the complexities of developing a product such as a phase-change cooler, Noctua has said that the thermosiphon cooler will not be listed on the roadmap until it is near completion, nor will it give a rough ETA.

The curious case of the disappearing NH-D12

Also demonstrated at Computex in 2024 was Noctua’s first full-size, dual-tower 120mm CPU cooler. Noctua has been around for 20 years, and in all that time, it has never built a dual-tower, dual-120mm-fan CPU cooler that uses standard square-frame fans.

Yes, the legendary NH-D15 and the new NH-D15 G2 are phenomenal coolers – but they’re huge, and with the round-frame fans, they look a bit incohesive, lacking clearly-defined boundaries. Of course, one of the reasons it may have disappeared off the roadmap is the limited situations in which a D12 may be needed – for space-restricted applications, Noctua already builds the D12L, a low-profile variant, and where there is enough space, the D15 will offer superior performance.

All that said, Noctua had stated that the prototype D12 offered D15-level performance in a 120mm form factor. However, being a smaller cooler, it’d have to cost less than the D15, and we don’t imagine Noctua is in the market to cannibalize its own product portfolio.

The NH-D12 was revealed in June 2024, and at the time, it had a release window of Q2 2025. It’s now a year later, and it’s nowhere to be seen on Noctua’s roadmap.

As Noctua's roadmap evolves, and we get a better understanding of what's on offer, be sure to check back on this page for updates. Who knows, we might even have the NH-D12 back on the roadmap.

We’re looking at an eye-catching AIO like none other today, sent to us by a relatively new player in the cooling game: Tryx. While the company only started in February 2023, its team of cooling experts has years of experience. We’ve previously reviewed the Panorama lineup of AIOs, finding them to be extremely strong in thermal performance.

Today we’re testing one of the company’s most recent AIOs, the Stage 360 ARGB. Like previous Tryx AIOs, it features a large screen. Technically, it’s two large screens, with a mirror base. This makes for some quite interesting customization options.

Will the Stage 360 ARGB make our list of the best CPU coolers? Let's take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks so you can decide if this is the right AIO for your next build.

Cooler specifications

Features of the Tryx Stage 360 AIO liquid cooler

● Packaging

While Tryx’s packaging isn’t hugely different from others, it tends to be a bit more eye-catching, just like its coolers. When you open the box, you’ll find a yellow-green cover that highlights the CPU block.

The inner contents are protected by molded foam and plastic coverings.

● Rota SL ARGB 120mm fans

Tryx includes three Rota SL ARGB 120mm fans, which are pre-installed on the radiator for your convenience. This is an extra step I appreciate for two reasons: It saves the system builder a few minutes, and it cuts down on unnecessary packaging waste.

These fans have seven blades, and are rated for up to 65.6 CFM (airflow) and 2.5 mmAq (air pressure).

The fans connect to each other via metal pins, eliminating cable management clutter. One combined ARGB and PWM cable connects at the end.

If you look closer at the connection, you’ll see it isn’t marked – and you might wonder which way to attach the cord. Well, it connects to the fans magnetically and it’s polarized. So if you try to attach it the “wrong” way, it will be magnetically repulsed and won’t attach.

Included with the AIO are the following parts:

• 360mm radiator with three Rota SL ARGB 120mm fans pre-installed
• Dual-screen 4-inch IPS displays

• Mounting for modern AMD and Intel platforms
• Pre-applied thermal paste
• Cable management velcro ties

• Pre-installed and extra α-01 thermal paste

● AM4/AM5 Installation

The installation of this liquid cooler is very simple. First, you’ll remove the default AM4/AM5 mechanism, and then place the plastic studs on top of the holes of the mounting bracket.

Next, you screw in the metal standoffs.

Tryx includes pre-applied thermal paste on the CPU coldplate, so you don’t need to worry about thermal paste application on the initial installation.

Place the pump and CPU block on top of your AMD Ryzen CPU, and then secure it with the included screws.

The CPU block itself is very simple and thin, without any bling. I think this is what most AIO CPU blocks should look like, assuming they don’t include something fancy like a giant screen (or two).

Speaking of screens, the last step is to place the display section on top of the CPU block.

You can optionally secure it using the knob highlighted below in blue, but it isn’t strictly necessary.

The last step is to connect the screen’s USB header and SATA power connection, and connect the PWM and ARGB connections. Power on your computer, and the hardware installation is complete – but you’ll need to install Tryx’ Kanali software if you wish to customize the display.

● The killer feature: Dual IPS screens with a mirror below

Unless you’re blind, you can easily see what the standout feature of the Tryx Stage 360 is: the included cube-shaped screen. It features dual four-inch IPS displays, each with a 720x720 resolution (1440x720 combined resolution), and a mirror on the bottom. The mirror has two sides – one with a mirror to show reflections, the other side is solid – and you can flip it over to customize the look as you please.

To control and customize the screen, you’ll need to download the Tryx Kanali software. Before I delve into the features of this software, let’s start with my singular complaint about it : the installation process.

As shown above, Tryx asks you to accept a user agreement and a privacy policy. I don’t know about you, but this seems ridiculous to me. Why does software that only serves to control a display need a privacy policy and an extensive EULA?

Worse yet, when I attempted to view the text of these “agreements”, Tryx’s web server kept timing out (as shown in the screenshot above), which means I wasn’t able to see what I was “agreeing” to. That alone might invalidate it in courts, but I’m no lawyer.

With that out of the way, let's look at the features included with the Kanali software. Currently, there are only four presets available. This will likely be updated with more n the future. When I first tested the Tryx Panorama AIO, it only included a few presets at launch. One year later when I tested the Tryx Panorama SE AIO, the number of preset options had greatly expanded.

What I really like about the Kanali software is the ability to easily record custom videos from your computer to use with the AIO’s display. To do this, you’ll click the “customization” button on the main screen (shown below).

A new screen will pop up afterwards, allowing you to control the recording. I loaded up a song from YouTube and recorded it. Once the recording is complete, it will save to a file.

You’ll then need to manually upload it using the “customization” tab.

Real-world testing configuration, AMD AM5 platform

The 9950X3D setup that we were testing coolers with last year has suffered an early death, likely caused by electrically defective equipment. While we were waiting for the CPU to be replaced, we tested coolers with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X instead and observed some interesting findings.

There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events – while the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I’m used has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods - many will test CPU coolers outside of a case, on an open test bench. Open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world PC cooler conditions.

Our latest testing setup uses the FLOVA F50 PC case, also from Tryx.

This case isn’t just stylish and classy; it features a unique “crossflow” fan that pulls air from the side, which the company claims is more effective than traditional intake fans.

PBO Performance

While some of y’all prefer to run coolers at low noise levels, I know a lot of you just want maximum performance. This test lets the fans run at their full speeds, to test the full potential of the AIOs cooling capabilities. Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D to stretch its legs to an extent. With the Ryzen 9 9950X (non-3D), the CPU will guzzle as much power as possible and hit TJMax no matter what cooler is paired with. However, at least with MSI’s X870E Carbon Wifi motherboard, power consumption averages ~250W with peaks of up to ~265W.

At first glance, the result of 89.4 degrees Celsius might seem poor – but you need to keep in mind that all four of the AIOs shown here are among the best performers on the market. While the temperature shown here is higher than the competitors I tested it against, it is strong enough to keep the CPU under its maximum temperature for the duration of testing – a feat which many weaker liquid coolers are incapable of passing.

200W thermal benchmarks

For the next thermal test, I leave motherboard settings at their defaults, resulting in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23. CPU temperatures averaged 73 degrees Celsius, which again shows very good thermal performance.

150W + GPU thermal results

Our next test runs Cinebench on the CPU with a 150W power limit, while also running Furmark on MSI’s RTX 4070 Ti Super Ventus 3x OC, which causes the GPU to consume ~295W.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of my MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of you prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

Let’s first look at noise-normalized results with PBO enabled, in terms of CPU temperature.

You’ll notice that the MSI prototype AIO and Silverstone’s IceMyst Pro are rendered in blue, indicating the Ryzen 9 9950X3D stayed under its peak temperature (TJ Max) of 95 degrees Celsius! The Tryx AIO, however, is rendered in red – indicating that the CPU reached its maximum temperature. This means it failed testing, right? Well… yes and no.

When comparing the power consumption levels of Tryx Stage 360 to MSI’s prototype AIO, they’re basically the same measurement, with only 0.2 watts of difference between the two results. That’s a margin-of-error difference, which means performance should also be more or less the same.

Noise levels

In terms of maximum noise levels, the Tryx Stage 360 AIO is about typical for liquid coolers on the market. What this chart can’t show you, however, is the pitch of the fans. The noise frequency of the fans here is pleasant, making the cooler “feel” quieter than the dBA measurement would indicate.

I’ve also measured noise levels with a 150W CPU load. This should be similar to the noise levels you’d experience while running CPU-intensive games – and the result here was simply perfect.

Tryx’s cooler measured 36.4 dBA, which is the lowest measurement my noise meter is capable of reading. This means it’s actually running quieter than this chart would indicate. We’re working on a new solution for measuring noise levels that will allow greater accuracy below 36 dBA, but it isn’t ready yet.

One last thing

One interesting thing about these liquid coolers that have detachable screens is… that they’re detachable. You don’t necessarily need to place them on top of the CPU block; you can place them in another spot in your computer’s case, or even outside of the case, as the cable for the display is approximately 1 meter (3 feet) long. This allows for non-traditional setups that could be more eye-catching than your standard configuration.

Conclusion

The Tryx Stage 360 liquid cooler is a premium AIO with a unique display, and its software is designed well, allowing you to easily customize the screens’ looks. Noise levels in common scenarios are whisper-quiet, making it ideal for the most sound-sensitive of users. This is a great AIO for users who aren’t sensitive to budget constraints and want the best-looking, quietest-running AIO cooler.

Thermalright has to be one of the standout manufacturers of CPU coolers for all types of PC builds. They truly make some of the best value coolers on the market, mixing performance with superb value for money. Today is no exception, with a limited-time deal on the fancy Thermalright Wonder Vision 360 UB ARGB liquid AIO CPU cooler, on a lightning sale at Amazon for just $165. This cooler is a fairly recent release, and it's a surprise to see it on sale, let alone with a 20% saving, shaving $41.48 off the $207.39 list price. This impressive CPU AIO cooler mixes a large 360mm cooling radiator with an attention-grabbing 6.6-inch curved AMOLED screen that sits above the CPU, perfect for displaying your system temps and performance, or for displaying pictures or video content.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

The good news is that this cooler is also discounted on several other variants, including a white version of the Wonder Vision 360, and black and white Turbo variants of the cooler, where the fans have been upgraded to 3000RPM fans instead of the 2150RPM fans of the non-turbo variant. The Turbo Wonder Vision will set you back an extra $13.76.

Thermalright's Wonder Vision 360 UB ARGB AIO cooler uses a 360mm cooling radiator with a 6400RPM pump speed, three high-speed (2150RPM) fans, and has a detachable 6.6-inch AMOLED screen with a sharp 2400 x 1080 resolution, and 60Hz refresh rate for displaying pictures or video. You can use Thermalrights TRCC software to fully customize the display's content and make an eye-catching addition to your PC build.

To show the full potential of the Thermalright Wonder Vision in testing, the AIO was placed under a stress load with PBO turned on to allow full fan speeds. Using the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X processor, the Wonder Vision 360 UB cooled 255W in this test, only 3W behind the best results we’ve had from a 360mm AIO.

We reviewed the Thermalright Wonder Vision 360 UB ARGB earlier this year and found the cooler to be an excellent mix of performance and aesthetics. The cooling performance alone didn't top the charts, but it wasn't far behind, and the added AMOLED screen added a unique look to system builds. Things we liked about the Thermalright Wonder Vision included the great-looking 6.6-inch 2400 x 1800 screen, low noise levels under typical load, and a long 6-year warranty. Negatives of the cooler included a rather loud max volume of 47 dB(A) when stressed, with some underwhelming noise-normalization results.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, Gaming Chair, Best Wi-Fi Routers, Best Motherboard, or CPU Deals pages.

Every now and then, you come across a PC hardware experiment that dares to reach beyond efficiency. What if you tried to create something that performs as well as what inspired the idea, but without any of the sterile, boring factory polish? That's what YouTuber Major Hardware just did with his new project — he combined 15 tiny fans to form one giant one that looks like Noctua's legendary NF-A12x25... and perhaps also an early atomic bomb.

There was no Eureka moment behind the idea; the YouTuber just decided to build this contraption for fun after seeing those self-balancing toy drones you can find online. They have a bunch of little propellers inside that move a lot of air, so the same logic can be applied to a much larger device, like an actual PC fan, such as the Noctua NF-A12x25. The project thus began with 7500 RPM 4.5V DC motors bought from Amazon.

These motors will power tiny 30mm fans that were 3D-printed to look like miniaturized versions of the real NF-A12x25, which is a 120mm fan. Running the numbers, Major figured out that about fifteen of these small fans would be required to match the area of a 120mm fan, but those fifteen fans still need to fit inside a 120mm frame. To make this possible, he whipped up a dome-like design in SolidWorks that houses the fans around the cupola.

This was the point where this fan started to look more like the Gadget that was created at Los Alamos. Major attached the fans to their motors, and the motors went inside little slots that sat inside crater-like cutouts. They were friction-fitted in the structure, with wires dangling from each of the fifteen fans. But since this project's one goal was to maintain airflow, the YouTuber decided to reroute all those cables.

Each of those wires was run up and out of the intrados through tiny holes. Then they were bundled up and connected to some winding wire on the surface. The end result looked an awful lot like the first atomic bomb used in the Trinity test, as stated by the YouTuber himself. But the mission to keep the insides clear of any potential chokepoints was successful, and it was now time for testing.

The 'Fanhattan Project' was connected to a power supply, and it spun to life right away, moving a significant amount of air. Unfortunately, we didn't get exact cubic feet numbers, but the fan did reach 73 dB while running. And that remains consistent because there's no PWM control here; the fan (fans?) runs at full speed the whole time, so how well can it actually cool a CPU?

The test bench consisted of a Noctua NH-U12A mounted atop a Core i7-7700K running at 4.9 GHz for 20 minutes. Using the NF-A12x25, the CPU reached 69.5 degrees Celsius while the Fanhattan Project kept it limited to "just" 69 degrees. That's just a 0.6% difference, which means it's within the margin of error, and the entire experiment is thus deemed a success — same performance for more than triple the noise. Worth it.

Thermal Grizzly (TG) has been stung by fake materials sellers based in China, with nearly $50,000 down the drain. Expert overclocker Roman ‘Der8auer’ Hartung’s computer accessories firm had been struggling to source copper and aluminum plates in Europe, so it decided to source alternative suppliers in the Far East. Despite some sage-sounding precautions and some diligence, TG received two separate shipments composed largely of fake material.

If you’ve been wondering about TG product stock, shipments, and delays, then the video above might help you understand what’s been happening behind the scenes.

Der8auer says the video was not easy to make, as it is “quite embarrassing for me personally.” However, it is good to share the story if it can help just one other person or firm avoid a similar fate. In TG’s case, the bad trade has been a big loss in cash (€40,000 or ~ $46,250), time, and energy. Moreover, it still needs to source these materials and find funds to cover the extra costs.

So, despite finding a pair of suppliers on Alibaba that seemed to have a solid verified track record spanning several years and corresponded professionally, they were both duds. Cautious procedures like paying just 30% up front, followed by the rest of the funds after receiving shipment confirmation, were simply not cautious enough. On receiving the shipping crates, it was one disappointment after another.

In the video, we see the ‘copper’ crate analysis first. What Der8auer received were ferric metal slabs (iron or steel) with quite a thick copper coating. So, they passed a visual test, and a corner snipped using some pliers looked good under an electron microcopy sample test.

However, the first red flag was shown when the TG boss went to test the copper slabs with a thermal surface conductivity meter. On a piece of reference copper material, the meter beeped, and the reading was 89%. However, the freshly unboxed ‘China copper’ didn’t even prompt this scientific instrument to produce a reading…

A milling machine was used to take a few millimeters off the surface of the newly imported material, and it soon revealed white metal, with sparks being produced. A small magnet confirms the actual shipped consignment consisted of “copper-coated steel plates.”

The second swindler

The second supplier’s aluminum swindle was a little different. This unscrupulous supplier had layered a few genuine aluminum slabs on top of the crate contents. Then, cheap steel plates were inserted below, and a few sheet steel voids were constructed to make the consignment roughly the expected weight for the amount of aluminum purchased.

From the video, it looks like about a quarter of the aluminum shipment was usable. After around five layers, the crates were filled with the aforementioned far-cheaper steel sheets as ballast.

There was also a copper shipment from this second supplier. Again, a few genuine sheets were on top. Like with the first supplier, though, it was soon found that most of the materials looked copper colored, but were magnetic. Another load of copper-plated steel…

A few thousand Euros for scrap

Der8auer was clearly exasperated to be swindled “twice, on this scale.” There is a possibility of getting a few thousand Euros back from the steel from a scrap dealer. Nevertheless, the loss isn’t just financial; it is to the company's reputation, delays, energy, and so on.

