Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 initial impression and review

[Filingo]

The cooler looks really nice. It comes with all the items necessary to install on either AM4 or the latest Intel sockets.

It doesn't come with a screwdriver like some other coolers, but you don't need it because it has access to the mounting screws, unlike some coolers where you need to insert a long screw driver to a tiny hole

 

 

 

It comes with a TF7 thermal paste:

 

 

PC specs:

Case: Fractal Design Define C Tempered Glass

CPU: Ryzen 5 5600x

Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 Tomahawk

RAM: Crucial Ballistix RGB 3200 32GB (16x2) (BL2K16G32C16U4BL)

 

Installation:

I did not remove the motherboard from the case, I installed it while it's in the case and it was not too difficult, except for the part where you need to install the heatsink itself to the metal brackets because the screws on the heatsink are sort hollow and have threads on the inside (How it's called?), and you need to align them on the two pins in the middle of the metal brackets, so you can't really feel if you're in the correct place as if it were two holes instead and it just goes inside.

The fans are easy to mount, the metal clips don't require much force to stretch them over to the heatsink

There is no issue with RAM clearance in my case, it fits perfectly

 

!!!Important for those who don't know!!!

AMD has weird issue where the old heatsink that's already installed is glued to the CPU because of the thermal paste, so be careful when trying to remove the old heatsink. I ran Prime95 for 10 minutes and it still did nothing, it was stuck! The thermal paste is very new, less than 1 month old and it still got stuck. So after you run a stress test, make sure you gently, without applying much force, rotate the old heatsink left and right (after unscrewing the screws), in small movements, until you can get more freedom to rotate more and more, and then it should be easier to lift it up.

 

 

 

Performance:

How I tested: I turned the AC on to 25°C, so I hope it made the test constant.

The case was closed, also at the top (The Define C has an option to open the top plate but it was closed)

I used the default fan setup of the Define C: 1 fan at the front and 1 fan at the rear

 

AMD Stock Cooler (PBO Disabled):

Idle temp: 45^°C

Prime95: 87^°C

Passmark CPU Mark: 20793

 

AMD Stock Cooler (PBO Enabled, MSI "Game Boost" mode in BIOS):

Prime95: 87^°C

Prime95: The CPU throttles to 95°C immediately, so I stopped the test

 

Peerless Assassin 120 (PBO Disabled):

Idle temp: 32°C                   

Prime95: 65^°C

 

Peerless Assassin 120 (PBO Enabled):

Idle temp: 32°C                   

Prime95: 81^°C

Passmark CPU Mark: 23827

 

Peerless Assassin 120 (PBO Enabled + Auto OC to 4750 MHz):

Idle temp: 32°C                   

Prime95: 84°C

Passmark CPU Mark: 24019

 

**I'm not sure why the difference is so little between PBO without OC and PBO+OC, I thought it should be higher, also voltages seem a bit high when using Auto OC so I disabled it after the tests (it reached over 1.4v)

 

Noise:

This was one of the most interesting things for me to test because of all the reviews complaining about high noise or high pitched sound, but those fans spin at 1500 RPM so I didn't expect them to be too silent. The problem was that the AC was quite loud already and it's a small room, and then I had no time to test it with the AC off, so I will update this as soon as I can.

 

 

But it looks good:

(The front fan is a little bit down in this photo, I fixed it later)

 

Let me know if you want me to test anything else

Edit: I might test it with single fan as well. It cools so well that I'm not sure I need both fans, and then it won't hide the other RGB RAM stick

[freeagent]

It looks good in white. I might have to get a white FC140.

[Filingo]

23 minutes ago, freeagent said:

It looks good in white. I might have to get a white FC140.

Yes, look how beautiful it looks:

 (In this photo, the front fan was a little bit too much down, not I lifted it)

[freeagent]

That is spankalicious, me like.

[Filingo]

13 minutes ago, freeagent said:

That is spankalicious, me like.

Haha

I bought white because the Define C has white fans and white slots covers so it's like a panda.

 

Also I edited my main post, you can see that the front fan hides the second RAM, and since the PA120 cools so well, I might just remove this fan completely to unhide it- what says you? It shouldn't be too bad right? I'll test it anyway

[alyen]

I thought about getting one of these heat sinks when I found out they were so much cheaper. Can the front fan be moved up higher away from the RAM if more clearance is needed?

[Filingo]

9 minutes ago, alyen said:

I thought about getting one of these heat sinks when I found out they were so much cheaper. Can the front fan be moved up higher away from the RAM if more clearance is needed?

