You can push the fan up with the peerless assassin/phantom spirit to give you more clearance, but if you like the AIO it isn't a big deal within the budget.
Afaik, the SE is slightly shorter, doesn't have dampened fans and lacks a top cover.
The phantom spirit is a bit better than the peerless assassin. The SE version is slightly shorter and lighter. I don't know if it has less dampening.
My Peerless Assassin SE120 does have rubber dampners on the corners of the fans and they are the stock fans. If they no longer have these I don't know when they have changed it but to add to the confusion I just checked Thermalrights website and there are now three different versions (
original which I have,
V2 and
V3) of the Peerless Assassin SE 120. The original has TL-C12C fans which may or may not have rubber dampners depending on when they were built, the V2 has TL-C12C-X28 V2 fans which do have rubber dampners and the V3 has TL-P12 which also has rubber dampners. The heatsink itself appears to be no different across all three variants.
Fan specs:-
TL-C12C FAN Spec：
Dimension：L120 mm x W120 mm x H25 mm
Weight：120g
Rated Speed：1550 RPM±10% (MAX)
Noise Level：25.6 dBA
Air Flow：66.17 CFM (MAX)
Air Pressure：1.53 mm H2O (MAX)
Ampere：0.20 A
Connector：4 Pin (PWM Fan connector)
Bearing Type : S-FDB Bearing
TL-C12C-X28 V2 FAN Spec：
Dimension：L120 mm x W120 mm x H28 mm
Rated Speed：1850 RPM±10% (MAX)
Noise Level：29.5 dBA
Air Flow：88.89 CFM (MAX)
Air Pressure：2.21 mm H2O (MAX)
Ampere：0.30 A
Connector：4 Pin (PWM Fan connector)
Bearing Type : S-FDB Bearing
TL-P12 FAN Spec：
Dimension：L120 mm x W120 mm x H25 mm
Rated Speed：2000 RPM±10% (MAX)
Noise Level：29.8 dBA
Air Flow：70.84 CFM (MAX)
Air Pressure：2.63 mm H2O (MAX)
Ampere：0.17 A
Connector：4 Pin (PWM Fan connector)
Bearing Type : S-FDB Bearing
The first two are 9 bladed fans while the last one is a 7 blade design rotating the opposite way and the fan blades look very much like the ones on the Arctic P12 series. Personally I have had zero problems with the original fans and with a third fan added at the rear the cooler is just about silent no matter the load on the cpu.
The Phantom Spirit is the one to get though. At only a couple of quid more expensive you get a extra heatpipe and a little better cooling. There is only the Phantom Spirit and Phantom Spirit SE with no extra variants yet and they both use TL-C12B V2 fans the spec of which can be seen below.
TL-C12B V2 FAN Spec：
Dimension：L120 mm x W120 mm x H25 mm
Weight：135g
Rated Speed：1500 RPM±10% (MAX)
Noise Level：25.6 dB
Air Flow：66.17 CFM (MAX)
Air Pressure：1.53 mm H2O (MAX)
Ampere：0.20 A
Connector：4 Pin (PWM Fan connector)
Bearing Type : S-FDB Bearing
Memory clearance is not a problem as you just raise the front fan up a little which does not seem to affect performance as this is what I have done with mine on my last two builds.
I should also mention that Thermalright does several very good AIO's if that's the OP's preference. The Frozen Notte 360 in particular is very good but the fans are loud at full pelt. The Aqua Elite V3 360 is slightly worse on performance but is much quieter which you can see in a review of them both
here. One that does look very interesting is the Frozen Warframe Pro 360 with it's digital screen on top of the pump/block but I can't find any reviews on it. Going by the fan specs it should be around the Frozen Notte in terms of performance/noise. I wouldn't pay the prices for any of them on here though.