To conclude, the TG boss reveals that one of the suppliers no longer responds to communications. Another is still in touch, but Der8auer admits he “honestly doesn’t have much hope.” In the end, it sounds like he won’t expend any further energy pursuing justice, as “a German company doing something in China like this, it's almost impossible that you will succeed and it will cost you a lot more time and money.”

Cooling a computer isn’t terribly complicated in and of itself. But if you want to do it right, selecting the best cooling fan can be a daunting task. It’s easy to throw money at Noctua, and we wouldn’t fault you for doing so, but that strategy gets very expensive very quickly. And not everyone digs the beige-and-brown theme – and the company flat-out refuses to do RGB.

Of course, you can opt to go the other easy route and just use what’s included with the case and cooler you bought. But that’s also rarely the optimal solution, and many premium cases come with no fans or just one for exhaust. Ideally, you want a fan that’s quiet, effective at moving air, attractive, and affordable. And since you’ve landed on this page, chances are you bought one of the cases that doesn’t come with enough fans, or you’re not happy with the included fans' performance or audio profile, and are looking for something better.

Recently, we’ve picked up fan testing again, and we’re working hard to test a bunch of different models to figure out the best options in this very crowded field. Over the past several months, we’ve worked in cooperation with industry experts to flesh out a benchmarking methodology, and we expect to update this page regularly with new models we’ve tested.

Our Testing methodology is built on real-world applications, and there are a handful of scenarios a fan needs to perform well in. Naturally, we’re testing airflow in an unrestricted environment as a ‘vanilla’ test, but this is often not indicative of performance inside a PC case.

What’s also not indicative of real-world performance is static pressure testing. Yes, it’s an industry standard, but it really only measures how much pressure a fan can generate when blowing into a closed tube, or up against a wall in a more real-world scenario. It does not account for the changes in acoustics when a fan is mounted on a radiator, heatsink, or behind a mesh intake.

Instead, we’ve decided to measure a fan’s acoustic performance not only when unrestricted and suspended mid-air, but also when strapped to a radiator and again when behind a mesh intake. The results from this paint a much more nuanced, real-world picture, often with interesting outcomes.

For more information about how we test PC fans, scroll to the bottom of this page.

Quick List

Best PC fans you can buy today

Best silence optimized fans

Noctua’s NF-A12x25 G2 is game-changing, offering the quietest, most refined fan we’ve ever seen. In our testing, it delivered whisper-quiet performance and managed an impressively huge amount of airflow despite running at very low RPMs.

Managing such big airflow despite not needing to spin fast to accomplish it means it’s also not a very turbulent fan, which translates to chart-topping performance when installed on a radiator or behind an intake mesh. In fact, it’s the only fan we’ve tested thus far that ran quieter on a radiator than when suspended mid-air without any load.

In addition to pulling off airflow miracles, the NF-A12x25 also offers a seriously advanced internal hub, featuring Noctua’s refined, tried-and-tested SSO2 bearing, a new 3-phase etaPERF motor, and a new PWM controller with SupraTorque functionality. This sounds like a bunch of marketing talk, but after testing the fan, we can tell you with confidence that it has zero audible mechanical noise.

Best budget silence optimized fans

The Arctic P12 Pro is an interesting fan, because it offers performance that is, as far as the charts go, nearly neck-and-neck with Noctua’s NF-A12x25. Except, the Arctic does something Noctua doesn’t: It only costs $8.50 for one fan.

The price you pay for the Arctic fan is, in part at least, in its level of refinement. It uses a plastic ring to strengthen the impeller. And, in order to achieve its airflow, it relies on spinning up to higher speeds. Consequently, it’s a more turbulent fan than the Noctua, so it takes a bit more of a hit when mounted close to a mesh intake. It also produces a few mechanical noises, but even so, it’s a highly capable fan.

If, however, you just want a fan to move lots of air quietly, and you don’t want it to cost much, the Arctic P12 Pro is in a league of its own.

Best RGB fans

It feels a bit weird to place essentially the same Arctic fan on the Best list twice, but it truly is that good. The P12 Pro RGB is, for all intents and purposes, the exact same fan as the non-RGB variant, except with a white translucent impeller so that the RGB lighting from the hub shines through.

It performs on par with the non-RGB variant in our testing, offering wicked performance at up to 3000 RPM and a fantastic noise-to-airflow ratio. The best part: it barely costs more than the non-RGB variant.

Best High-Performance fans

The Phanteks T30 (review here) is one of the fans that somewhat copied the NF-A12x25 – it featured a similar blade shape, and also used a LCP (liquid crystal polymer) plastic for the impeller. Except, it wasn’t quite a copy, and now, even half a decade later, it’s still king of the hill in the ultra-high-performance fan space.

Why is it so good? Phanteks cheated. I wish I could say they didn’t, but they did. The industry standard for a 120mm fan is 25mm thickness. So what did Phanteks do? They made a 30mm fan. In fact, Phanteks was so proud of this fan that when they sent it out for review, they put together a wind tunnel kit for us because they wanted everybody to know Phanteks meant business and had defeated Noctua at their own game. And they did – it performed notably better than Noctua’s finest when tested for noise-to-airflow.

Moreover, the good stuff doesn’t stop at just 5mm of extra thickness. The company also built in a mode selector at the back of the hub that lets you select quiet, regular, and advanced modes. If you ask me, though, advanced should be called Final Destination mode it lets spin all the way up to 3,000 RPM. With its added thickness, high speed, and LCP material, it’ll gobble air and your fingers if you’re not careful.

Choosing the best fan for you

Fans. They spin. They move air. They make noise. Sometimes they have lights, and more recently, some have LCD screens. It may seem like a silly thing to obsess over, but picking the right, or wrong, fan can make a major difference in a PC build.

Not everybody looks for the same thing in a fan, and whereas picking the Best CPU or Best GPU is often a matter of what’s best-performing for the dollar in your allocated budget, fans don’t evolve at nearly the same pace, so picking one is much more of a subjective exercise. With that said, depending on your situation, there can be a few key considerations that can make the choice easier.

• If you’re someone who comes home from work, whips on a headset, and plays games for an hour, noise levels or MTBF (durability) figures may not matter much to you.
• Alternatively, if you’re someone who works on your PC in silence all day long, it may be worth investing in more refined fans that offer less wind and mechanical noise, with a more durable motor.
• Personal sensitivity to certain noise types and frequencies also plays a role.
• Whether the PC is placed on the desk or on the floor is another factor to consider. Fan noise can be less noticeable from the floor.
• Some fans are designed to perform better on radiators and heatsinks, whereas others perform better as case intake or exhaust. Pick accordingly.
• Fans with daisy-chaining connectors can ease installation and provide tidier cable management.
• Cases with tinted windows require fans with brighter RGB for a visual spectacle.
• Mini-ITX PCs, though fantastically small, can benefit more from a fan upgrade to quiet them down than big full-tower E-ATX machines.

More about how we test PC fans

Our PC fan testing consists of multiple phases. First, we test a fan’s vanilla acoustics by suspending it mid-air with four pieces of string so that no frames or holders interfere with the airflow. We start with a basic measurement, noting whether the fan breaks through the noise floor at its minimum speed, then we record the RPM for every whole dB between 34 and 44 dB(A). Finally, we record the maximum RPM and its associated noise level.

We then repeat these tests with a radiator mounted behind the fan, and again with a mesh intake in front of the fan. We do this because radiators and intake mesh fundamentally change a fan’s acoustics and the RPM they must spin at to achieve the desired noise targets.

After the acoustic data, we mount the fan in our wind tunnel to collect airflow data.

The windspeed is measured with an anemometer. However, although the fan’s impellers may push air, no air comes from the space behind the motor hub, and fans don’t generally push air in only one direction. In fact, the space immediately behind a motor hub usually becomes a low-pressure pocket, which is why we need a wind tunnel – to form the airstream into one cohesive, non-turbulent column of moving air.

Inside the wind tunnel (at the halfway point and near the end) are two air-straighteners, which together with the length of the tunnel at 77cm (just over 30 inches) neatly combs the airstream into something we can measure, without creating tons of backpressure that would affect the readings.

Using the RPM datapoints from the acoustic testing phase, we now set the fan to each RPM point and record the associated wind speed. We repeat this with a radiator behind the fan, and again without the radiator but with the mesh intake in front of the fan. Of course, the wind speed isn’t actually a useful measure (yet) of how much air a fan can displace, until we convert it to meters cubed per hour (m³/h).This testing yields up to 84 datapoints per fan (assuming the fan can achieve each point), which tells us enough about a fan's capabilities, quirks, and acoustics to judge whether it's one of the best PC fans you can buy.

German company be quiet! (henceforth referred to as Be Quiet) is well known in PC builder circles for its coolers and cases, which (as the company’s name implies) focus on low noise levels. The Dark Rock Pro and Elite air coolers performed excellently in our testing, and the Dark Base Pro 901 is personally my favorite PC case.

The Silent Loop 3 420 is the company’s largest AIO, and the latest to land on our test bench. Will it make our list of the best CPU coolers? Let's take a look at the specifications and features of the cooler, and then we’ll go over thermal and noise benchmarks so you can decide if this is the right large AIO for your next build.

Cooler specifications

Packing and included contents

The Silent Loop 3 arrives in a black box, showcasing the product on the front.

Included with the product are the following:

● 420mm radiator

● Three 140mm fans

● Mounting for AMD and Intel platforms

● Thermal Paste

● Extra coolant

● Cable management ties

Features of the Silent Loop 3 420 AIO liquid cooler

▶️ 140mm Silent Wings 4 fans

Three black Silent Wings 4 140mm PWM fans cool the radiator, featuring rated speeds of up to 1900 RPM, 78.4 CFM, and up to 2.36 mm H20 air pressure. As we’ll see in our testing, they deliver solid performance while running at lower noise levels than most competitors on the market.

▶️ Large CPU block suitable for Threadripper

The CPU block included with this AIO is large, and it supports AMD’s TR4 and TR5 Threadripper platforms. The tubes are fully rotatable, as is common with most AIOs.

▶️ Extra coolant

The cooler is DIY and user-repair friendly, with extra coolant and an accessible refill port in case you want to service the AIO after years of use.

▶️ (Optional) ARGB lighting on the CPU block

For those who prefer illumination, ARGB lighting is supported on the CPU block. Of course, if that’s not your thing, you don’t have to plug in the ARGB header. It has a sleek grey and black aesthetic without the lighting enabled.

AMD AM5 installation

1. First, you’ll need to connect the fans to the radiator, then secure the radiator to your PC’s case.

2. Next, remove the default AM5 brackets and place the included rubber standoffs.

3. Take the included mounting bars and place them on top of the standoffs, and then secure them with a screwdriver and the included screws.

4. Apply the included thermal paste to your CPU. If you aren’t sure how to do this properly, please refer to our handy guide on how to apply thermal paste.

5. Press the pump block on top of the CPU, and secure the built-in screws using a screwdriver.

6. Once complete, connect the PWM and ARGB headers to your motherboard, then installation is complete.

Real-world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform

The 9950X3D setup that we started testing coolers with last year has suffered an unfortunate death. So we’ve begun to test coolers on a system with AMD’s 9950X.

There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events – while the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I’m using has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods - many will test CPU coolers outside of a case, on an open test bench. Open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world PC cooler conditions.

That said, this review bends this rule a little: The MSI Pano 100R PZ case that we use for cooler testing doesn’t technically support 420mm radiators. So I had to place it on top of the case to make it fit. This likely affects thermals and acoustics at least somewhat, but short of re-testing all our coolers in a different case, we didn’t have a better option.

We tested Arctic’s competing Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 in this same way for comparison, while the smaller 360mm coolers were tested in a typical fashion, with the radiator and fans inside the case. If there is heavy interest in large 420mm cooler testing, we will revisit these results in a larger case later this year.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of my MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

We’ll start with the “easiest” of these tests, which runs Cinebench R23 with a “stock” power limit. On our motherboard, this means the CPU will consume ~200W. The results are pretty much within expectations – outperforming all competing 360mm AIOs tested here, but falling a few watts behind Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro 420.

The next test is a bit harder, with PBO enabled to allow the CPU to use as much power as it can handle – it handled an impressive 257W on average.

For the next test, we’ve added the heat of a GPU to the mix – which contributes 295W of thermals into the PC case. The results are similar to our other noise-normalized tests, and Be Quiet maintained its second-place position once again.

Noise levels

We’ve measured noise levels at two points to give you an idea of how the cooler operates when tied to a motherboard’s default fan curve. Our first measurement is when the fans are allowed to run at full speed, delivering the loudest noise levels possible.

In terms of maximum volume, Be Quiet’s Silent Loop 3 420 reaches 45.3 dBA – quieter than most AIOs that we’ve tested.

Our next acoustic measurement is the cooler’s volume when the CPU consumes 150W. This might be similar to your “worst case” gaming scenarios, especially if PBO is enabled. Noise levels are very good here, reaching only 37.3 dBA. This means the cooler runs virtually silent in most common workloads, and will only become audible in stressful scenarios.

PBO Performance – full fan speeds

While some of y’all prefer to run coolers at low noise levels, I know a lot of you just want maximum performance. This test lets the fans run at their full speeds, to test the full potential of the AIOs cooling capabilities. Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X to stretch its legs and guzzle power, pushing the limits of any CPU cooler on the market.

The Silent Loop 3 420 cooled more than 260W in this test, just a few watts behind the best results we’ve recorded – maintaining its overall second-place position.

200W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I leave motherboard settings at their defaults – which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23. CPU temperatures averaged 73.7 degrees C, which is rather impressive when you consider that our best result – with Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 – was only 0.1 C cooler.

150W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I’ve set the power limit to 150W.

In this lower-intensity scenario, Be Quiet’s Silent Loop 3 slipped to third place – with an average temperature of only 59.7 C.

100W thermal results

Our next test is the least difficult benchmark featured in this review, with a workload consuming only 100W. As with the previous low-intensity test, Be Quiet’s ranking slipped – this time taking our fourth-place result. However, noise levels were dead silent – quieter than the noise meter we’re using is capable of measuring!

Conclusion

Be Quiet’s Silent Loop 3 420 offers a great combination of strong cooling and quiet performance. In stressful scenarios, it outperforms competing 360mm AIOs on the market – and in low-intensity workloads, it runs whisper-quiet – quieter than our noise meter is capable of measuring. If you’re interested in this AIO, it has an official MSRP of $189.90, but is frequently available for only $139 on Amazon.

Thermalright is well known for delivering some of the best coolers on the market, usually available at extremely competitive prices. So today’s review of a Thermalright AIO featuring a price tag of $260 USD might come as a shock to some of our readers.

What makes this AIO different from the lower-priced, value options we’re accustomed to seeing? Well,it has a large 2400x1800 6.7-inch anamorphic screen with a slightly oversaturated look that makes colors “pop,” a wide variety of preset customization options – and the screen can be detached and mounted elsewhere in (or outside) the case.

Will this unusual option make our list of best CPU coolers? Well, let's just say we might have to make a new category covering curved LCD AIOs in our recommendations list.

Cooler specifications

Packing and included contents

Thermalright’s Wonder Vision 360 is packaged in a reflective, jet-black box.

The inner contents are protected by molded foam, carboard, and plastic coverings.

Included with the product are the following:

• 6.7-inch anamorphic display
• 360mm radiator with pre-installed fans
• Mounting for AMD and Intel platforms
• Thermal Paste

Features of the Thermalright Wonder Vision 360 UBB ARGB Black

▶️ Impressive 6.7-inch curved display

The standout feature of this AIO is the beautiful 6.7-inch display, featuring an ultrawide 2400x1080 resolution with a curve for an anamorphic 3D effect with moving media. The display’s colors seem slightly oversaturated, making them “pop,” or seem more vivid than reality.

▶️ TRCC Software

To control the display, you’ll need to install Thermalright’s TRCC software. There are an insane number of preset visuals to choose from here — over 200 by my count!

And of course, there are multiple ways to display performance metrics, in addition to the visual themes.

▶️ The screen is detachable

The included screen is detachable and doesn’t have to be connected to the cooler in order to function. This means that you can place the screen in any location inside of your PC’s case, or even externally. If the included USB cable that attaches to the motherboard isn’t long enough, you can simply replace the cable with a standard USB cable and connect it to an external USB port.

Still pictures don’t quite do this screen justice. This is a seriously eye-catching display, which makes the ability to mount it wherever you want all the more appealing.

▶️ Fully rotatable tubing, management clips

The AIO’s tubing is fully rotatable in any direction.

Three management clips are included to keep the liquid tubing organized and clean-looking.

▶️ Pre-installed fans

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink or radiator. The bundled fans have a significant impact on cooling and noise levels, as well as how the cooler looks in your case.

The fans included with this cooler have a unibody design, with a single cable for ARGB and PWM connections – simplifying cable management.

The blades of the fans are solid black, but there are ARGB strips along the sides of the fans and on the sides of the radiator.

AM5 installation

The installation of this cooler is simple, and assumes the you’ll have secured the radiator to their case before these steps. This guide will go over the installation on AMD systems.

1. Remove the default AM4/AM5 mounting mechanism.

2. Place the rubber standoffs around the screw holes surrounding the CPU.

3. Take the included mounting bars and place them on top of the standoffs, and then secure them with a screwdriver and the included screws.

