Noctua Reveals New Flagship CPU Cooler NH-D15

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Noctua has introduced the successor to the NH-D14: the NH-D15.

After many years of good service, Noctua has finally updated its legendary NH-D14 cooler. The NH-D14 didn't actually need updating in our opinion, but that hasn't stopped Noctua from trying to do so anyway.

The new model is called the NH-D15, and as you might have thought, it is now indeed a little bigger. Rather than having a fin stack that's 140 mm wide, it is now 150 mm wide. Also, the heat pipes have been distributed differently, which should have the heat spread across the fin stack more evenly.

"Having convinced tens of thousands of quiet cooling enthusiasts around the globe, our NH-D14 has become a reference for top-tier dual tower heatsinks," explains Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "In the end, it took us more than three years of continuous development, countless thermal simulations and over hundred samples to come up with a substantial improvement in efficiency. Staying true to our policy of not releasing anything we're not 100% satisfied with, we had to accept some delays in order to squeeze out the last few percent of performance, but now we're proud to finally release the NH-D15 as a worthy successor to the venerable D14."

The fans on the unit are the NF-A15 fans, which have PWM support and can spin at speeds of up to 1500 RPM, or 1200 RPM using a low-noise adapter.

Pricing for the unit is set at $99.90 with availability set for mid-April.

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Niels Broekhuijsen
Niels Broekhuijsen

Niels Broekhuijsen is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He reviews cases, water cooling and pc builds.

33 Comments Comment from the forums
  • patrick47018
    Well here we go again, aio liquid coolers prepare to meet your air cooled maker yet again!
    Reply
  • bgunner
    Really would like to see how this stacks up against the rest of the coolers. Also being bigger this means it will have even harder of a time fitting in many mid tower cases.
    Reply
  • 10tacle
    Yep, my D14 barely, and I do mean barely, fits in my Antec 900 case. The fan cowlings are touching the side panel window. People without full towers are definitely going to need to take measurements on this. I'm curious to know what difference the larger fans and redesigned heat pipe layout of the D15 does for performance over the D14 (and retail box closed-loop water coolers of course). It is disappointing to see Noctua is still going with that nappy color combination that ruins the case aesthetics (for those who care about that anyway like me, who painted the fan cowlings on mine black).
    Reply
  • JackNaylorPE
    They really had no choice given all the "Top Tier CPU Cooler Shootouts" ya can find on Youtube, Vortez and other sites which relegated the venerable Noc to 2nd or 3rd behind the Phanteks PH-TC14 and Thermalright Silver Arrow. Anxious to see how it stands up also and hoping that the "substantial improvement in efficiency" results from something besides the rpm increase.

    In reference to the 1st comment, I have to agree.....given the presence of these 3 coolers, I fail to see a "raison d'être" for AIO / CLC's other than:

    a) I oft put my PC in the hands of FedEx gorillas
    b) My miniITX case doesn't give me many options

    I was so hoping we'd see something better in the aesthetics department .... the color scheme while excellent for a "desert theme" build, is the usual first response I get when recommending the user pick from the aforementioned 3 coolers.
    Reply
  • Shankovich
    Mother of God...can't wait to see some benchmarks!
    Reply
  • edogawa
    Great air cooler, and hopefully the increase in size makes a sizable difference, that thing is a a hell of a huge thing to fit into some cases. I wish they had some different colour schemes for those fans since most cases have a red, blue, or green theme.

    In regards to the first comment too, closed loops are still good options since there is barely any weight on the socket, you can cool mini-itx cases easily, they look better, have extra features on some(H100i), and don't take up a huge portion of the interior of the case. Even if a closed loop performs 5C worse, or even 10c, and hitting a limit of 50c your processor will still last 6 to 10 years. I think the biggest plus is the UPS/FEDEX issue like Jack mentioned above, those gorillas can bring you your PC like it was just out of a blender.

    Reply
  • ozchoz
    No the colour scheme is perfect. When people look into your side window and say, "Looks good mate, apart from that naff fan on your CPU cooler."

    You respond, "Thats the Noctua. You don't need to blend in with the rest when you perform that well."
    Reply
  • jhanschu
    Well here we go again, aio liquid coolers prepare to meet your air cooled maker yet again!

    It's been shown time again that the cooling prowess of massive air coolers can, in fact, match that of decent AIO coolers. The difference is that AIO's don't have a large mass of metal hanging from the motherboard socket. Not that has really ever been an issue, but is something to consider when transporting a LAN rig for example.
    Reply
  • anonymous_user
    Now that it has two large-sized fans, I wonder if it will affect motherboard and memory heatsink compatibility.
    Reply
  • IInuyasha74
    I would like to see if it is able to best Phanteks.
    Reply