I think you can move it up a little bit as long as the metal clips can hold, tomorrow I am planning to completely remove the fan so I will check it.

 

Also, you can install the fan at the rear instead of the front (like what I have in the picture), if you have room for it.

I might test that as well.

 

[freeagent]

1 hour ago, Filingo said:

I might just remove this fan completely to unhide it- what says you?

I say go for it, you may lose 1-3c but its not that big of a deal. I was running 1 fan on my cooler for a month or so, just to see how it dealt with summer. I have the front fan on right now, but I might take it off since I cant see my ram anymore

[Filingo]

11 hours ago, alyen said:

I thought about getting one of these heat sinks when I found out they were so much cheaper. Can the front fan be moved up higher away from the RAM if more clearance is needed?

I just checked it, as long as the clip can go forward, it holds the fan firmly, and the clearance at max is around 5.5cm from the base of the motherboard:

(The fan is a little bit out, but who cares? It's still pretty, and you can take the second fan out to match it ) 

 

 

 

 

 

 

9 hours ago, freeagent said:

I say go for it, you may lose 1-3c but its not that big of a deal. I was running 1 fan on my cooler for a month or so, just to see how it dealt with summer. I have the front fan on right now, but I might take it off since I cant see my ram anymore

As soon as I test the noise, I will remove the second fan and make another test.

Also from what I see now, the fans are noticable at 1200 RPM, but I just set my curve to never spin more than 1200 RPM then, because it cools too well even below 1200 RPM

 

Also, it's noticable at 1200 only when I open the glass panel, and put my head close to it, since the PSU I am using is very noisy, it's a shitty 450W PSU. So until I replace this PSU, I can't really test the noise from it well, but, it looks good so far!

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

Excellent write up.

 

Oh and add to another fact that thermalright packages the heatsink and fans separately in a thick closed cell foam that encapsulates all the components tightly. The box itself will surely be able to take a beating. 

 

The tf7 thermal paste is a nice touch. I am surprised they gave that much. Its now my default thermal paste and it saved me from buying a new one. 

[Filingo]

9 minutes ago, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

Excellent write up.

 

Oh and add to another fact that thermalright packages the heatsink and fans separately in a thick closed cell foam that encapsulates all the components tightly. The box itself will surely be able to take a beating. 

 

The tf7 thermal paste is a nice touch. I am surprised they gave that much. Its now my default thermal paste and it saved me from buying a new one. 

Yes! That's why I didn't return it after seeing the wet box, the foam is extra thick (Will upload photos later)

Yep, and I applied the TF7 as they showed in the video, and it's doing really well:

[freeagent]

TF7 is pretty good.. but if you guys like that you should try some TFX.. awesome sauce right there. I am using SYY-157, great stuff cheap as borscht too. I have like 20 grams of it lol..

[Filingo]

6 hours ago, freeagent said:

TF7 is pretty good.. but if you guys like that you should try some TFX.. awesome sauce right there. I am using SYY-157, great stuff cheap as borscht too. I have like 20 grams of it lol..

privet haha, let's see if I can get it, although I just think most of thermal pastes are within 1-2C difference so I never worry too much about the paste itself

[anggatape]

are this cooler can be install on matx board with gpu on first slot?

i had msi B450m mortar, which is no big rom for giant cooler.

[Ludens997]

On 11/2/2021 at 11:29 PM, anggatape said:

are this cooler can be install on matx board with gpu on first slot?

i had msi B450m mortar, which is no big rom for giant cooler.

I installed it on a MSI B550M Mortar Wifi with the GPU in the first slot and it is perfect, it is not a very tall or long heatsink.

[Dogzilla07]

 

[Lurking]

Does anyone know what the exact difference is between the SE and the regular? To me it looks like the SE has fewer optical improvements and is a bit smaller. Is there a thermal or noise difference? 

 

Google yielded this old spec image (not on website anymore) indicating the SE has 3 fewer fins. SE is $3 cheaper, FWIW. 

[FIXXX]

10 hours ago, Lurking said:

Does anyone know what the exact difference is between the SE and the regular? To me it looks like the SE has fewer optical improvements and is a bit smaller. Is there a thermal or noise difference? 

 

Google yielded this old spec image (not on website anymore) indicating the SE has 3 fewer fins. SE is $3 cheaper, FWIW. 