4. Apply the included Arctic MX-6 thermal paste to your CPU. If you aren’t sure how to do this properly, please refer to our handy guide on how to apply thermal paste.

5. Press the pump block on top of the CPU, and secure the built-in screws using a screwdriver.

6. Once complete, place the 6.7-inch display on top of the CPU block and connect the included cable to a USB header, as well as the AIO’s PWM and ARGB cords.

Real world testing configuration – AMD AM5 platform

The 9950X3D setup we started testing coolers with last year has suffered an unfortunate death. As such, we’ve begun to test coolers on a system with AMD’s 9950X.

There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events. While the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I’m using has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other – with a difference of over 10C in some scenarios, shown below.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I place an emphasis on having results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods. Some reviewers will test CPU coolers outside of a case, on an open test bench. Open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have also used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world conditions where a CPU cooler is.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of our MSI x870E Carbon motherboard. But some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

We’ll start with the “easiest” of these tests, which runs Cinebench R23 with a “stock” power limit. On my motherboard, this means the CPU will consume ~200W. The results here aren’t quite as impressive as we hoped, falling behind other 360mm AIOs.

The next test is a bit harder, with PBO enabled to allow the CPU to use as much power as can be handled – where it handled 237W, on average.

For our last test, we’ve added the heat of a GPU to the mix, which contributes 295W of added thermals into the PC case. This result is similar to our other noise-normalized tests, and isn’t very impressive. However, when tied to a typical fan curve, this AIO performs much better – as you’ll see in the last section.

Noise levels

We’ve measured noise levels at two points to give you an idea of how the cooler operates when tied to a motherboard’s default fan curve. Our first measurement is when the fans are allowed to run at full speeds, the loudest noise levels possible.

In terms of maximum volume, Thermalright’s AIO reaches 47.2 dBA. This is louder than I would prefer, but seems to be about “middle of the road” in comparison to other high-performance liquid cooling systems these days.

Our next acoustic measurement is the cooler’s volume when the CPU consumes 150W. This might be similar to your “worst case” gaming scenarios, especially if PBO is enabled. Noise levels are very good here, reaching only 38.9 dBA. This means the cooler runs quietly in most common use cases, and will only become noisy in high-intensity workloads.

PBO Performance – full fan speeds

While some of you prefer to run coolers at low noise levels, I know many just want to see maximum performance. This test lets the fans run at their full speeds, show the full potential of the AIO’s cooling potential. Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X to stretch its legs and guzzle power, pushing the limits of any CPU cooler on the market.

The Wonder Vision 360 UB cooled 255W in this test, only 3W behind the best results we’ve had from a 360mm AIO thus far.

200W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I leave motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23. CPU temperatures here averaged 74.7C, which is rather impressive when you consider that our best result – with Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 – was only 1.1C cooler!

150W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I’ve set the power limit to 150W.

In this lower-intensity scenario, the Wonder Vision 360 UB showed off, delivering the best temperatures we’ve seen on this AMD Ryzen 9 9950X system, reaching an average of only 59.1 degrees Celsius.

100W thermal results

Our next test is the least-difficult featured in our cooling reviews, with a workload consuming only 100W. In this lower-intensity scenario, Thermalright’s Wonder Vision 360 UB again had the best results of the 360mm AIOs we’ve tested on this system, with a temperature averaging a ‘chilly’ 47.6 degrees C.

Conclusion

With the Wonder Vision 360 UB ARGB Black, Thermalright has shown that the company isn’t just an effective competitor for budget cooling – it’s also fully capable of producing high-end, premium products.

This AIO’s price of $205.90 might seem steep at first, until you consider that curved-screen competitors from Tryx and others often have prices closer to $300 or more. The included 6.7-inch ultrawide display is gorgeous, and features hundreds of visual theme options, courteously of Thermalright’s TRCC software. And the ability to use the screen independently of the cooler might appeal to those wanting to customize their PC cases in unique ways.

Not long ago, we tested two popular case fans, pitting Noctua’s NF-A12x25 G2, an industry legend, against the also well-liked Arctic P12 Pro. We had some surprising results, as the Arctic fan almost kept up with the much pricier Noctua. However, Arctic also sent us some P12 Pro’s of the RGB variety, so we thought it would be fitting to put Artic’s colorful spinner up against some competitors in its own price category.

In this round of testing we’ve rounded up five 120mm RGB fans that don’t cost a whole lot, so here, you won’t be seeing Lian Li’s fancy LCD-infused, wireless, infinity-mirror fans. Instead, we’re pinning the P12 Pro up against Be Quiet’s Light Wings LX, Fractal Design’s Aspect 12 RGB, Phanteks’ M25 G2 RGB, and finally, Levelplay’s Combat Fan 120 A-RGB. This last one was sent to us as a surprise, and I thought it was fitting to include in the roundup.

Let’s dive straight into the testing.

Testing Methodology

For evaluating PC fans, there are two main terms you should be aware of: Airflow and Static Pressure.

Airflow is easy – how much air does a fan move (through a wind tunnel in our tests) when not burdened by a radiator, mesh, or any other restriction.

Static pressure can be measured by placing the fan on a wind tunnel, closing the end, and measuring the pressure generated with a sensor, which spits out a value in millimeters of water. The higher the number, the better a fan is likely to be at overcoming restrictions.

However, I find that a fan’s measure of static pressure isn’t actually all that useful – all it tells you, really, is how well a fan can push air up against a wall, which is obviously not how you want to position the back of your PC. Instead, I prefer to test for noise and airflow through a radiator and intake mesh, as well as the standard suite of unrestricted tests for a more nuanced, real-world picture.

Testing Results of 5 Budget RGB Fans

(Not) Breaking the Noise Floor

On the day of this testing, the noise floor in my office sat between 32.4 and 32.7 dBA, and I am happy to be able to write that all five fans, when run at their minimum speed, were completely inaudible and did not break the noise floor, even with the dB meter placed at just 20 cm from their hubs.

This used to be something I only saw in premium fans, where manufacturers have designed quiet hubs, so I was delighted to see this kind of performance from budget-friendly RGB fans.

Airflow is not recorded for these tests, as none offer enough air speed for the anemometer to register.

dBA VS. Airflow: Unrestricted

The first series of tests I subject the fans to is measuring their acoustics in an unrestricted environment. I target every whole dB between 34 and 44 dB(A), and record the associated RPM. Then, I put that same fan on our wind tunnel, and record the windspeed at said RPM figures. This is then calculated over to cubic meters per hour for airflow.

In this test, Arctic’s P12 Pro leads the pack by a significant margin, followed by Be Quiet’s Light Wings LX. Phanteks’ M25 G2 RGB only performs a smidge worse than Be quiet’s fan.

Note the dip in the curve of Fractal Design’s Aspect 12 RGB at 37 dB(A). This fan creates quite an annoying resonance at certain speeds, where it gets louder at a certain RPM, and then quiets down again once past this RPM. I suspect that if I were to test at even smaller increments, the graph would become quite wobbly.

Most fans exhibit this kind of behavior to some extent, where they create unwanted noises at certain RPMs – even Arctic’s fan does this, but the level to which the Aspect 12 RGB made this noise was really quite bothersome.

Similarly, for the Phanteks’ fan (while its curve looks alright), I was unable to test at 35 dBA, which is why its line starts at 36. No matter how much I fidgeted with its speed, I simply could not get the dB meter to hit 35 – it was either over, or under, but not on.

The Levelplay Combat fan had the same issue, but at 41 dB(A), where I just couldn’t hit the mark.

All of this is not to say that Arctic’s fan is without imperfections either, though. This sample exhibited a light high pitch at certain RPMs which didn’t affect the readings, but I did notice, and at speed it started wobbling – a sign that it is unbalanced.

The predicament: Whether to test with more fans

I’ve wondered throughout testing these fans whether I should test with more fans and take the average results, but I have two problems with this: firstly, testing this thoroughly already takes quite some time, and more importantly, averaging out the results would mask defects.

In a premium fan from Noctua, we expect near-perfection. However, these are RGB fans that cost no more than $15 each. There will be some variance in issues between samples, but not averaging out the results means you get to see the fan’s performance for what it really is with one specific fan. Some of these behaviors will be down to their design and consistent across samples, while other issues may differ between units.

I do request three samples for each fan to review, however. If I do run into any issue like those mentioned above, I grab the other samples and quickly run them from lowest to max RPM and judge the results. If they exhibit similar behavior, I roll with the data, but if they to suddenly sound much cleaner, then I know there’s a manufacturing defect at play.

dBA VS. Airflow: Radiator Restricted

Pin these fans on a radiator, and something very interesting happens. Four of the fans perform nearly the same as each other, with the Arctic P12 Pro standing out by a huge margin.

Note that for this test, the acoustics are measured separately from the acoustics without the radiator, and the fans follow similar noise-to-RPM patterns.

dBA VS. Airflow: Mesh + Filter Intake Restricted

When placing the fans behind a mesh intake, things again get interesting. This is the most challenging test of the three, as placing intake mesh in front of a fan fundamentally changes the way they sound – intakes punish airflow more than radiators, not because they’re more restrictive, but because placing something in front of a fan has a much more profound effect on the noise than something behind it, and this is where a fan’s blade design really starts to shine.

The Arctic P12 Pro continues to lead the race here, with Be Qquiet’s Light Wings LX following behind. The Combat fan, despite being from a lesser-known brand, does OK for itself.

However, Fractal Design’s Aspect 12 RGB and Phanteks’ M25 G2 put down appalling performances on this test, offering only 60% of the P12 Pro’s airflow at the same noise levels.

Maximum performance

Finally, the fans get a test at full blast.

This isn’t a useful test to compare noise-to-performance efficiency of the fans, but if you’re looking for a fan with low maximum speed to keep noise levels down without having to make a custom fan curve, Levelplay’s Combat Fan is your best pick. On the other hand, if you’re looking for maximum peak performance, Arctic’s P12 Pro RGB is a beast in a league of its own that can spin at well above 3000 RPM.

The dBA figure doesn’t say everything

Just because a fan performs well on the charts doesn’t necessarily mean it may be pleasant to listen to. One example of this is the Combat Fan from Levelplay. It’s not a terrible performer, but at certain speeds, something starts humming at an annoying mid-frequency. It was one of those frequencies that echoes through the room, and if I weren’t testing it but had it in my PC, it would drive me mad, wondering what the source of the noise in the room is.

The Fractal Design Aspect 12 RGB also suffers from a painfully dirty noise profile that did show up on the charts, as it limited the fan’s ability to reach the speeds it otherwise would have had it not made these noises. It sounds a bit raspy, almost like there’s grit in the motor, and it had similar resonant noises as the Combat Fan.

The M25 G2 didn’t have weird noises – it was just inefficient in its noise-to-airflow ratio.

Judging the RGB, feature set and pricing

Fractal Design Aspect 12 RGB

Fractal Design’s Aspect 12 RGB fans have the worst RGB of the lot. The blades are almost opaque, which makes the RGB on anything but the hub rather dim compared to the competition. It also does not have a zero-RPM mode – when fed a 0% PWM duty, it will still spin, and with a minimum speed of about 500 RPM; I consider this a problem. Yes, it’s quiet at its minimum speed, so that’s not an issue, but high minimum speeds combined with no Zero-RPM implementation can lead to excessive dust buildup, as the constantly whirring blades accomplish nothing but to pull small particles towards your filter and / or fan.

This fan is available for $51.47 as a 3-pack, which brings the per-unit cost to $17.16.

Combat Fan 120 A-RGB

Levelplay’s Combat Fan 120 A-RGB comes with a ring around its blades, which makes for a cool look. Despite the RGB coming from the hub, it still lights up the ring moderately. It also responds correctly to a Zero-RPM signal.

Pricing for the Levelplay Combat fan sits at $12.23 per unit.

Be Quiet! Light Wings LX

Be Quiet’s Light Wings LX fans feature good RGB and a slick blade design, but no Zero-RPM feature. That being said, the minimum RPM is extremely low, tested at just 213 RPM, so I can forgive the lack of a zero-RPM mode.

Pricing sits at $47.90 for a 3-pack, bringing the per-unit price to $15.97.

Phanteks M25 G2 RGB

Phanteks M25 G2 RGB, although not being the quietest fan, offers a properly complete feature set that makes a compelling case for forgiving its performance shortcomings. The RGB is gorgeous and it comes with an infinity-mirror hub. The fans can also clip on to each other, daisy-chaining in a not-quite-wireless fashion but certainly better than the competition. The fan even comes with plastic covers for the screw holes for a tidy appearance. It also responds correctly to a 0% PWM duty signal.

Pricing sits at $36.99 for a 3-pack, which is a surprisingly good price if you consider the amount of effort that went into their design. It may not be the quietest fan, but it sure is the prettiest and comes with most bits and pieces to complete the set.

Arctic P12 Pro RGB

Arctic’s P12 Pro lights up bright and uniform, offering a fantastic visual spectacle. It also comes with a proper Zero-RPM implementation, but that’s where its feature set ends.

This fan costs just $28.49 in a 3-pack, which is a mighty good deal that’s hard to pass up at $9.50 per fan.

Picking a winner

It would come as no surprise if I said that Arctic’s P12 Pro was the winner of this test, but I’m not sure about that. The P12 Pro RGB is clearly the best performer, but it was a tad unbalanced and had some light high-pithed whining. It also clicked a few times upon startup, but most of the fans did that. Mechanical noises.

If you’re looking for the best value offering, the Arctic P12 Pro RGB is hard to pass up with the 3-pack costing just $9.50 per fan.

The Light Wings LX, although being the second-place fan in testing for noise levels, is my favorite of the bunch. Why? It’s clean! It makes a crisp, clean sound ---just a whoosh, with no extraneous noises on top. It’s a slightly louder whoosh, but a clean whoosh. Of course, that’s not to say it may be your favorite. Personally, I’m sensitive to these kinds of noises, and I’m willing to pay a little extra for a clean-sounding PC, but that little bit extra is quite a bit if you tally it up over multiple spinners.

Costing $15.97, this puts the be quiet! Light Wings LX right on the edge between budget and mid-range RGB fans.

If, on the other hand, you’re someone who doesn’t mind noise too much, and wants to build something that you’re truly proud to show off, Phanteks’ M25 G2 fans do away with the focus on silence, and prioritize looks with bright RGB, an infinity mirror, seamless daisy-chaining, and even a mechanism that clips the spinners into one unit and covers for the screw holes.

I’m someone that works many hours a day in silence, with my open air PC on my desk near me, so I’ll prioritize silence any day of the week. But if you’re a gamer, keep the PC on the ground, or wear a headset all the time anyway, the quality of the RGB may be far more important.

If picking a winner is so difficult, should we pick a loser?

If there’s one clear conclusion I can draw from this batch of testing, it’s that Fractal Design’s Aspect 12 RGB is on my do-not-buy list. It offers no real redeeming features to make up for its shortcomings – it produces a dirty, inconsistent noise, performs disappointingly compared to the competition, has no Zero-RPM mode, and even the RGB doesn’t look all that great. It doesn’t even come with vibration-damping rubber pieces on the corners.

I honestly don’t understand what it’s doing in Fractal Design’s product portfolio at all, other than making the company’s other fans look good. And the wildest thing is, it’s also the most expensive fan tested here, at $17.16 a piece.

In this respect, fans are much like tires for cars: they come in all shapes and sizes, each with different purposes, from different manufacturers, and they all seem to do the same thing. And much like tires, in the world of fans there are a few great ones, many good ones, and some to avoid entirely.

Lack of Linux support for internal PC build components, such as RGB lighting and internal LCD screens, is a big headache that Linux users normally have to get around by installing Windows just to install the control software for these devices to make them function. However, a Redditor has decided to fix this problem for his personal Thermalright LCD cooler and has built a full-fledged Linux port of the Thermalright Linux software all by himself. The Redditor's new Linux build of Thermalright's control center software can be found on GitHub.

The software is feature-complete and supports a wide variety of Thermalright coolers, including the Frozen Warframe/SE, Frozen Vision V2/Core Vision/Elite Vision, Frozen Horizon Pro/Magic Pro, LC1/LC2/LC3/LC5 AIO pump heads, AK120, AX120, PA120 Digital, and Wonder Vision CZTV.

This Linux version of the Thermalright app includes all the features necessary to fully utilize Thermalright's supported devices. It comes with a GUI copied from the Windows version "pixel-for-pixel", featuring local themes, and can download extra themes from the cloud. Video and GIF playback is also supported, with options for overlaying hardware information, such as CPU and GPU temperatures, on the screens of supported devices.

The Redditor who created the app has only tested his Linux version on Fedora so far, but states the app technically supports all Linux distros.

Linux's very low consumer population has made it practically invisible to most component manufacturers that build internal PC components that require dedicated software to customize or control. Most of these apps only support Windows and MacOS.

This problem has forced the Linux community to build its own third-party dedicated apps to rectify support issues on Linux. For instance, a well-known RGB application on Linux is OpenRGB, which can interface with lots of RGB devices, including motherboards, RAM, GPUs, fans, mice, and keyboards. With Linux support now present through a third party, Thermalright owners of the aforementioned supported coolers no longer need to have a secondary Windows installation on hand to control their coolers' screens. That said, this Linux version is not an official version supported by Thermalright, so there could be bugs.

