Best Air CPU cooler 138mm & under and 120mm case fan recommendations for Gaming HTPC

[LapisSwordfish]

Budget (including currency): unlimited

Country: USA (can import)

 

Greetings, I’m planning on building an Raptor Lake Intel Z790 chipset gaming PC in an archaic Silverstone GD08 HTPC case this fall/winter. The CPU cooler maximum height is 138mm so I’d like to buy the absolute best performance cooler to hopefully be able to do some mild overclocking. I purchased a Noctua NH-U9S, but I’m open to any recommendations. I also bought an additional Noctua NF-A9 PWM fan for it.

 Also a stupid question but should I mount the cooler to that it is venting in an orientation that allows it to exhaust directly out the case fan like a normal ATX case would?

 

 

 

I’m also open to case fan recommendations. So far I’m considering 5x any of the following:

Noctua NF A12x25 PWM (a bit pricey)

Arctic P12 PWM PST,

Arctic P12 PWM PST CO, 

Scythe Kaze Flex 120 Black

XPG Vento Pro 120 PWM (Nidec Gentle Typhoon).

 

Whatever you guys believe can help this HTPC form factor case to unlock it’s potential to perform it’s best as a gaming PC.

 

Many thanks in advance.

 

[Ophidio]

Personally I would go with Noctua fans just because of the silence. Especially for a HTPC, you wouldn't really want noise from fans being loud an obnoxious when trying to enjoy some sweet precious multimedia. They are pricey but when it comes to how quiet they are and their longevity it's totally worth it. 

 

The cooler you chose is definitely the best you can get int hat class so I wouldn't change that. As for your "stupid question" I would try and exhaust as much heat out as you can since it's an HTPC case. You don't want that heat just sitting in the case causing other components to heat up and get hotter than they should. 

 

Curious though, why a Z790 chipset? Do you plan on overclocking? Depending on what CPU you go with I don't see you having much headroom for overclocking in such a small case with a low profile cooler, especially if you were to choose an i7 or i9 as the CPU. 

[LapisSwordfish]

19 minutes ago, Ophidio said:

Personally I would go with Noctua fans just because of the silence. Especially for a HTPC, you wouldn't really want noise from fans being loud an obnoxious when trying to enjoy some sweet precious multimedia. They are pricey but when it comes to how quiet they are and their longevity it's totally worth it. 

 

The cooler you chose is definitely the best you can get int hat class so I wouldn't change that. As for your "stupid question" I would try and exhaust as much heat out as you can since it's an HTPC case. You don't want that heat just sitting in the case causing other components to heat up and get hotter than they should. 

 

Curious though, why a Z790 chipset? Do you plan on overclocking? Depending on what CPU you go with I don't see you having much headroom for overclocking in such a small case with a low profile cooler, especially if you were to choose an i7 or i9 as the CPU. 

I understand about the silence of the Noctua fans, but I just wanted the best for the situation giving the cramped nature of HTPC cases and didn’t know if higher RPM or higher static pressure was the way to go. Besides, the PWN fans should all be about the same when just playing media, no? I also usually have some sort of AC or Air Purifier going so I’m rarely in an ideal sound environment, but it’s definitely going to be used for movies and music.

 

Why Z790? Future proof with the PCIe Gen 5 M.2 SSD compatibility. I also plan on getting a an AMD 7900 XT GPU and rocking some higher speed DDR5. I’m getting out of non-retro console gaming and am just trying to buy all new generation components. Luckily everything is coming out around now so I’ll even pick up a PSU with the new slim 12VHPWR H+ PCIe connector. 

 

As for overclocking, I’ve just always found it such and easy & cheap way to milk extra gaming performance out of a CPU. It’s not necessary, but I’ve done it in an HTPC in the past, lol.

[Livin]

41 minutes ago, LapisSwordfish said:

The CPU cooler maximum height is 138mm so I’d like to buy the absolute best performance cooler to hopefully be able to do some mild overclocking. I purchased a Noctua NH-U9S, but I’m open to any recommendations

I used an NH-C14S which falls in that specification for a height restricted build recently and it performs really well.  I have the fan bottom mounted in "low profile" mode sucking through the heatsink.  With that Silverstone case though it may not be great for the airflow patterns the case (my application was in an old Antec Skeleton which is open air).  I could see it working well with some vents cut in directly above the CPU socket, especially if you're willing to go the extra mile to shroud that directly to the heatsink as that would give some great fresh air intake.  This does require some extra work though.

