Spec. me a quiet CPU cooler

Soldato
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Hi folks, could anyone recommend me a quiet (or as quiet as possible) CPU cooler (no WC or AIO's) for a 6600k @ 4.6ghz? Don't want to spend more than £50 if possible. Many thanks.
 
What is your case CPU clearance? How tall is your RAM? How close is PCIe socket?

Asking for cooler recommendations without any of the above information is like asking for tire recommendations without telling us what you want to put them on. :p
 
What is your case CPU clearance? How tall is your RAM? How close is PCIe socket?

Asking for cooler recommendations without any of the above information is like asking for tire recommendations without telling us what you want to put them on. :p

It's a big case, it'll fit pretty much anything height wise. Ram clearance should be fine as it's low profile, PCI-E sockets are well out of the way.
 
I would go up to £55 and get something like
PH-TC14PE black for £53.99
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/phanteks-ph-tc14pe-cpu-cooler-black-hs-009-pt.html

Alpenfohn Olymp for £54.95
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/alpe...h-performance-cpu-cooler-140mm-hs-054-al.html

NH-U14S for £54.95
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/noct...lim-cpu-cooler-with-nf-a15-fan-hs-000-nd.html

They are among the best you can get and much lower priced then most similar top tier coolers.

If you want to pay less, drop down to Alpenfohn Matterhorn or Atlas, Ereboss, etc., but they will not give as good a cooler or be as quiet .

To me coolers are a long term investment. I haven't bought a cooler in donkey's years, I think the last one was PH-TC14PE when they first came out. I have some newer coolers that I have tested, but none are better.
 
It's about the colours!!!!

Doyll>Just the person I looking for. I am building a pc for a friend and he has a strict budget so all that is left from the budget is 30-40 anything in the range that you would recommend?

The cpu is a stock 6700k no OC the motherboard is MSI titanium z170a. HTe pci sockets are no where near at least not the important ones. and the ram is corsair vengeance led.
 
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i would have a noctua cooler over my aio if it wasnt for those god awful fan colours. i just dont get why they dont make them plain old black like normal.
 
Those test results are the result of inaccurate data collection, and have little meaning to us. They are only applicable to users with an identical system to theirs. But who has that exact system?

It does not take a rocket scientist to see how wrong the results are .NH-D15 is 2c cooler PH-TC14PE, but how can PH-TC12DX cool the same as PH-TC14PE? Answer is it can't. :D
  • They use room temp as baseline, not cooler intake air temp.
  • They are not testing different coolers to see how well the cooler perform against each other, but instead are testing their system to see how well it cools with different coolers.
  • Different coolers have different airflow rates, but the case has a constant airflow rate. When airflow rate of component changes, the airflow paths and temps inside of case change too.
  • To test coolers against other coolers we need to use the air temp going into cooler, not the room air temp. Then we can calculate a delta temp of how well each cooler performs against the other coolers and not how well the system performs. Even doing this can easily have a +/-1c margin of error, but that is way better then the +/-8c the cooler intake air temp is likely to be changing. :p
 
Yes, if you interpret it correctly. Some of the low wattage temps can be misleading. I don't pay much attention to low wattage testing. I have not tested a single cooler that performed among the best at extreme load (like 340w) that did not also perform extremely well at lower wattage loads. Only difference is they do it at lower fan speed and noise levels. I always compare performance by lower temperature and lower noise level.

For example Okeanos, D15, R1 & TC14PE are all within 2.2c of each other. But while TC14PE and D15 are within 0.3dB of each other (human ear needs 2-3dB to hear change), R1 is 2.9db louder (still no big deal) while Okeanos is 9.5db louder (we hear 10db change as twice as loud).

Another thing, sound in db pressure does not give us a true understanding. We do not know if the sound is pleasant or distracting. For example, R1 fans do not sound as smooth / nice to my ears as D15, TC14PE fans which do not sound as nice as Thermalright TY-14x and other of same design. And new Phanteks fans sound better than older models did .. and the difference is very very little anyway. In A/B side by side blind testing I can hear the difference, but if testing at different times I can only pick correctly 3 out of 5 times .. and that is when I'm stone sober. :D

Honestly the mount, sound/sound level and looks are as important if not more so than 3-8c difference in cooling at 340w. That and how well your case is setup to flow air to supply components with with air within 3-5c of room ambient under full load.

Sorry if I am confusing you with too much information. :o
 
I've got a Raijintek Themis currently and appears to be relatively cheap compared to many of the others. Now I've increased my OC, I am assessing how I could lower temps further. I'm unsure how my current cooler would compare on cpu temp compared the the more expensive ones or even a NH-D15? Struggling to find the info via google.
 
After reading some reviews, am I right in saying the Themis is good on a stock system, however when overclocking the 4 heatpipes and the single fan really makes this struggle with the temps at load?
 
H100i's and any of the H series from corsair are nice and quiet and keep CPU's very cool

Yeah, about a true as pigs fly.

Sorry, but CLC being quiet has been proven too be untrue so often it's not even funny. CLCs make more noise then good air coolers at same component temperatures.
 
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