It's safe enough to say that almost everyone in the PC building space is a fan of Noctua's wares. The Austrian company has distinguished itself from its peers by being very... well, Austrian, and obsessing about the quality of its coolers and fans — even if the price tags aren't the most inviting. Today, the firm is celebrating sending out its 500,000th CPU cooler mounting upgrade kit.

The story harkens back two decades ago, to the ancient times of 2006 and AMD's release of the AM2 socket, necessitating a mounting kit for existing coolers. Noctua opted to make the upgrade completely free since then (including shipping), by just sending out one to anyone who asked and had a valid receipt. A tradition it has kept up ever since.

Not only are the kits free, but they're always available at Noctua's website, whereas many other brands make them hard or impossible to obtain, and often at costly prices.

The result is that two decades later, Noctua is sending out upgrade kits for CPU mounting coolers that are going on 20 years old. The blog post even recounts a story about a Finnish customer asking for an AM5 kit for an NH-U12P cooler, setting the record of 17 years between purchase date and upgrade. Since buyers have reasonable assurance they'll be able to reuse their coolers, the high initial asking price can pay off for itself on every new build(s).

Noctua also points out that just creating an upgrade kit isn't just machining some new parts, as the cooler itself needs to be designed in a way that will easily accept new parts. Reviewers have consistently praised the coolers' mounting hardware, so it's fair to say the Austrians know what they're doing. Additionally, the company points out that its free upgrade program contributes to reducing e-waste.

I have personal experience with Noctua's wares and upgrade kits and can attest that it really was as simple as going to the website and requesting one; the exact parts arrived in the mail within two or three weeks. This was in sharp contrast to what happened with another brand's cooler, for which an upgrade kit technically existed but might as well be made of unobtainium.

You won't be asked for more than a purchase receipt, too. Even if you don't have one, Noctua will take invoices for CPUs and motherboards, or even a photo of your existing cooler with a piece of paper visible. If you prefer to have one shipped out faster, you can also find them at Amazon and other e-tailers for cheap.

Researchers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences have discovered that saturating water with ammonium thiocyanate salt and pressurizing it, and then suddenly releasing the pressure, would allow it to cool by 30 degrees C (54 degrees F) at room temperatures, even going as far as a 50-degree C (122 degrees F) drop in warmer environments. The research paper, published in Nature [PDF], presents this as a greener alternative to current refrigerants, with its theoretical efficiency hitting almost 80% — much higher than conventional refrigerants — making it a great solution for the thermal issues that data centers face.

The researchers compare the system to a wet sponge, with water acting as the sponge and salt acting as the absorbed fluid. When you apply pressure on the sponge (the water), the fluid (the ammonium thiocyanate salt) will be squeezed out and release heat. But when you reduce the pressure, it will quickly reabsorb the solution and reabsorb the heat from its environment, causing a quick temperature drop.

“Cooling systems currently account for nearly 40 percent of a data center’s total electricity consumption,” state media CCTV said. “This finding could provide a more efficient cooling solution for these high-energy-consumption facilities.” The development could reduce the power needed to cool AI chips, especially as we get chips that deliver more performance while requiring higher power. Aside from this, it can also be used in other applications, like HVAC systems.

Although ammonium thiocyanate is a salt, it’s not corrosive to many common metals, meaning you do not have to use special piping to use it for cooling. However, it still faces several challenges. For one, you still need electricity to compress the refrigerant. The salt can also cause burns and irritation, making it more difficult to handle than some compounds. Aside from that, it’s hygroscopic and absorbs moisture, potentially affecting the long-term stability of the solution.

Still, this has the potential to reduce data center electricity consumption — a big problem that many AI tech companies are grappling with right now. Even China, which has ample electricity supply for all the data centers it’s building, is considering this a breakthrough, allowing it to be more cost-efficient and competitive when in the AI race.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve dreamt of building my own PC case. Not to mass produce one and bring it to market, but to prove to myself that, as a former case reviewer, I also have what it takes to design and build a chassis myself. Except, the right opportunity never presented itself. So, when the opportunity arose to build a ‘Showstopper build’ for Tom’s Hardware Premium, I wanted to do something special.

Noctua recently also celebrated its 20th anniversary, so I thought it would be fitting to commemorate the occasion by hand-crafting a PC case made out of wood, kitted out with the best parts Noctua could offer. How hard could it be, right?

For this build, we feature an Asus Z890-Creator motherboard, Intel Core Ultra 285K processor, 96 GB of Team Group T-Create memory, and two 2 TB SSDs: one from Team Group and another from Kingston. Noctua also supplied an ample laundry list of fans and parts, including its mighty NH-D15 G2 cooler, a power supply, a handful of G2 spinners, and of course, the pièce de résistance: the Asus x Noctua GeForce RTX 5080.

Before we move forward, we've also produced a handy build video, which will cover many elements of this article, as a companion piece to the build. Follow us on our journey, including all of the trials and tribulations of undertaking such a task.

Why build a wooden PC?

Initially, I hadn’t planned on a wooden case for this build. In fact, I aimed to use all off-the-shelf parts, but I’ve been running into a bit of an issue in my quest for a case worthy of these components: It seems like the market for high-end, high-quality ATX cases has dried up a bit – everything has become thin sheet metal and oceans of glass.

Where’s the CNC’d and brushed aluminum? Where are the thought-out layers of acoustic treatment we used to find? Even the best PC cases have mostly become samey-looking boxes that end up looking a bit too anonymous. And while there are efforts to differentiate some in design, none of them spoke to me.

Now, I don’t have the resources at my disposal to build a CNC’d aluminum case (it would also be prohibitively expensive), but it just so happens that Noctua components pair up beautifully with wood, which is down to the iconic brown and beige branding. Now, I’ve been a hobby woodworker for a little while, so why not challenge myself by building a case entirely out of wood? What I found out, after months of hard work, was that it would become the ultimate test of my skills.

Designing the custom case

Over the last few years, I’ve been rocking an open-air, water-cooled PC – Blue Shift. In this time, I’ve learned that open-air PCs are nothing to be afraid of. It doesn’t seem to gather a ton of dust, it’s easy to clean, and my cats have zero interest in poking around the inside. This may be different for folks with children, but for me, an open-air case came with basically no downsides.

Most recently, I did a build in Phanteks’ Evolv X2, and it has some design elements I quite admired. Most notably, the motherboard tray is only as wide as it needs to be, and consequently, a large GPU stretches past the tray, giving it a floating appearance. The same goes for the top radiator mount of that case.

I sketched up a design, but throughout the build, many parts of it changed. For one, I found a much stronger piece of wood to use as the motherboard tray than I anticipated, so I decided to take the floating aspect a step further – notice how the support bracket on the left of the sketch is missing in the final piece?

From the start, I had a few goals in mind. It was going to follow a standard-ish ATX tower layout. It would be open-air, be 100% air-cooled, and no taller than it needs to be. Because the PSU chamber would be going around the spine holding the motherboard, it would also be somewhat wide. Quiet, short, well-set, and powerful: The Stout Owl.

Component selection

With the calm Noctua theme, I didn’t feel it was fitting to build a system aimed purely at gaming – it had to be quiet and efficient, more of a workstation. With that in mind, the basis for the system became the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K, as this CPU offers fantastic multithreaded performance and extremely low idle power consumption.

This chip was placed into the Asus Z890-Creator WiFi motherboard and paired with two 48 GB kits of Team Group T-Create 7200-MHz CUDIMM memory, for a total memory pool of 96 GB, across four modules. I am aware that for performance optimization, it’s better to stick to using only two DIMMs, but visually, this doesn’t work for me – and this is a build that’s all about the aesthetics.

Disclaimer: These memory kits were acquired before the DRAM crisis. In today’s market, I would not opt for this memory configuration due to the cost.

For storage, I picked a 2 TB Kingston Renegade G5 PCIe 5.0 SSD as the main system drive, with the Team Group T-Create C47 series Classic 2TB PCIe 4.0 drive for additional capacity.

Of course, from Noctua’s lineup, we picked the Asus x Noctua RTX 5080, the mighty NH-D15 G2 as the CPU cooler, the Seasonic x Noctua Prime 1600W Power Supply, and five NF-A12x25 G2 fans, two of which as part of a Sx2-PP set for speed offsets to avoid harmonics in the top panel.

For the USB ports, incorporated a Fractal Design 10 Gbps USB C Model D cable, along with a DeLock USB 3.0 Type-A internal cable to round things out.

Parts List

Materials Selection

For the case, I decided to work with European oak, because American oak has a totally different appearance. I also live in the Netherlands, so I could not get my hands on American Oak, even if I wanted to.

I purchased a pair of 18mm thick oak panels to build many of the case’s pieces with, along with a ‘wall shelf’ that has a tree trunk edge on one side. I loved the appearance of this “live edge,” as it’s often called, and the 40mm thickness. This would give me plenty of strength to function as the spine for the PC, even with cable management channels gutted out of it.

In addition to the oak pieces, I also grabbed a strip of meranti hardwood, which would function as the splines in the joints for added strength. I wanted to avoid materials like plywood and acrylic, as I find them too soft and fragile – they would experience much harder wear and tear over time.

The tools I have at my disposal

Having completed a full DIY home renovation, I have a fair number of tools at my disposal. These include basics such as a circular saw, a jigsaw, a handful of chisels, a drill, a cheap soldering iron, and a palm sander.

I also have a miter saw, as one of my past projects was a herringbone floor, where everything had to be cut at 45-degree angles. This proved to be one of the two most valuable tools in this project.

The other key tool for this project was the router. For this project, I purchased the Makita DRT50Z. I was already invested in the LXT battery ecosystem, and it is one of my best powertool purchases to date – this build would not have been the same without it, as it let me route the cable gutters and cavities at the back of the system, cut the holes for the USB ports, the grooves for the illumination, and trim all the edges to shape. In the end, I must have spent 50+ hours using the router, and although a CNC machine would have saved me a lot of time, it’s far beyond my budget and would take away from the handmade aesthetic.

I also used a basic collapsible workbench so that I could work outside, and decided to finally invest in an orbital sander, along with a heap of little accessories like drill bits, various router bits, sandpaper, extra clamps, tin, and so much more.

While not strictly necessary, my DA polisher also came in handy during the final finishing process.

For dust collection, I used a cheap Philips household vacuum with a custom (homemade) fine particle filter. As an apartment dweller, I do not have the space for a proper shop-vac, and despite the hell I’ve put this household vacuum through over the years, it’s still somehow functional. Masks and safety glasses were used as an extra safety measure, along with hearing protection.

Building the basic shape of the PC didn’t take long. I started by putting the system’s spine on feet, with the intention of carving legs out so that the PSU chamber would appear to float.

Using the circle saw and the miter saw, I then cut up the pieces to make the PSU chamber’s box. I would have preferred to do all with the miter saw for more exact 45-degree cuts, but my saw is too small for the longer cuts along the length of the pieces, so I had to rely on the circular saw, with a guide and a steady hand.

For consistent height between the three side pieces, I cut the entire length of the board in one go, since I was using the circular saw anyway, and then used the miter saw to chop out the left, front, and right sides. As a bonus to this method, the wood grain is one continuous piece along the outside of the PSU chamber, neatly transitioning from the side to the front piece.

Once this was done, I test-fit some of the components to get a feel for what it was going to ultimately look like. At this point, I decided I didn’t like the feet – by raising them, they made the PSU chamber look far too big and drew too much attention. I wanted a more calm, subtle appearance.

Splines galore

With the PSU chamber’s frame built, it was time to add splines to the joints. For strength, dovetails would have been ideal, but I prefer the appearance of straight lines. For this step, I built a jig from some scrap plywood that I could affix onto a corner, and run the router through at 45 degrees to create slits, which I strategically placed in spots where they would not just add the necessary strength, but also add to the overall visual appeal.

I then pushed the meranti pieces into the slots with glue to ensure full coverage inside. I then sawed off the bits of wood sticking out, chiseled off the excess glue, and sanded the remainder to a level finish.

Then, I used the planing tool to even out the bottom of the chassis to stop it from wobbling, and attached it to the spine with nuts and bolts. I didn't want to use screws to make up for weak wood joinery — any screws or bolts used should be removable for disassembly of the case, and thus, the wood joints needed splines to add the necessary strength.

Part of the design was to have these bolts out in plain sight, so I went out and found the prettiest bolts money could buy. They cost between €2.50 and €4.00 a piece, excluding the washers and nuts.

Part of why they cost so much is because they’re imperial sizing, which isn’t commonly available in the Netherlands, and no metric bolts came with as nice a finish. Look at the lines on the sides of the heads – and the sheer ratio of Allen key socket size to the circumference. Of course, in stainless steel. Robust, yet refined. Worthy of being installed in plain sight in a boutique system build.

The top panel

For the top panel, I decided that a better approach would be to cut the pieces and make all the cutouts beforehand, and only then glue them together and add the splines afterward.

This approach paid off. I had a few slipups with the router, as I forgot to fasten my guide, and by the time I had a front fascia that looked good, I realized that it wouldn’t work anyway: The power button I used would collide internally with the downward-facing LED strip that illuminates the system.

It was one or the other, and I was willing to sacrifice neither. Having run out of scraps, I went out and bought a new oak plank, and cut a new strip with the circular saw and started over. You live and learn.

The top panel consists of two parts: the top and sides as one, with the vent at the top, along with illumination and USB ports on the sides. The second part you’ll see later is a shroud that slots in from below, which holds the fans and covers up the gaps around them. As I put the system together, I realized I may be able to complete the build without an additional support pillar at all.

The Vents: A Sore Point of Frustration

In the design process, I had already decided that the PSU chamber was going to have a vent on top for keeping heat from accumulating, but having decided it was going to sit flush against the desk (instead of levitating with an open bottom), it also needed an intake vent. I didn’t want the intake vent on the user side, nor did I want it at the front, so I decided to make a hole on the right side, in the space of the PSU compartment that sticks out from the spine.

Using a jigsaw, I cut out a 120mm gap for the fan to sit in, and then used the router to cut holders for the fins. The result was… disappointing to say the least. I had done a test piece elsewhere and thought it would look okay, but the router left tons of ugly blowout artifacts.

Of course, I could tidy things up with a chisel and some sanding, so I made some fins by tilting the miter saw 45° to see what it would look like – but even with the fins in place, I was displeased – the fins sticking out looked far more aggressive than the vibe I was going for.

So, once again, I grabbed the router, cleared the angled cuts into a tidy straight line, and left a small lip for the fin holders to glue up against.

To make the fin holders, I first used the router with the plunge base to flatten a chunk of an oak plank. Then, I used the router again with an angled base to cut 45-degree slits, after which I used the miter saw to cut the slab into strips.

I had decided to make an abundance of holders, as some would get lost to the miter saw inevitably chewing pieces up. And being rather thin, I figured some would break along the way.

I was very happy with these holders as an outcome, and later, when making the fins, it all came together to produce a beautiful end result. I glued the strips in and used the router with a flush trim bit to remove any excess lip I had left earlier.

Routing the cable channels

For cable management, I wanted to cut out grooves in the back of the spine of the PC, where I would use cable combs to create some stunning cable management. For the CPU’s two 8-pin EPS cables, it was a matter of cutting a straight line up and placing a hole to get to things to the motherboard on the other side.

But for the 24-pin motherboard cable, I had to make a wide turn, so I built a jig that allowed me to rotate the router along a center point, like a compass. A template would have worked too, except that I had no means of making a template to the correct circumference, and I didn’t have any shallow enough template bits with a bearing at the nearside of the router – the bits I did have would cut deeper than I wanted the groove to be.

In addition to the 24-pin motherboard cable and two 8-pin cables for the CPU, I also cut out two grooves for the cables going from the PSU compartment to the top panel, a small groove for the front I/O cables, a large cavity near the PSU area, and a small cavity at the top where the RGB controller would sit, as there was no space left in the top panel.

I hadn’t yet cut out the holes for the GPU brackets to attach, nor had I added the threaded inserts for the motherboard. I did not want to sand the gold finish off the threaded inserts during a later stage, so I only inserted these after applying the final finish. Once the motherboard was installed, I could determine the exact position of the GPU brackets.

Beveling all the edges

Throughout the process of building all the pieces, I frequently switched the router to a 45° chamfered bit to trim all the edges of the workpiece, with larger cuts on the boxy bits, and smaller cuts on the spine, along all grooves and cutouts, for a smooth and soft-looking finish.

The Fins

The fin holders I had created earlier looked tidy, but weren’t very consistent with their thickness – without storage space for a proper flattening jig, my hand-guided results were a fraction of a milimeter off across the plane, and therefore, some of the fins sat higher up than others.

Their spacing was good however, so I made new fins and simply sanded down the bits that stuck out from the top of the panel, leading to a smooth, flush finish with the top of the vents. Once sanded down, you couldn’t tell that they all have ever-so-slightly different sizes.

Finishing Touches

Finally, it was time for some finishing touches before finishing each wooden piece itself.

Initially, I hadn’t planned on doing much about the back of the PC, as well, it’s the back. Who cares? But after having sunk this much time into it, it felt a shame to leave it like this. I already trimmed things up with the miter saw to make it all flush, but decided it needed a “veneer” to cover things up.