[Filingo]

On 3/13/2023 at 10:12 AM, Dogzilla07 said:

 

Damn isn't it the best Air cooler in the chart? nice

[yen1co]

Hey @Filingo, so have you tested it with only one fan?

[Filingo]

On 3/21/2023 at 2:23 PM, yen1co said:

Hey @Filingo, so have you tested it with only one fan?

Haha no, with 2. But maybe I suck at installing CPU radiators so my results are worse? They are still pretty good . Btw I'm still using it lol 

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

I might get one and use only the middle fan.

[Filingo]

17 hours ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

I might get one and use only the middle fan.

Should still be good enough

[Chree]

On 10/7/2021 at 11:04 AM, Filingo said:

The cooler looks really nice. It comes with all the items necessary to install on either AM4 or the latest Intel sockets.

It doesn't come with a screwdriver like some other coolers, but you don't need it because it has access to the mounting screws, unlike some coolers where you need to insert a long screw driver to a tiny hole

 

 

 

It comes with a TF7 thermal paste:

 

 

PC specs:

Case: Fractal Design Define C Tempered Glass

CPU: Ryzen 5 5600x

Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 Tomahawk

RAM: Crucial Ballistix RGB 3200 32GB (16x2) (BL2K16G32C16U4BL)

 

Installation:

I did not remove the motherboard from the case, I installed it while it's in the case and it was not too difficult, except for the part where you need to install the heatsink itself to the metal brackets because the screws on the heatsink are sort hollow and have threads on the inside (How it's called?), and you need to align them on the two pins in the middle of the metal brackets, so you can't really feel if you're in the correct place as if it were two holes instead and it just goes inside.

The fans are easy to mount, the metal clips don't require much force to stretch them over to the heatsink

There is no issue with RAM clearance in my case, it fits perfectly

 

!!!Important for those who don't know!!!

AMD has weird issue where the old heatsink that's already installed is glued to the CPU because of the thermal paste, so be careful when trying to remove the old heatsink. I ran Prime95 for 10 minutes and it still did nothing, it was stuck! The thermal paste is very new, less than 1 month old and it still got stuck. So after you run a stress test, make sure you gently, without applying much force, rotate the old heatsink left and right (after unscrewing the screws), in small movements, until you can get more freedom to rotate more and more, and then it should be easier to lift it up.

 

 

 

Performance:

How I tested: I turned the AC on to 25°C, so I hope it made the test constant.

The case was closed, also at the top (The Define C has an option to open the top plate but it was closed)

I used the default fan setup of the Define C: 1 fan at the front and 1 fan at the rear

 

AMD Stock Cooler (PBO Disabled):

Idle temp: 45^°C

Prime95: 87^°C

Passmark CPU Mark: 20793

 

AMD Stock Cooler (PBO Enabled, MSI "Game Boost" mode in BIOS):

Prime95: 87^°C

Prime95: The CPU throttles to 95°C immediately, so I stopped the test

 

Peerless Assassin 120 (PBO Disabled):

Idle temp: 32°C                   

Prime95: 65^°C

 

Peerless Assassin 120 (PBO Enabled):

Idle temp: 32°C                   

Prime95: 81^°C

Passmark CPU Mark: 23827

 

Peerless Assassin 120 (PBO Enabled + Auto OC to 4750 MHz):

Idle temp: 32°C                   

Prime95: 84°C

Passmark CPU Mark: 24019

 

**I'm not sure why the difference is so little between PBO without OC and PBO+OC, I thought it should be higher, also voltages seem a bit high when using Auto OC so I disabled it after the tests (it reached over 1.4v)

 

Noise:

This was one of the most interesting things for me to test because of all the reviews complaining about high noise or high pitched sound, but those fans spin at 1500 RPM so I didn't expect them to be too silent. The problem was that the AC was quite loud already and it's a small room, and then I had no time to test it with the AC off, so I will update this as soon as I can.

 

 

But it looks good:

(The front fan is a little bit down in this photo, I fixed it later)

 

Let me know if you want me to test anything else

Edit: I might test it with single fan as well. It cools so well that I'm not sure I need both fans, and then it won't hide the other RGB RAM stick

you have the cooler on upside down. the correct orientation puts the mass of pipes opposite of the GPU.

[Filingo]

On 7/3/2023 at 4:34 AM, Chree said:

you have the cooler on upside down. the correct orientation puts the mass of pipes opposite of the GPU.

Really? I just following their official YouTube video where it shows that this is the orientation:

 

 

 

 

should I try the other way around?