The Promised King Returns - Noctua NF-A12x25 Chromax is here, but is it too late?

[Dogzilla07]

18 minutes ago, GDRRiley said:

still no 140mm options
been really happy with my old (2015) 120mm LTT noctua fans and the pair of r industrial140mm. and redux 120mm.

if they get a 140mm out I'd be temped to move to all A12-25/A14-25 in black.

Heh, my reaction exactly, I'm giddy like a little kid, waiting for 140mm LCP fans to show up xD, have been ever since the Phanteks tradeshow booth showing ther 140x30mm and 120x30mm stuff way back in 2018

 

I've been basing my pc hardware purchases around a dream build with 140x30mm (Air cooler that fits 140x30mm in between two heatsink towers, shortest possible ATX psu, narrowing down future case to full 3x140mm model, etc, ...), with Noctua 140x25mm LCP as backup (whichever ones end up being better)

[DeScruff]

11 hours ago, Moonzy said:

i have a question

 

why did it take so long just to change a color? how can changing the color change the performance of a fan? does choice of material affect fan performance THAT much? we're talking a color swap, i don't think a huge change is required to achieve that

It might not be performance that was the problem, but consistency of the manufacturing.
 

Remember how much of a freakout there was when Noctua introduced fans that were made in China vs Taiwan? And how it turns out there was little to no difference in performance besides the slight difference in color?
Imagine that happening again because the fans made 5 months after launch don't look exactly like the ones at launch.

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

Yea its definitely too late. Fans like toughfan, msi gale and scythe wonder snail have been out in the market for some time now. 

 

But fans of noctua will be happy. 

[Stahlmann]

11 hours ago, TVwazhere said:

140mm are still slated for a Q1 2022 reveal, however it should be noted that this roadmap has not been updated sine June 2021; so it's possible there will be delays. Given that they're starting to hit their targets though, it's looking more likely that they will actually produce a 140mm variant. 

 

Source (reference for latest updates)

Thing is every time the roadmap gets an update it's because something is being pushed back.

 

So no update is good i guess

[Dogzilla07]

On 10/13/2021 at 3:51 AM, Kinda Bottlenecked said:

Yea its definitely too late. Fans like toughfan, msi gale and scythe wonder snail have been out in the market for some time now. 

Wondersnails Machines&More youtuber tested had similar resonance issues like Arctic Cooling P12/P14. And there's been reports on reddit and forums of broken down Toughfans, and of vastly different quality of the finish/how same the color between users (The exact reason Noctua gives as too why they took so long).

 

There's also a report of a few broken down NF-A12x25 at about 4 years of usage (not retail units though)