I also removed the large bolts holding the fan shroud entirely, as I didn’t like them in this part of the PC. Instead, I used a cleat method, and countersunk the bolts at the front to sit flush, as to not distract from the components that were to be installed in the system.

Yuck. The rear of the PSU compartment also needed a veneer.

The picture above well describes the final stages of what the woodworking process felt like. I had bumped a splinter off the back of the PSU compartment while I sawed some off for the veneer, so I glued it back on. Also, one of the splines hadn’t pushed in far enough during gluing, so I cut a tiny piece off of some scrap meranti and glued that in, then sanded it flush.

On the top panel, these two splines also had burrs that broke off during sawoff. If you look carefully, you can see the difference in grain pattern on the right one, which had been fixed earlier.

Sanding and Finishing

I’ll skip the part where I talk about the sanding because… it’s boring, takes a long time, and I could write a book about all the steps I took to find the right method. Instead, I’ll let the picture below do the talking. It had reached freezing temperatures outside, so I freed up this room in my house, moved almost all the furniture to the living room, and spent three days sanding the project. Bless my neighbors.

For the final finish, I opted to use Rubio Monocoat. It’s a pricier finish, but it’s a linseed-based hardwax that bonds with the wood grain at a molecular level. This means that you cannot create overlapping lines the way a film finish would, and with all the nooks and crannies this build has, a film finish was going to be very difficult to apply properly – I really did not want to end up with a droopy mess.

Rubio, on the other hand, is fairly simple to apply. Just wipe it on, wait 5 minutes, wipe things off, and buff. Better yet, Rubio performs best when the workpiece is sanded only up to 120 grit, as higher grits close off the wood pores and stop it from taking in the pigment. This saved me a lot of time sanding, as if three days of straight sanding weren’t enough.

For good measure, I went over the pieces with my DA polisher as a final step, which led to a beautiful and even finish.

The body pieces I finished with the color “Arabica,” a rich brown with a warm reddish tint, somewhat matching Noctua’s own colorway. For the spine and fins, I opted to use Mist 5% (pictured on the left of the three samples), as this is a color that has a bit of cream white pigment in it to counter the natural darkening that an unpigmented oil (middle) would cause, keeping the spine and fin pieces almost entirely true to their original colors. Moreover, both colors fit the Noctua-themed build almost perfectly.

Bits and Pieces

With the finish applied to almost all pieces, I could install the threaded inserts, the brass standoffs, and test-fit the motherboard. With the Asus Z890-Creator in place, I determined how I was going to support the GPU and built the GPU holders.

The Asus x Noctua RTX 5080 is a thing of beauty – it’s one of the biggest graphics cards money can buy, weighing in at almost 6 pounds. But with its classy colors, I didn’t want to do it a disservice with a trashy vertical mount. Instead, I opted to build a hidden-in-plain-sight mount for the graphics card that would make it appear unsupported from the side and front profile, for a subtle, creative touch.

This GPU occupies four slots, so I could easily “hide” the L-shaped support behind the GPU without any protrusion. Because it also has to carry a decent amount of weight, I used the grain pattern in two different directions by applying a veneer to the outside of the bracket for added strength, and a tidier visual finish.

While making the GPU support bracket at the rear and the anti-sag nub, I also routed out two oval-shaped holes in the motherboard tray for their bolts to fit through, being oval by just a few millimeters, so I could adjust them up/down to get the GPU perfectly level during final installation. The extra pieces were then finished in Arabica, and the fresh cuts in the motherboard tray were tidied up.

For the motherboard, I found galvanized threaded inserts to match the gold accent color of the motherboard and RAM, with an M4 inner thread, 10mm brass standoffs with M4 outer and M4 inner thread, and brass thumbscrews with – you guessed it – M4 outer threading.

A support bracket for the power supply was also built so that no screws would be visible from the rear of the build.

And a support structure was made for the lower compartment fan to adapt it to the larger vent. Of course, I could have just grabbed a 140mm fan, but where would the fun be in that?

I also stamped each of the fins with a letter and number during sanding so that I would know which fin belonged in which position in the case – the six side fins for the intake wouldn’t be too difficult to figure out, as they’re much smaller than the rest, but the remaining 29 fins would be a nightmare to pick out without some sort of guide.

Yes – I know stamping each of the 35 fins with their intended position seems like an insane level of detail, but I’m telling you: The 15 minutes it took to do this is the kind of foresight I wish I had earlier on in the build process.

At Last, The Case is Finished!

Next, let’s install a PC into this owlet.

Illumination, and The Case of the 12V Power Button

For the illumination (I refuse to call it RGB, as you may have noticed) I used Phanteks’ Neon M1 and M5 strips, as I liked their diffuser, along with a Phanteks NexLinq V2 hub. This hub would display the correct color from the moment it receives power, which is of the utmost importance, because for some reason, even in 2025, Asus still thinks we all want to see unicorn vomit in the time between pressing the power button and typing in our password.

The only acceptable illumination colors in this build are anything between white, warm white, and amber. Anything else may as well be criminal, and I can’t be seen displaying the default strafing rainbow next to Noctua’s classy colors, even for a few seconds.

Sadly, the NexLinq hub doesn’t allow custom color nor brightness control yet, so I’m relying on Windows Dynamic Lighting to get the exact shade and brightness I’m looking for. Thankfully, the hub does default to ‘Off’ during bootup, or whatever it last remembered, depending on the mood it’s in, which is acceptable.

During installation, however, I found that one of the LED strips was broken. I tried soldering it, but ran out of tin. It was still early in the evening, but it was a Sunday, so the shops were closed, and I couldn’t obtain more. Moreover, this strip had to go in before I could move on with any other part of the build. I had hit a roadblock until dawn.

“A tragic development. How could this possibly have happened?! Everything in this project has been going entirely according to plan!” I sarcastically chanted to myself all night.

The final configuration is for the hub to drive the downward facing LED strip at full brightness in a rich amber color, which is only really visible at night – hence what’s essentially really warm white, and Windows Dynamic Lighting takes over the forward and sideways facing strips at 10% brightness for a subtle lighting accent to complement the power button, but doesn’t distract from the rest of the system or blind the user.

Speaking of the power button – this is the coolest button $6 has ever bought me. It has a clicking quality that even the best mechanical switches cannot think to compete with (you’ll have to watch the video for a demonstration). Obviously, it has an amber LED ring around it, a stainless-steel body, and it’s a 12V button.

Buying the 12V version was intentional. I could have purchased a 5V variant that I could power by the power button headers on the motherboard; however, I also bought a 12V Bosch 5-pin relay along with the button. Why? So that when the system is powered, the power LED receives 12V for full brightness, and when in sleep mode, the relay switches to the 5V power button LED output from the motherboard, so that it blinks at a lower brightness.

ATX power supplies have a common ground, so this works without a problem – I’ve done this in the past and double-checked with a multi-meter. Except, there was a problem: It turns out that this specific motherboard does not make the power button blink in sleep mode. Therefore, the entire relay circuit was redundant. So, I just connected the button up to 12V power from the PSU instead and called it a day.

What I did not see coming, though, is that the 12V rail doesn’t instantly lose power the moment the system enters sleep mode or is shut down. Instead, the power button now gradually dims over the course of a few seconds, while the fans also lose their momentum. While it was entirely unintentional, it’s also very cool.

The power button has become, in effect, a representation of the (residual) voltage on the 12V rail of the PSU. Now that’s what a power LED is supposed to act like, if you ask me. This must be one of those ‘happy accidents’ Bob Ross told us about. After the LED strip catastrophe, and what will go down in history as The Great Sunday Evening Tin Shortage, seeing the power button’s LED behave this way gave me motivation to see this build through to the end.

After many iterations and attempts to get everything working, I installed the fans in the top panel. With Noctua’s own components complementing the case I had so meticulously built, and everything working well, I knew that I was onto a pretty special-looking build.

Motherboard installation

With the top panel finally sorted, I moved on to the motherboard installation. For this, I chucked the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K into the Asus Z890-Creator, and clicked the four 24 GB DDR5-7200 modules from Team-Group into place. I also installed the two SSDs: a 2 TB Kingston Renegade G5 into the primary PCIe 5.0 capable M.2 slot as the main system drive, and a 2 TB Team-Group Classic C47 SSD into a PCIe 4.0 slot.

I also pre-installed the bracket for the Noctua NH-D15 G2 CPU cooler. The beast wouldn’t be getting installed until way later, when all the cable management was done, but as the case’s spine doesn’t have a cutout to access the back of the motherboard, I made sure the bracket was already in place for later.

Then, I installed the motherboard, and boy was I glad that I pre-installed the cooler’s bracket – getting the thumbscrews turned in, as pretty as they are, was a very difficult task. The spots I drilled out for the threaded inserts were quite accurate, but the M4 thumbscrews only just fit through the motherboard’s nine holes. Consequently, being off by only half a millimeter meant a lot of extra turning resistance – resistance I had to overcome without the aid of a screwdriver. My fingers hurt after this. I prayed to not have to remove the motherboard later.

Power Supply installation

Moving on, it was time to tackle the PSU chamber. I had already installed all the power cables, along with the custom extensions I had made into the system’s spine, albeit not in any tidy manner. I tucked the cables through the cutout in the PSU chamber, and then bolted the chamber into place.

For the power supply, because the entire system up until this point used 100% G2 fans, I decided that the G1 fan installed in the Seasonic x Noctua 1600W Prime PSU was not good enough. So, I tore it open and swapped it out for an NF-A12x25 G2 spinner. To accomplish this, I had to swap the connector on the fan.

However, what happened next was crushing. I had done the math on the cable lengths prior to cutting out the grooves, but in doing so, forgotten to account for the fact that the 24-pin cable powering the motherboard would go through two 90-degree bends in the same direction, leaving me with a cable that ended up being too short.

This was a problem. There was no way I was going to extend 27 sleeved cables (the power supply uses doubles on some pins), and I certainly didn’t have time to wait for an order of custom cables to arrive.

In fact, I was so desperate to crack on with the build, I didn’t even want to remove the motherboard, because of those pesky but pretty thumbscrews – my fingers already hurt from installing them, and removing and re-installing them would probably add another hour to the process.

So, I did the only thing one could logically do in this scenario: surgery. I covered up my patient, marked out where I had to make the incisions, clamped it down, and went for it. I’ll let the picture speak for itself. At this stage in the build, it was terrifying to bust out the tools again. With the extra gap cut out from the spine to accommodate the cable that was too short, I popped the base of the case back on and reinstalled the power supply. Order was restored, for now.

GPU Install

Installing the GPU went smoothly and easily. I used a threaded insert and one of the leftover thumbscrews to fasten the GPU to the bracket, and then installed the GPU, with the bracket attached, into the PCIe slot. While still supporting the GPU by hand, the bracket was fastened into place at the correct height.

After this, the anti-sag nub was installed at the front of the system, between the spine and the graphics card. It was also adjusted to the correct height for a perfectly level GPU.

Cable management

Because the cable management at the back of the spine is fully open and exposed, I needed to make some custom cables for powering all the devices.

The first of these is a 4-pin fan extension cable, so that the three fans at the top could be controlled by a fan header at the bottom of the motherboard. For this, I sacrificed one of the 8-pin PCIe cables from the power supply.

From that same sacrificial cable, I also used two extra wires and sleeving to make an extension for the power button. I used the brown sleeving for this one, merging the two wires into one cable at the solder point, and pulled some extra scrap sleeving over the short bit of the power cable I had pulled from the other case. The power button header sits at the very front of the motherboard, so I wanted this to be covered in sleeving, with a bit of shrink-wrap to remove any fraying.

The two wires remaining on the 8-pin PCIe cable were soldered to the power button’s LED to feed it 12 V power.

I then sacrificed another 8-pin PCIe power cable from the power supply, and used half of it to make an internal USB 2.0 cable so that the RGB controller could be plugged in and controlled. Two SATA power cables were combined into one longer cable to power the RGB controller.

Finally, all the cables were tidied up with combs, and were glued in place using 3M 468MP double-sided tape.

The PSU compartment easily went on to become the tidiest chamber I’ve ever built in, thanks to the secret cavity at the bottom of the motherboard tray, where I could easily tuck what little cable excess I had. Because of this hidden cavity, this is also the first PC I’ve ever built in where not a single ziptie was needed or used.

System complete: Behold the Stout Owl

This build measures 23.8 cm wide, stands at 51.5 cm tall, and is 46.0 cm deep. It weighs in at a staggering 20.8 kg.

I drove over 842 km, over the course of 19 trips to various stores for supplies. Five splinters were removed from my hands and, at peak, I had 14 cuts on my hands at one given moment. 17 different finishes were tested. About a dozen items have been returned. One Makita 3AH 18V LXT battery died. One wood bit, two router bits, one jigsaw blade, and both blades for the circle and miter saw were worn out. An estimated 30 pieces of sandpaper were used up. Lastly, six different neighbors came over, curiously asking what I was working on.

And on at least 18 different days, the words “I will be done tonight” were spoken, 17 of which in vain.

To test the performance of this PC, I started by changing a few system parameters. For Showstopper builds like this one, the aim is maximum performance within thermal or power limits, whichever comes first.

For starters, the memory was set to the XMP-II profile, where it takes on the voltage, frequency, and timings Team Group intends the kits to run at. It’s worth noting that despite using four modules from two identical kits, I had no problem running the XMP-II profile at 7200 MHz with CL36 timings.

This is a testament to both CUDIMM technology and Team Group’s binning for these modules. However, I must note that there was a luck factor: Running four modules at their intended frequency and timings, especially if they only come in a kit of two, even with CUDIMMs is not a guarantee, and depending on your CPUs IMC, you may not get such luck. Obtaining the memory with the intention to run it this way was a gamble, but it paid off handsomely.

From there, I set up a fan curve that suits the system. Personally, I find idle temperatures for both the GPU and CPU under 50 degrees C acceptable. Under load, I’m willing to let a CPU cook up to 5 degrees C below its thermal limit during an extended Prime95 run – real life scenarios never offer such loads anyway, but 5 degrees under the thermal cutoff under synthetic stress is a good figure to strive for given that in practice, it would never come close to that anyway.

As such, for this build specifically, I set the CPU fan up to run at 10% duty up to 50 degrees C, ramp up to 60% approaching 70 degrees, then stay at 60% until 90 degrees C is reached. From 90 to 100 degrees C, the curve ramps up to 100%. The reason for this plateau at 60% is to avoid unstable fanspeeds during extended real-world loads. And unless you’re running a synthetic test, the CPU fan should practically never exceed 60% duty.

I allowed 10-15 minutes for things to saturate, and then measured temperatures over the course of one minute. It ended up at 98 degrees C with this fan curve, hitting that sweet spot, and I did not need to lower the power limit, nor did I have to undervolt the 285K. I could have, but was happy with the result, given that real-life workloads only lead to temperatures around the mid-70s.

For the GPU, temperatures are generally much lower, as there is no integrated heatspreader at play – the cooler makes direct contact with the GPU die. The Asus x Noctua RTX 5080 has a standard power limit at 360 W, but I was able to max out the power limit to 450 W and raise the GPU clocks to a zippy 3,172 MHz under boost. Despite leaving the graphics card’s BIOS switch in quiet mode, it still kept the GPU at no more than 63 degrees C, and everything was running perfectly stable, so I was happy and left it at that.

The PSU was not run in passive mode, as the fan opening is facing downwards, which limits convection, making passive mode less than ideal.

So, why the case fans?

So, the case fans. I’ve asked myself the question why I’m using them at all numerous times. I chose not to run them passively, as I don’t want any heat accumulating in any of the cavities of the wooden chassis. The case fans were, however, all limited to a maximum 50% duty because let’s be real: It’s an open-air PC – it could probably do without the case fans altogether and just let convection handle the rest, but the aesthetics of a Noctua build would never be complete without the iconic fans.

Luckily, the fans are nearly inaudible while the system is powered on, even at 50% duty, and let’s face it: We’re pushing 800 watts through this system, and the case is made from the same stuff we throw in our fireplaces.

Besides, without the fans, I wouldn’t have had an excuse to make the gorgeous vents throughout the case. By that logic, I could also have done without the top panel altogether. And the PSU chamber too – just strap everything to a single panel with some feet to hold it upright. Right?

That would be no fun! We get case fans in an open-air case. Deal with it.

Performance testing

The tests below are run until thermals stabilize, the temperatures and power levels are recorded for 1 minute, from which their average is calculated.

In due time, as I collect data on more builds, I will make charts to compare systems to one another. But for now, we can draw some clear conclusions from the data we have about this build specifically.

It uses just 4 W in sleep mode. When browsing with a few programs, MS Word, and a few tabs open, system power hovers around 100 W, and noise levels are indistinguishable from the ambient levels in the room. Truly, the fans may look like they’re spinning, and sticking your finger in would confirm that, but your ears wouldn’t pick up a thing – or at least mine don’t.

During a 1000-shot DXO PhotoLab export, where each image has a handful of effects applied, including DeepPrime 3 AI Denoising, the system consumed an average 313 watts, and barely broke the ambient noise floor by just 0.5 dBA. DXO Photolab loads up the 285K nicely and also uses the RTX 5080. In fact, as each shot passes through the export, you can hear when it gets handed over to the GPU for the final DeepPrime3 denoising step, because of the very brief light coil whine.

3DMark Speedway put down a tidy score, and so did Cyberpunk 2077. In fact, gaming, despite drawing near 500 watts, at most raises the noise level by 1.0 dBA above the ambient noise floor – a truly astonishing feat, and without a doubt, it’s quieter than custom water cooling. The only perceivable sound is a tiny bit of wind noise and coil whine, the latter of which you can only hear because well… it’s an open-air PC.

Of course, if you load the system up with Prime95 and Furmark at the same time, things get hot, hungry, and noisy. In fact, despite all G2 fans from Noctua, this PC can make quite a ruckus – but it’s totally unnecessary, and I honestly don’t know why anyone would choose to do this other than for kicks.

This took a very, very long time

Getting the basic shape of the case built was a breeze. However, after building the PSU chamber and bolting the spine to it, I needed the motherboard on hand to route out the cable management on the back of the case’s spine. Then, the motherboard got stuck in customs, and there wasn’t much I could do in the meantime.

However, it turns out, once I got the motherboard, the adventure had only just started. Building the basic frame of the case only took about a week – half the time I had allotted to building the entire case.

It’s the details that got me. The vents took me about a week and a half, spread out across the project. The spine probably took just as long. The top panel, though not very big, contains three LED strips, a power button that’s internally very challenging to find the space for, three USB ports, an RGB controller, 21 flaps for the vents and three 120mm fans. That top panel took the better part of two weeks to figure out.

I’ve told the story in this article in a somewhat orderly fashion, but the reality is that all these pieces are interconnected somehow, and there was a ton of back-and-forth to get everything to fit together.

Even building the two GPU support brackets, though they may look like a simple L and a nub, took 10 hours to build, because I also needed to figure out how to attach them to the spine, route those holes out, bevel them, water-pop and sand them, and apply the finish to not only the two support brackets, but also the adjustments on the spine where I had cut through the finish applied earlier.

When all was said and done, I spent about a week sanding and finishing the entire project, and only then could I install the system into it.

Thankfully, the system is air-cooled, so the installation was a breeze in comparison to the rest of the project.

Reflecting on the saga

Building The Stout Owl has been an adventure. It was easy imagining how I’d build a wooden case in a week, maybe two, but in practice, this is a project that by the time I finished, I had poured somewhere between 5 and 600 hours into if you include all the planning that came in the months before the case building even started.

Of course, I could have saved myself a lot of headache by fully designing the system beforehand and handing the CAD drawings over to a company to CNC the pieces for me. It may even have been cheaper despite outsourcing, but I don’t regret not doing so. The Stout Owl is entirely handmade with nothing but a few powertools, not a single one of which cost more than $250 – this is something achievable in a small apartment, and it doesn’t require multiple-thousands of dollars worth of equipment, provided you have the time and patience.

Moreover, because I started out with only a simple sketch, the final design is something that evolved throughout the build process. Initially, I hadn’t planned on many of the complexities the final piece has – but the more time I sank into it, the more determined I became to perfect every last piece. For every skill I learned along the way, I went back to earlier parts of the project to improve on them.

Examples of these kinds of evolution are the vents, which despite their rough start turned out far more beautiful than I could have imagined – and even though almost nobody will ever see it, I love the unique touch of the letters and numbers being stamped into them to accommodate for the fact that I did an imperfect job flattening the slab I made their holders from.

In that same line of thought, the levitating GPU mount is something I would never have come up with had I not spent as much time with my hands on the workpiece and evolving the design as I went about building The Stout Owl.

Now that it’s over, I’m going to be taking a long weekend, and then I’ll get back to the “regular” builds for the inspiring creativity series.

Special Thanks

This build was made possible thanks to Noctua, Team Group, Kingston, Phanteks, Asus, and Intel, Tom’s Hardware Premium subscribers, and my partner.

Others, whose names I don’t know, also played key roles – folks I met at the hardware store, a parquet shop for the finish – people who helped me with advice along the way.

Parts List

Cooler Master, known for producing some of the best CPU coolers on the market, has shared details of its upcoming 360² (360x360mm) AIO liquid cooler at a product launch event in China. According to ITHome, the unnamed cooler has a cooling capacity exceeding 2,000W, which is overkill even for some of the most core-heavy processors on the planet, such as the Intel Xeon, AMD Threadripper, and EPYC series.

The 360² AIO liquid cooler will look familiar to those who attended CES 2026 or saw our coverage of the event. Cooler Master discreetly installed the massive cooler inside the company’s premium Cosmos case. The decision to keep this impressive cooler hidden within the case, rather than featuring it among the company’s main product stack, is puzzling. Regardless of the reason, Cooler Master China has shared details about the extreme cooling solution for high-end workstation and server processors.

The description alone is enough to make you gasp at the cooler’s ambitious design. The concept is straightforward: stack two 360mm radiators to create a massive 360 x 360mm cooling surface with a grid design. It is the largest radiator ever integrated into an AIO liquid cooler, surpassing even today’s 420mm offerings such as the Alphacool Eisbaer Pro Aurora 420 and Corsair iCUE Link Titan 420 RX RGB. If you're a liquid-cooling enthusiast, Cooler Master's radiators will remind you of the German manufacturer Watercool's MO-RA IV series. The difference is that the former comes in an AIO package, whereas the latter is only the radiator and requires a custom loop.

Cooler Master 360² (360 x 360mm) AIO Liquid Cooler Specifications

The large surface area of the Cooler Master 360² cooler should provide exceptional heat dissipation. According to Cooler Master's marketing slide, the entire cooling system flaunts a cooling capacity of over 2,000W. The manufacturer's claim is credible, as larger surface areas improve heat transfer. The 360² radiator has an area of 129,600 mm², which is 43% less than the MO-RA IV. However, it's up to 103% larger than the mainstream 420mm AIO liquid coolers.

Radiator size is only one piece of the cooling performance puzzle. The pump plays an equally critical role. Cooler Master has confirmed that its forthcoming cooler will feature a dual-rotor pump design. Dual-rotor pump configurations have proliferated in modern AIO liquid coolers. They deliver higher flow rates, resulting in superior cooling performance and quieter operation. The trade-off, however, is higher costs, as manufacturers must use two pumps instead of one. The approach still has the primary pump housed within the processor block, while the secondary pump can be mounted along the tubing or integrated into the radiator.

The liquid cooler will utilize four 180mm cooling fans that appear to conform to the 18030 specification. It suggests Cooler Master may be incorporating industrial-grade fans similar to those found in RV furnaces or automotive cooling systems. The company claims these fans deliver up to 600 CFM of airflow, though static pressure is the more important metric for radiator cooling. Cooler Master reports that these fans achieve up to 20% reduction in high-frequency noise compared to conventional designs. Four fans are the standard configuration, but you can add four more for a push-pull setup, for a total of eight, to improve performance; however, it doesn't always deliver significant benefits.

Cooler Master demonstrated the 360² AIO liquid cooler with a 96-core AMD Ryzen Threadripper Pro 7995WX processor. It's unclear whether the company will support Intel Xeon platforms. Given the cooler's unique radiator design, you'll need a large case with ample space to accommodate it. For now, the Cosmos 700 series, such as the C700P or C700M, has shown to support the cooler.

We've reached out to Cooler Master to inquire about the price of the 360² AIO liquid cooler and when it'll hit the retail market. We'll update the story once the manufacturer responds.

Sama has made a splash this past year, rolling out a number of cooling-related products the company announced at Computex in mid-2025. We covered the A60E air cooler back in August; today’s review will cover Sama’s latest AIO, the L70 AIO.

At first glance, this cooler might not seem different from alternatives on the market, with its standard infinity mirror CPU block and RGB fans like many others have released, but it also sports a rock-bottom price of only $70 USD. And just wait until you see the thermal performance of this newly released AIO; it delivers performance that’s ver competitive with much pricier coolers.

Will this new cooler make our list of the best CPU coolers on the market? Let’s first take a look at its specs, along with what comes in the box. Then you can decide for yourself if it’s worth putting in your next build.

Cooler specifications

Packing and included contents

Sama’s AIO is protected with molded cardboard, soft coverings, and a foam top to keep the cooler protected during shipment.

Included with the product are the following:

• 360mm AIO with pre-installed fans
• Freezee thermal paste
• Mounting for AMD and Intel platforms
• Installation manual
• Pre-installed tube clips

Features of SAMA’s L70 AIO

▶️ Low MSRP of only $69.99

It’s not just the thermal performance of this cooler that’s good – the price is extremely enticing at only $69.99. This is very competitive with the cheapest offerings from ID-Cooling, Thermalright, and other manufacturers.

▶️ Top performing Freezee thermal paste

Sama includes its high-performance Freezee thermal paste with the L70 AIO, and this among the best thermal paste on the market – outperforming competitors like DeepCool’s DM9 and ID-Cooling’s Frost X45 in our testing. Taking our third-place position for traditional pastes, it was only beaten by Arctic’s MX-6 and Thermal Grizzly’s Duronaut!

▶️ Full RAM compatibility, Infinity mirror CPU block

As with most liquid coolers, SAMA’s L70 360mm AIO does not interfere with or overhang DIMM slots. All sizes of RAM, no matter how tall, are compatible.

The bottom of the CPU block features a full-size copper coldplate to move heat away from the CPU.

▶️ Pre-installed 28mm fans with quick-connect system

The fans of this liquid cooler come pre-installed, saving users a few minutes of time during the installation process.

A quick-connect system for the PWM and ARGB connections is also used to minimize cable clutter.

AM5 installation

Prior to following the steps below, you’ll want to secure the radiator to your PC’s case.

1. AMD users will remove the default mounting mechanism, then place the included black metal standoffs around the CPU.

2. Take the mounting brackets and place them on top of the standoffs, using the included screws to secure the brackets. The mounting bars include convenient arrows that should point to the CPU, which makes installation a little simpler.

3. Apply the included Freezee thermal paste to your CPU. If you aren’t sure how to do this properly, please refer to our handy guide on how to apply thermal paste.

4. Press the pump block on top of the CPU, and secure the built-in screws using a screwdriver.

5. Connect the cables – there’s a PWM header for the pump and the AIO’s fans, and ARGB connections for the fans and the infinity mirror on the CPU block.

6. Power on your computer, and you’re good to go.

Real world testing configuration –AMD AM5 platform

My results may differ from others, because I emphasize results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods. Many will test CPU coolers outside of a case, on an open test bench. But open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some publications have used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world conditions in which a CPU cooler is typically used.

The 9950X3D setup that we started testing coolers with last year has suffered an unfortunate death – as such, we’ve begun to test coolers on a system with AMD’s 9950X.

There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events. While the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X we’re using has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees Celsius in some scenarios, shown below.

Noise levels

We’ve measured noise levels at two settings to give you an idea of how the cooler operates when tied to a motherboard’s default fan curve. Our first measurement is when the fans are allowed to run at full speed, their loudest noise levels possible.

In terms of maximum volume, SAMA’s L70 is one of the louder units on the market, reaching 47.2 dBA. This comparison chart is larger than others you’ll see in this review because we’re using data collected from previous systems here.

Our next acoustic measurement is the cooler’s volume when the CPU consumes 150W. This is more similar to “worst case” gaming scenarios, especially if PBO is enabled.

SAMA’s L70 reaches 40.3 dBA in this scenario. I think most users will find this level of noise acceptable, but those who prefer the quietest systems may want to manually lower the fan speeds.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of our MSI X870E Carbon motherboard, but some of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

We’ll start with the “easiest” of these tests, which runs Cinebench R23 with a “stock” power limit. With our motherboard, this means the CPU will consume roughly 200W. SAMA’s L70 kept the CPU at an average of 78.7 degrees C, placing it between ID-Cooling’s FX360 and Thermalright’s Wonder Vision 360.

The next test is a bit harder, with PBO enabled to allow the CPU to use as much power as it wants – that was 242.7W over the course of testing. This is in line with the previous results, placing it again between competitors from ID-Cooling and Thermalright.

For our last test, we’ve added the heat of a GPU to the mix, which contributes 295W of thermals into the PC case. Sama’s cooler handles this test better than the previous two, and doesn’t lose as much thermal capacity with the added GPU heat. As a result, it secures the second-best position of the 360mm AIO coolers we’ve tested in this setup.

PBO Performance – full fan speeds

While some builders prefer to run coolers at low noise levels, I know a lot of you just want maximum performance. This test lets the fans run at their full speeds, to test the maximum potential of the AIO’s cooling abilities. Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X to stretch its legs and guzzle power, pushing the limits of any closed-loop CPU cooler on the market.

SAMA’s L70 does remarkably well for a budget $70 AIO, cooling 258.2W from the CPU, on par (within margin of error) with the best results we’ve seen from pricier 360mm liquid coolers.

200W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I leave motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23. SAMA’s L70 continues to punch above its weight here, trailing our best result from a 360mm AIO by only 0.1 degrees C, and at a fraction of its competitors’ prices!

150W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I’ve set the power limit to 150W.

SAMA’s position in this test drops a little bit, but it still performs exceptionally well at 60.6 degrees C, only 2.4 degrees behind Arctic’s larger, more powerful Liquid Freezer III Pro 420mm.

100W thermal results

Our next test is the least difficult benchmark featured in this review, with a workload consuming only 100W. This is a simple test, one that even most SFF coolers should have no issue handling. Results, as expected, are excellent – the average temperature of the CPU measured 47.7C using Sama’s AIO.

Conclusion

Sama’s L70 challenges one of the longest-standing assumptions in the AIO market: that strong 360mm liquid coolers must come with a premium price tag. In terms of raw cooling potential, the L70 stands among the strongest offerings currently available on the market, while carrying a price tag of only $70. It’s not the quietest cooler you can buy, but if you don’t like its noise level, you can dial down the fan speeds somewhat and still get the level of cooling that most users need.

It may be a grim time for building a new PC due to the ever-growing expense of RAM kits, SSDs, and graphics cards, but that makes it super important to look after what you've already got and keep your PC maintained and in tip-top condition. Apart from the normal tasks of cleaning out your case's dust filters, don't forget to replace the aging thermal paste on your CPU or GPU if everything starts to run a little hotter. Dropping to its lowest-ever price on Amazon, Arctic's MX-6 thermal paste (4g) is now only $5.99, down $6 from its previous $11.99 price tag. Checking the Amazon price checker CamelCamelCamel, we can see that this new $5.99 price point is an all-time low for this product.

• Grab this deal at Amazon

Arctic's MX-6 thermal paste is a very popular choice for enthusiasts looking to add a premium cooling solution to their very important CPUs and GPUs. Thermal paste provides a way of getting a good thermal contact between the integrated heat spreader (IHS) of the processor and the cold plate of your cooler. A lot of coolers come with a default paste already applied, but this isn't always the best option, and temperatures of CPU operations can be improved with more heat-conductive thermal paste options.

There is a new Arctic MX-7 thermal paste available, and it boasts better performance, but it's also a fair bit more expensive than this deal. Also, this particular product is available directly from Arctic via Amazon, and not a third-party reseller, so you avoid possible forgeries.

We haven't reviewed Arctic's MX-6 thermal paste, but we have tested the previous MX-4 and MX-5 products, and they both appeared high up in the benchmarking charts. Arctic's MX-6 thermal paste is our recommended pick for runner-up in the best premium thermal pastes, with Thermal Grizzly Duronaut being the top pick. The price of the Thermal Grizzly Duronaut (6g) is $19.99, which gives you an idea of how good the price on this Arctic MX-6 really is.

If you're looking for more savings, check out our Best PC Hardware deals for a range of products, or dive deeper into our specialized SSD and Storage Deals, Hard Drive Deals, Gaming Monitor Deals, Graphics Card Deals, Gaming Chair, Best Wi-Fi Routers, Best Motherboard, or CPU Deals pages.

Move over, Frore, there's a new player in town. A research team comprising boffins from the Danish Technological Institute and the Heatflow company have come up with a 3D-printed cooler that can draw a whopping 600 W off a chip fully passively, without any pumps or fans, 3D Printing Industry reports. The design is naturally aimed at datacenters first and foremost, though one can imagine a world where variations on the design could work on desktop PCs and workstations.

Should the presented figures pan out, to say this cooler is impressive is quite the understatement. The original specification set an already-ambitious target of 400 W, a figure that was exceeded by a nice, round 50%.

Other than a presumably exquisite internal layout, this heatsink doesn't seem to have any special tricks. It's a standard two-phase thermosiphon, where coolant heats up and evaporates at the bottom, and condenses into vapor at the top, coming back down via gravity alone. The part shown in the picture is the heatsink that will connect to a radiator somewhere without any moving parts needed for the heat transfer.

The cooler's dissipation ability is impressive enough, but the liquid that goes out of it is claimed to be at 60 to 80°C, making it easy to recover and use in other heating networks for a double-whammy. The report claims these figures are superior to standard datacenter cooling that whisks away heat at lower temperatures, making it harder to reuse.

Seeing as the cooler is 3D printed, it has very little material wastage for production and only employs one material, making for efficient production and easy recycling. The underlying chip temperatures should also be lower than with conventional designs, helping with their longevity — a boon for AI accelerators that tend to live fast and die young, with exceedingly high failure rates.

The project's budget is arguably even more surprising than the end results. All it seemingly took was 10 million Danish Crowns (DKK), a figure that translates to $1.56 million, or 1.34 million euros. We do hope this technology makes its way to our gaming PCs... whenever we can afford RAM again.

Arctic is a name well-known by many PC enthusiasts for often providing high-value, quality cooling solutions. Arctic’s MX-6 is one of the best thermal pastes on the market, and the Liquid Freezer III Pro 360 showed some of the best liquid cooling results we’ve seen when tested on AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X3D and Intel’s i7-14700K.

Since the release of the Liquid Freezer III Pro, many loyal readers have been requesting that we test the 420mm version of this powerful cooler. And so we’ve tested it with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X.

Not to get ahead of our testing, but this cooler will certainly be a strong contender for a spot on our Best AIO Coolers list. It offers industry-leading cooling performance at a very reasonable price. But before we get to testing, let’s look at the cooler’s specs and what’s included in the box.

Cooler specifications

Packing and included contents

Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 arrives in a triangle-shaped box, a very unusual design decision, which certainly makes it stand out. It also certainly makes it harder to ship, but that shouldn’t be an issue for potential buyers.

Included with the product are the following:

• 420mm AIO with pre-installed fans
• MX6 thermal paste
• Mounting for AMD and Intel platforms
• All-in-one or separated PWM cords
• VRM fan

Features of Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro 420

▶️ 38mm thick radiator

This AIO’s radiator is thick. At 38mm for the radiator and 27mm for the fans, that’s a combined thickness of 65mm. This will present compatibility issues with many cases, so make sure to do some measuring before buying. You probably aren’t considering a compact case with a 420mm cooler. Even with our MSI MAG Pano 100R PZ test case, we had to mount the radiator above the top frame, as it doesn’t technically support coolers this large. More on that below in our testing section.

▶️ Anti-bending frame for Intel systems

Intel LGA 1700/1800 CPUs, especially Raptor Lake, have been known to warp or bend in certain conditions. And as a result, the CPU can become harder to cool. This issue can be avoided altogether with the use of a contact frame, which Arctic includes for users of Intel systems. It’s a nice inclusion, but it also complicates the installation process and is a requirement for mounting Artic’s current-gen AIOs on Intel-based systems.

▶️ Low price

Officially, the LF3 Pro 420 carries a MSRP of $148.99, which is a reasonable price in and of itself. However, this AIO is frequently on sale, making it an even better value. At the time of this writing, it is available for only $103 on Amazon.

▶️ MX-6 thermal paste

Arctic includes a small tube of its MX-6 thermal paste. We’ve tested it on both AMD and Intel systems, and it’s one of the best on the market! Check out our thermal paste benchmarks for more detailed information.

▶️ Improved CPU mounting

Different CPUs currently on the market can have different hotspots, which can impact the effectiveness of a cooler. This is why some coolers seem to do better – or worse – with AMD or Intel. Arctic refined its mounting for AMD AM4/AM5 and LGA 1851 systems, resulting in claimed performance increases of up to 9 degrees Celsius with a 250W power limit. We’ll, of course, see how that shakes out shortly, in our testing.

▶️ New P14 Pro Fans – and a VRM fan too!

There’s more to a cooler than just the heatsink or radiator. The bundled fans have a significant impact on cooling and noise levels, as well as how the cooler looks in your case.

The new P12 Pro fans include seven blades instead of the five-bladed fans included with previous Liquid Freezer CPUs, and are pre-installed for convenience. Arctic claims they perform at the same level as its MAX fans, but at a lower noise level. That’s not to say these fans run quietlym though. As you’ll see in our benchmarks below, they can get pretty loud.

A quick connect system for the PWM and ARGB connections is utilized to minimize cable clutter.

AM5 installation

The installation of this cooler is simple, but a bit of a pain for Intel users, due to the required use of a custom contact frame for the CPU. This guide will go over the installation on AMD systems. Intel users can check out our review of the smaller Arctic Liquid Freezer III Pro for installation help.

1. Remove the default AM4/AM5 mounting mechanism.

2. Place the rubber standoffs around the screw holes surrounding the CPU.

3. Take the included mounting bars and place them on top of the standoffs, and then secrure them with a screwdriver and the included screws.

4. Apply the included Arctic MX-6 thermal paste to your CPU. If you aren’t sure how to do this properly, please refer to our handy guide on how to apply thermal paste.

5. Press the pump block on top of the CPU, and secure the built-in screws using a screwdriver.

6. Once complete, connect the cabling to the CPU block’s head. For the purposes of testing, I chose the option with individual PWM control for the fans, pump, and VRM fan. However, some may prefer the simplicity of the all-in-one cable. Connect the cables, place the VRM fan on top of the CPU block, and installation is complete.

Real world testing configuration –AMD AM5 platform

The 9950X3D setup that we started testing coolers with last year has suffered an unfortunate death. As such, we’ve begun to test coolers on a system with AMD’s 9950X.

There are some differences in how the 9950X and 9950X3D CPUs are impacted by thermal events: while the heat output of the CCDs of AMD’s 9950X3D are relatively balanced, the 9950X I’m using has one CCD that runs much hotter than the other, with a difference of over 10 degrees C in some scenarios, shown below.

The benchmark results shared in these reviews may differ from others because I emphasize results that are comparable to real-world use.

This means that I generally test CPU coolers inside of a closed desktop case, which increases cooling difficulty compared to other testing methods. Open benches have lowered ambient temperatures, which in turn makes weak coolers appear stronger than they really are. Some have used generic thermal plates to test cooling solutions. I reject both of these methods, because they don’t accurately reflect the real-world conditions where a CPU cooler is used.

That said, this review bends this rule a little: The MSI Pano 100R PZ case that we use for cooler testing doesn’t technically support 420mm radiators. So I had to place it on top of the case to make it fit. This likely affects thermals and acoustics at least somewhat, but short of re-testing all our coolers in a different case, we didn’t have a better option. We tested Be Quiet’s competing Silent Loop 3 420 in this same way for comparison, while the smaller 360mm coolers were tested in a typical fashion, with the radiator and fans inside the case. If there is heavy interest in large 420mm cooler testing, we will revisit these results in a larger case later this year.

Noise-normalized testing

Most testing is performed with the cooler tied to the default fan curve of the MSI x870E Carbon motherboard, but many of y’all prefer to see tests when the noise levels of coolers are equalized. This is especially important to those of you who prefer silent computers.

We’ll start with the “easiest” of these tests, which runs Cinebench R23 with a stock power limit. On this motherboard, that means the CPU will consume roughly 200W. The Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 achieved the best result we’ve seen yet on this system, with a temperature of only 73.6C – outperforming all of the 360mm AIOs we’ve tested here, and even beating BeQuiet’s Silent Loop 3 420 by 1.4 degrees C.

The next test is a bit harder, with PBO enabled to allow the CPU to use as much power as can be handled, and the cooler handled a whopping 262.3W, on average.

For our last test, we’ve added the heat of a GPU to the mix, which contributes 295W of heat into the PC case. The result of 249.3W is very impressive, outperforming the best 360mm result, with an increased thermal capacity of 16.5W.

Noise levels

We’ve measured noise levels at two points to give you an idea of how the cooler operates when tied to a motherboard’s default fan curve. Our first measurement is when the fans are allowed to run at full speed, their loudest noise levels possible.

In terms of maximum volume, the Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 is quite noisy, at 52.7 dBA. This is the second loudest cooler we’ve tested in the past few years.

Our next acoustic measurement is the cooler’s volume when the CPU consumes 150W. This might be similar to your “worst case” gaming scenarios, especially if PBO is enabled. At 42.4 dBA, it isn’t too loud – but it ain’t quiet by PC standards, either!

PBO Performance – full fan speeds

While some enthusiasts prefer to run coolers at low noise levels, I know a lot of you just want maximum performance. This benchmark lets the fans run at their full speeds to test the full potential of the AIO's cooling potential. Turning on PBO allows AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X to stretch its legs and guzzle power, pushing the limits of any CPU cooler on the market.

Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro 420 stayed true to its name, cooling over 268W here.

200W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I leave the motherboard settings at their defaults, which results in a power limit of 200W when running Cinebench R23. The performance gap between 420mm and 360mm AIOs shrinks at this power level. While the Liquid Freezer III Pro 420’s result of 73.6 degrees C is the best we have seen thus far, it is only 0.9 degrees lower than the best 360mm AIO we’ve tested.

150W thermal benchmarks and noise levels

For the next thermal test, I’ve set the power limit to 150W.

The story for our 150W results is about the same as our 200W results. The LF3 Pro 420 takes the lead with a relatively cool temperature of only 58.2 degrees C, maintaining a 0.9 degree lead over the best 360mm result we have in this chart.

100W thermal results

Our next test is the “easiest” benchmark featured here, with a workload consuming only 100W. This is a simple test, one that even most mainstream coolers should have no issue dealing with. Results, as expected, are excellent once again, with the average temperature of the CPU measuring 44.6 degrees C, an improvement of 3 degrees CC compared to the best 360mm AIOs we’ve tested.

Conclusion

The 360mm version of Arctic’s Liquid Freezer III Pro is among the best AIOs on the market, and the newer 420mm variant only pushes the bar for cooling performance further, delivering the best temperatures we’ve seen from any AIO when paired with AMD’s Ryzen 9 9950X CPU. If you have the need for this level of cooling and your case has the space for it, the Artic Liquid Freezer III 420 is an excellent cooler and an excellent value – especially if you can find it on sale significantly below its $149 MSRP.

TrashBench, a hardware enthusiast and YouTuber that we've covered in the past, has a specific talent for clever-but-chaotic PC experiments. In his latest video, he's managed something that has tripped up far bigger channels before him: he successfully ran a desktop PC at –28°C inside a household freezer, benchmarked it, overclocked it, and pulled the hardware out afterward cold and bone-dry.

The concept of the freezer PC is obviously not a new idea. Plenty of creators, including Linus Tech Tips, have tried putting PCs in freezers, only to be defeated by condensation, thermal instability, or both. TrashBench's twist was realizing that the freezer itself was the limiting factor, and that solving the problem wasn't about exotic coatings, or insane insulation, or extreme temperatures, but instead, size and patience.

The exotic cooling enthusiast didn't risk modern flagship silicon here, and that restraint was probably a factor in the experiment's success. The setup consisted of an ASUS ROG Maximus XI Apex motherboard, an Intel Core i7-9700KF, an ASUS ROG GeForce GTX 1070 (despite charts briefly claiming GTX 1060; chalk that up to beer, not malice), a Thermalright Phantom Spirit air cooler, some G.SKILL Trident Z RGB memory, and a SilverStone Strider 750 EF power supply. Everything except the PSU went into the freezer.

By 2026 standards, this is firmly 'old hardware,' but that's exactly the point. If something went catastrophically wrong, the loss was survivable, and just as importantly, these parts draw far less power than modern high-end CPUs and GPUs. Lower heat output matters when your 'cooling system' is a household freezer with a compressor designed to deal with groceries, not a 600 W load spike.

Instead of resting components on shelves or freezer walls, TrashBench completely emptied the freezer and instead suspended them in mid-air using flexible straps. Cables were carefully routed and sealed to minimize moisture ingress from outside air. At the bottom of the chest freezer, he placed silica gel packed into breathable socks, acting as an active desiccant system. That combination of large freezer volume, minimal airflow turbulence, and aggressive moisture control is what allowed the system to stabilize instead of instantly fogging up and dying.

TrashBench tested performance before freezing, inside the freezer at stock clocks, and again after manual GPU overclocking. The benchmarks included 3DMark Time Spy, 3DMark Fire Strike, Cyberpunk 2077, Far Cry 6, and Shadow of the Tomb Raider, all venerable tests well-suited to the 2016-vintage hardware. Simply placing the PC components into the –28 °C freezer resulted in very marginal performance improvements. In most cases, the difference was within the noise; the only clear hardware-level gain was a 51 MHz increase in sustained GPU clock, thanks to lower operating temperatures.

Manual GPU overclocking of around +240 MHz on the core produced more noticeable gains, albeit still nothing earth-shattering. The largest uplift was in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, which gained about 8% (102 FPS to 110 FPS), and then 3DMark Fire Strike improved about 7%. Other tests showed smaller improvements, and TrashBench didn't specify exact in-game settings, so the results should be taken as directional rather than definitive. In other words: freezing your PC won't magically turn a GTX 1070 into a monster.

After benchmarking, TrashBench was able to remove the parts from the freezer and verify that they were not only still cold (at just 9°C), but in his words, "dryer than a GPU market." In YouTube comments, he added that he didn't actually expect the experiment to work at all. So why did his test work when others failed? The secret wasn't that the freezer was cold — it's that it was big. Smaller freezers heat up almost instantly under load, causing rapid temperature swings and repeated crossings of the dew point, which happen to be the exact conditions that create condensation.

In contrast, a large chest freezer acts less like an air conditioner and more like a cold reservoir. Hundreds of liters of air pre-cooled to –28 °C can absorb several hundred watts of heat for minutes before warming significantly, thanks to thermal inertia slowing temperature changes, reduced hot air recirculation thanks to open space, more cold wall surface area for passive heat absorption, and lower relative humidity spikes, even with minor air leakage.

The silica gel worked because the environment was stable. In a small freezer, the desiccant is quickly overwhelmed. In a large one, it actually has time to scrub moisture from the circulating air. TrashBench didn't try to make the freezer continuously cool a running PC, which would be an impossible task. He treated it as a temporary thermal battery, spent carefully during the benchmark runs.

TrashBench's conclusion is cheeky in a typically-Australian way: 'Like everything in life, size does matter.' He also notes that this kind of setup only really makes sense if you're planning to push overclocking harder than he did here — and doing that for long would almost certainly overstress the freezer's compressor. The takeaway: size matters, but so do expectations.

Superheat was at CES 2026 to showcase what it describes as “a water heater that pays for itself.” The new Superheat H1 is a $2,000 water heater that warms up your H2O using waste-heat from its built-in Bitcoin mining ASIC hardware, rather than an immersed resistive heating element.

It is claimed that owners of a Superheat H1 can “offset up to 80% of electricity and water costs” with earnings from cryptomining. Superheat extrapolates these numbers to suggest that a 700-apartment community could raise “up to $980,000 yearly earnings.”

The infographic above shows that a Superheat H1 can earn $1,000 in passive income per year. Therefore, your initial hardware investment should be entirely paid-off in two years, while it reduces your water heater energy spend by 80%. The H1 has a predicted service life of 10 years, very similar to a regular domestic boiler.

Waste not, want not

Cooling data centers that run demanding workloads like cryptocurrency mining is a notoriously expensive business. It is estimated that cooling is the second most costly activity after actually powering the systems to chew through the tasks central to their existence.

But what if the ‘waste’ heat became a benefit? Indeed, some businesses, and most households, spend a lot of their energy budget heating water, for washing and heating systems, and so on, and get nothing else back except a hefty utility bill.

Enter the Superheat H1 with its “dual-value operation.” It requires roughly the same amount of energy as a regular electric water heater, according to the maker. Moreover, it is claimed to be scalable beyond homes, for apartment blocks, hotels, and so on.

“Heat is one of the world’s most overlooked resources,” said Andrew Geng, Co-Founder and CTO of Superheat. “The H1 proves that home appliances can create real economic and environmental value. As we expand into distributed AI and cloud computing, Superheat will redefine how buildings produce, reuse, and monetize heat.”

Bitcoin pricing is rather volatile. In Q3 last year, it nudged over $125,000, but 1BTC is currently valued at around $91,000. Superheat H1 owners should benefit from a higher Bitcoin valuation, but no one really knows which direction, nor how high or low BTC could go in 2026. CNBC recently measured investor and analyst predictions and estimated that Bitcoin valuations of between $75,000 and $225,000 would be seen this year.

Owning a Superheat H1 might be yet another reason for not being able to tune out from watching information feeds and stressing about trends, charts, and valuations. Can I heat water with a heatsink on my forehead?

Cooler Master just introduced a coolant distribution unit, or CDU, with a massive capacity of 900 to 2,500 watts. The Tom’s Hardware team saw the rather compact unit at CES 2026. The company says it is designed for CPUs, GPUs, and ASICs, balancing the ease-of-use of AIOs and the maximum cooling performance you get from open-loop systems. Each unit measures around 10 x 10 x 19.6 inches (255 x 255 x 497 mm) or around 32 liters and weighs between 12 and 18 kg (between 26 and 40 pounds), so you’re not going to fit this inside the case of your gaming PC. Instead, it’s built for specialized desktop systems that need robust cooling, like those that feature multiple GPUs for AI applications.

Another thing that makes the Aquagate MAX an excellent solution is its modularity and scalability. You can get this CDU with either a 240mm, 280mm, or 360mm radiator, allowing you to increase its cooling capacity without drastically taking up more space. And if that is not enough, Cooler Master says that you can connect multiple units in both serial and parallel connections, allowing you to expand your cooling capacity as you add more units to your system.

We don’t expect to see this cooling solution among the server racks you’d find in a data center (Cooler Master has the LTL In Rack CDU for that). Instead, this will probably be located at labs running high-end workstations or on AI and compute development systems where AI engineers are working on next-generation LLMs. Some overclockers might also find this a useful solution, although they might prefer liquid nitrogen cooling over this industrial-grade cooler. Aside from the Aquagate MAX and the LTL In Rack CDU, Cooler Master also showed off a Mini-Charge Tool designed to quickly refill cooling systems with coolant.

For gamers and consumers, Cooler Master released the GPU Shield Adapter Cable, which detects abnormal currents and adjusts power output in real time for improved stability, the MWE Gold V4 power supply with built-in GPU Shield capability, and a variety of fans, air coolers, and AIOs. There are also several PC cases of varying sizes, including the Q300L V3, Qube 540 SP, MasterFrame 500 Mesh V2, and the limited-edition Cosmos Alpha Gold, which only has 199 available units and features a 24K pure gold-plated CM logo.

Tom's Hardware's boots on the ground at CES have yielded an impressive amount of information, and the latest batch comes from the stand of German silence engineers Be Quiet. The company has finally pulled back the curtain on multiple new products and revisions of existing gear. The stars of the show are the Light Loop AIO and Dark Perk mice, arriving with the Dark Rock 6 / Pro 6 coolers, and PowerZone 2 and PurePower 13 M 1,200 W power supplies as entourage.

The Light Loop AIO is currently the apple of Be Quiet's eye. This stylish closed-loop cooler comes fitted with a round LCD display coupled with an RGB LED light ring esconced in the ridges around the pump assembly. That gives it a fairly unique look, further customizable by Bequiet's IO Center software that's getting a new revision around April and is now all web-based.

The display is a 2.1" unit that's capable of 500 nits of brightness, and the spinners on the radiator are 120-mm Light Wings LX PWM units. Be Quiet claims the jet plate and cold plate are bespoke designs, too. The Light Loop will be available on the 14th of April, in black or white colorways. The price is 205 € for the 240 mm and 235 € for the 360 mm variant. Taking away VAT and doing currency conversion, that should be roughly $201 and $231, respectively.

The Dark Perk mouse has been quite a while in the making. It was originally announced at CES 2025 and has finally arrived. Be Quiet says it spent this while tuning the mouse, particularly the battery life for the wireless version. There are two ergonomic takes on the Dark Perk: the standard right-handed Ergo, and the ambidextrous Sym.

Inside, the rodent contains a PixArt PAW3950 sensor capable of reading 32,000 DPI and polling information at a rate of 8 KHz. The switches underneath the main buttons are Omron optical units, and the corded version has an angled cable to avoid snagging. The base weight is a mere 55 g (1.94 oz). Bequiet says the wireless version should be good for 110 hours of gaming. Expect these on February 3rd.

Next up, we have the Dark Rock 6 and Pro 6 coolers. The standard model has six heatpipes and one 135-mm Silent Wings fan, while the Pro 6 variant has two Silent Wings spinners and seven heatpipes. You'll be able to get these on the 19th of May.

Additionally, Be Quiet showed off a prototype of a Dark Rock cooler with a customizable LCD display, the Dark Rock Pro 6 IO LCD. The screen measures 4.5" across and will have the same wide-ranging customization options available as the Light Loop IO. There's no set release date, but the German makers expect to deliver this upmarket variation in the second half of 2026.

Last but by no means least, there are now 1,200 W versions of both the Power Zone 2 and Pure Power 13 M PSUs. The Power Zone 2 is primed for efficiency, carrying both an 80 Plus Platinum badge and a highly demanding Cybenetics Platinum certification. The fan inside is a custom 140 mm Pure Wings 3 model. This power supply is ATX 3.1 and PCIe 5.1 compliant and comes with a 90° angled 12V-2x6 connector. This model will arrive on the 27th of January-

As for the Pure Power 13 M, it has an 80 Plus Gold efficiency logo (up to 93.5%), and is likewise compatible with ATX 3.1 and PCIe 5.1. Both models use LLC topology, and their voltage regulation should be able to take spikes up to twice their rated power, making these a safe bet for RTX 5090 graphics cards that tend to draw power in quick, high-amplitude bursts. Be Quiet says this version will be in stores on the 10th of February.

Oh, and do check out the gallery below for the full-sized versions. There's a Pretzel PC in there, and yes, it was tasty.

Frore Systems' seemingly magic apparatuses for both air and liquid cooling have long been in the news, claiming to offer performance up to several times that of existing designs. Some companies are already using Frore's designs, like Qualcomm with its Snapdragon X2 Elite reference platform, and many others are integrating the products as we speak. At CES, Tom's Hardware photographed some rather impressive live demos.

The company's wares are the AirJet and LiquidJet lines, each for a different cooling medium as their names imply. The AirJet Mini G2 is the building block, so to speak, of a cooling package that Frore calls an AirJet Pak and includes several Minis with vibrating membranes for near-silent or even fully passive operation. The company is aiming these at ultraportables, laptops, and mini-PCs — roughly any application requiring up to around 45 W. The units are dust-proof, too, and water-resistant.

One of the most impressive demos is this one, an AirJet Pak 5C (five AirJet Mini G2 units) cooling a Nvidia Jetson Orin NX Super machine (40 W steady TDP), with a 300g apparatus containing a cooling package not much larger than a 2.5" hard drive performing the same duty as a massive heatsink weighing in at a whole two kilos.

The same theme carries over to this Galaxy Book 5 Pro 14" that replaces its two-fan, 32-37 dbA bog-standard laptop cooling setup with a design packing four AirJet Mini G2s, offering an even higher TDP (24 W over 20 W), while simultaneously operating silently at the base noise measurement level of 27 dbA. As additional bonuses, theoretically, the AirJet-clad unit won't ever need cleaning, either. Not only is it much quieter, but the AirJet variant also goes significantly faster thanks to the higher steady-state TDP, as shown by the running Cinebench tests.

For servers and other high-performance applications, Frore makes the LiquidJet, essentially a really high-tech cold plate with 3D microscopic water channels that move water through a much shorter path than conventional designs, with far better cooling efficiency and lower pressure. Unsurprisingly, Frore is targeting mainly, but not only, at AI servers, where more efficient cooling directly results in lower power bills and better ROI.

Over at the Big Iron desk, Frore has a big honkin' Nvidia Rubin 2 SoC containing eight HBM modules plus I/O chips (in the center of the picture), for a grand total of 1950 W of heat that must be dissipated. The LiquidJet setup keeps this chip at a balmy 65-70°C, and the radiator-and-fan kit appears to be roughly bigger than an SFF PC, quite an achievement compared to what would otherwise be necessary. We'll bet that the fans weren't nearly as loud as those in a datacenter, too.

Here we see a large ASIC with a 1200 W TDP being cooled by one of its LiquidJet cold plates, remaining pretty chilly at 70-75°C. The inlet water temperature is just 34.5°C, warm enough to take a shower but not even qualifying as "hot".

Finally, a 600 W GPU (105° C), cooled by a LiquidJet with top-mounted inlet and outlets, holding itself steady at a nice 95°C. This displays how Frore precisely designs each block to better suit the hotspots of the chip(s) resting underneath, one of the key features for LiquidJet blocks. Be sure to click the pictures for high-res versions, and check out the gallery below for the whole set.

Asus’ latest ROG Strix LC IV series of AIO liquid coolers not only rival the best CPU coolers on the market, but also introduce the world’s first cable-less design. This innovation is made possible by a proprietary AIO Q-Connector that relies on pogo pins for seamless connectivity, and we got a good look on the ground at CES 2026 in Las Vegas.

The novel AIO Q-Connector is at the heart of Asus' breakthrough, featuring 11 spring-loaded pogo pins organized in two groups—nine for primary connections and two for additional controls. These precision connectors allow the new ROG Strix LC IV coolers to seamlessly receive power and control signals for the pump, ARGB lighting, and, in select models, an integrated 5.08-inch LDC display. Impressively, there’s no need for users to connect any cables to the radiator fans manually; the AIO Q-Connector discreetly transmits PWM and lighting signals through a cable cleverly concealed inside the cooler’s tube sleeving.

To fully benefit from the innovative cable-free design of the ROG Strix LC IV series, you must pair these coolers with a compatible motherboard equipped with the AIO Q-Connector. Currently, Asus has introduced four new AM5 motherboards with the new connector: the ROG Crosshair X870E Glacial, ROG Crosshair X870E Dark Hero, ROG Strix X870E-E Gaming WiFi7 Neo, and ROG Strix X870E-A Gaming WiFi7 Neo. Asus may expand the AIO Q-Connector to Intel motherboards in the future, but for now, AM5 users have a unique advantage in creating a next-generation, wireless cooling setup.

While the ROG Strix LC IV series is designed for a truly cable-free experience, Asus has ensured flexibility by including a modular design that allows users to connect standard cables to any motherboard, even if it lacks the proprietary AIO Q-Connector. However, given that the key selling point of the ROG Strix LC IV AIO liquid coolers is its advanced wireless functionality, it would be counterintuitive to invest in this premium product without leveraging its signature feature.

Asus has introduced three distinct base models for the ROG Strix LC IV series, each available in two color variants—providing a total of six configurations to suit various build aesthetics. The ROG Strix SLC IV 360 ARGB LCD and ROG Strix LC IV 360 ARGB LCD stand out with their vibrant 5.08-inch LCD displays, boasting a crisp 720 x 720 resolution. These displays enable users to monitor critical hardware stats, showcase personalized content, or display exclusive ROG animations, enhancing both functionality and visual appeal. Notably, the LCD panel connects to the pump via a dedicated five-pin pogo connector, ensuring reliable data transmission and a streamlined installation process.

The key distinction between the ROG Strix SLC IV 360 ARGB LCD and the ROG Strix LC IV 360 ARGB LCD lies in the tubing length. The SLC model features shorter tubing—an intentional design choice aimed at PC builders seeking a tidier and more organized interior. The small adjustment helps prevent tubing from hanging awkwardly across other components.

Completing the lineup is the ROG Strix LC IV 360 ARGB, which forgoes the LCD display and instead features an ARGB-illuminated logo on the pump housing. This model offers a more budget-friendly option for builders who want to experience the innovative cable-free design of the ROG Strix LC IV series without the additional cost of a display.

Another noteworthy feature of the ROG Strix LC IV lineup is the all-in-one fan assembly. The three cooling fans come fully pre-installed on the 360mm radiator out of the box. The approach, as silly as it may sound, eliminates the need for manual fan mounting, saving PC builders time. The upside of the design is that it allowed Asus to implement its Aura Sync lighting across the triple-fan setup, making it look like an animated billboard.

Asus has yet to announce official pricing or a release date for the ROG Strix LC IV series, keeping eager PC builders in suspense for now. However, the company has confirmed that all models in the lineup will come with a generous six-year limited warranty.

MSI has shown off some rather intriguing hardware so far at CES 2026, but something that really caught our eye while touring the show floor is the company's latest dual-tower CPU air coolers: the MPG CoreFrozr AP15 and AP17. Your eyes can't help but be drawn to the displays affixed to each unit.

The MPG CoreFrozr AP15 features a Digi-Display that provides real-time readouts of your system vitals. The LCD is split into four segments, showing CPU temperature, CPU load, and the fan's current RPM. There's even a weekly calendar function in the lower left-hand segment.

The MPG CoreFrozr AP17 takes things a step further with an absolutely massive 6-inch LCD. Not only can it display the same system information as its lesser sibling, but it also offers fully customizable output. You can even add custom visuals to give your system some added flair that matches the aesthetic of your gaming rig. The displays are also removable, though I don't really see the need to remove them if you're paying a premium for that functionality in the first place, but I digress.

When it comes to actual cooling performance, both feature dual cooling fans. However, their approaches differ slightly from there. The MPG CoreFrozr AP15 was specifically optimized to work with the AMD Ryzen X3D family of processors and features a copper base along with six heat pipes. The MPG CoreFrozr AP17 ups the stakes with a nickel-plated copper base and eight heat pipes.

MSI also designed both coolers to be user-friendly, especially in tight confines. As a result, there is sufficient clearance under the heat pipes to avoid interfering with your motherboard's DIMM slots.

At this time, MSI hasn't announced pricing for the MPG CoreFrozr AP15 or AP17. However, for reference, the Thermalright Peerless Assassin 140 is available for around $53.

Picking out new fans for a build is a process you either love or hate. You’ve come to terms with the fact that your PC needs fans – after all, air has to be moved to cool it. For today’s comparison, let’s take RGB out of the equation – assuming all you care about is that your PC gets cooling, nothing more.

We quickly run into the triangle of cooling:

Now, you have a choice to make: do you prioritize cooling performance, cost, or noise? You only get to pick two.

Say you want the best cooling fan: It has to have the absolute best cooling performance, run absolutely quiet, and cost is no object. There is one clear winner there: the Noctua NF-A12x25 G2 — at least by reputation. We’ll only know for sure whether that’s true when we’ve tested a lot more fans. But let’s take it as a given for now.

In comes an option on the other end of the spectrum: You just need some fans to move air, and please do so without adding much more cost to the already-expensive build. Since I’m deciding which fans to spend time on based on their reputation, I’m picking the Arctic P12 Pro as the competitor in today’s head-to-head, in what may be the most unfair fan comparison in history – or at least in PC fan history.

However, there is a reason behind this madness: The Noctua NF-A12x25 G2 is a brilliant fan, but it costs a mighty $35 on Amazon for a single spinner. If you need five fans for your PC, that’s $175, spent on just fans.

On the other side of the spectrum sits Arctic, with the recently released P12 Pro. A single P12 Pro costs $8.50. Want a 5-pack? Sure thing, that’ll be $27.50, please. Do you see where I’m going with this?

For what effectively comes down to a cost difference of 6:1, how much noise and cooling performance are you really sacrificing by using one of the cheapest fans that still has a good reputation, as opposed to the most expensive? The difference might be less than you think. Because if being an enthusiast for decades has taught me one thing, it’s never to underestimate the underdog.

Deeper Dive: Noctua NF-A12x25 G2

The Noctua NF-A12x25 G2 (what a handful, that name) is Noctua’s second-generation A12x25 fan. The A is for all-rounder, at 120mm in size and 25mm thick, and it is the second-generation model.

The all-round aspect of the fan is key here: The point of the NF-A series fans is to offer great performance, both for airflow and static pressure. This means that the NF-A12x25 G2 will function brilliantly as a case fan where its sole purpose is to move heaps of air. But it should also function great as a fan on a radiator, where it encounters much more resistance.

Obviously, building a fan that can move a lot of air through an unrestricted opening but also effectively cool a restrictive radiator comes with its own complexities — especially if you then also want this one-model-fits-all fan to achieve top-end acoustic performance.

So, hats off to Noctua for trying. In the past, the company was only satisfied with these two categories by offering two different pedigrees of fans. But as of 7 years ago, the company firmly stands behind the NF-A12x25, and more recently, the G2 variant.

To achieve its capabilities, the NF-A12x25 G2 features a self-lubricating, self-stabilizing fluid-dynamic bearing, which the company calls the SSO2 bearing, with SSO denoting self-stabilizing oil pressure. I suppose SSOP2 didn’t have the same ring to it. In essence, this is a hydrodynamic bearing with an added magnet that self-stabilizes the rotor axis for a very long and very quiet running lifetime.

From there on out, the NF-A12x25 G2 has a beige frame with vibration dampers on every corner. But at the heart of it all is where the magic happens: the 9-blade, Sterrox LCP fan blade assembly, shaped with a strong forward sweep, steep angles, impeller winglets, a centrifugal turbulator, and flow acceleration channels. It all sounds like marketing talk, but the sum of it all seems to produce a winner.

What I find most noteworthy is the 0.5mm tip clearance from the frame – it’s honestly unreal to see the fan blades so close to the frame – and that, paired with the high blade density, is bound to do good things for the static pressure.

To top it all off, Noctua includes a low-noise adapter, and the hub’s PWM microcontroller is even equipped with programming to ensure that even when pushing through high-impedance cooling devices, the fan retains the RPMs it is meant to achieve and a particular input voltage and PWM duty cycle.

By default, the Austrian goldilocks spinner will rotate at up to a bit above its rated RPM, but the company also includes a low-noise adapter that lowers this figure to give or take 1500 RPM. As an enthusiast feature, the fan will stop when fed a 0% PWM duty – something not all fans do, in order to protect the system.

To add complexity to the matter, Noctua also introduced the NF-A12x25 G2 Sx2-PP, which is a kit with two of the spinners, one of which is programmed to run 25 RPM lower than the standard model, and one 25 RPM higher.

Why? Because the NF-A12x25 is said to be so painfully consistent with its rotational speeds per PWM figure between samples, that if you group multiple fans together on one motherboard header, running off the same input voltage and PWM signal, they become harmonic. That may be beautiful in an orchestra, but not so much so when your fans play sing-along with each other in your rig.

Come to think of it, I should have asked Noctua for two additional NF-A12x25 G2 fans for review. Today I only have a single unit, along with a two-fan NF-A12x25 G2 Sx2-PP kit with the speed offset. I’d like to experience the harmonics they speak of, but that’ll have to wait for another day.

Deeper Dive: Arctic P12 Pro

Diving deeper into the Arctic P12 Pro may not be as exciting as the Noctua, but I still find it intriguing. Why? Because for a $7 fan, it’s surprisingly well-built.