If you are interested in that direction, do make sure you check out their motherboard compatibility list as there can be clearance issues with some VRM heatsinks etc.

[LapisSwordfish]

45 minutes ago, Livin said:

I used an NH-C14S which falls in that specification for a height restricted build recently and it performs really well.  I have the fan bottom mounted in "low profile" mode sucking through the heatsink.  With that Silverstone case though it may not be great for the airflow patterns the case (my application was in an old Antec Skeleton which is open air).  I could see it working well with some vents cut in directly above the CPU socket, especially if you're willing to go the extra mile to shroud that directly to the heatsink as that would give some great fresh air intake.  This does require some extra work though.

If you are interested in that direction, do make sure you check out their motherboard compatibility list as there can be clearance issues with some VRM heatsinks etc.

I appreciate the reply. I was looking at the C14 original (used) & C14S as potential options, but I just wasn’t certain with the current configuration as well. Still, heat rises and theoretically should still get exhausted just fine. I was more concerned about the memory clearance and if the extra worry was worth it. I’m not worried exchanging my cooler thoughts if there’s something better for my case. I’m considering having my case modded for a window if I incidentally end up with some cool RGB components, but for the time being I don’t believe I’m capable of modding my case by myself (and doing a good job whilst retaining all my fingers!)

[Somerandomtechyboi]

7 hours ago, LapisSwordfish said:

Why Z790? Future proof with the PCIe Gen 5 M.2 SSD compatibility. I also plan on getting a an AMD 7900 XT GPU and rocking some higher speed DDR5

Gen4 is useless enough as is with basically nothing using it (other than content creators) and any differences for normal use being non existent or not noticable, imagine wasting on a gen5 which is gonna be even more useless, i bet even the damn content creators could give less of a shit unless were talking the ones that do 16k video or some sht like that, at this point its prob only be useful for data crunching reasearch machines

 

ddr5 is also just stupid, very useless and expensive, just like >12 years ago on 775, ddr3 didnt benifit 775 much due to nb not being able to utilise the speed so everyone went with ddr2, ddr5 doesnt give much of a speed benifit yet so ddr4 makes more sense, maybe itll make sense when you get a ddr5 only platform like am5 or whatever the the hell 14th gen will use since you also get ipc increase which may actually be able to use ddr5 speed

[LapisSwordfish]

8 hours ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Gen4 is useless enough as is with basically nothing using it (other than content creators) and any differences for normal use being non existent or not noticable, imagine wasting on a gen5 which is gonna be even more useless, i bet even the damn content creators could give less of a shit unless were talking the ones that do 16k video or some sht like that, at this point its prob only be useful for data crunching reasearch machines

 

ddr5 is also just stupid, very useless and expensive, just like >12 years ago on 775, ddr3 didnt benifit 775 much due to nb not being able to utilise the speed so everyone went with ddr2, ddr5 doesnt give much of a speed benifit yet so ddr4 makes more sense, maybe itll make sense when you get a ddr5 only platform like am5 or whatever the the hell 14th gen will use since you also get ipc increase which may actually be able to use ddr5 speed

With all due respect that wasn’t my question. I appreciate the advice, but I don’t build PCs often and was looking to future proof as much as possible. Either way I have decided to to go with a different case for better CPU cooling so this thread is successfully concluded. Thanks for looking out.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

19 minutes ago, LapisSwordfish said:

With all due respect that wasn’t my question. I appreciate the advice, but I don’t build PCs often and was looking to future proof as much as possible. Either way I have decided to to go with a different case for better CPU cooling so this thread is successfully concluded. Thanks for looking out.

Gen5 will be useless for a very long time so dont bother, and actually gen4 can go for very good deals, i mean theres a freakin gammix s70 blade 2tb at 200$ which has the same speeds as a 980 pro, prob still useless but it doesnt hurt to spend an extra 30 ish $ over a gen3 for futureproofing unlike the >100$ likely for gen4 -> gen5 gap

 

if you do wanna save a few $ later on and problably outspeed the ddr5 standards of the next few years then ddr5 6000+ or hynix bare pcb with 16gbit a die, you can run slow speeds for now and as platforms get better theyll be able to clock higher so for a conservative estimate id say 8000mhz capable in the next few years, i mean look at crucial 2666 bare pcb with rev e, those can go 4600+ cl18, so i dont see why ddr5 wont do the same. Sure you are prob not gonna save that much but hey atleast you get a minor performance uplift and prob bragging rights that your old ram is outspeeding new standard ram

 

also just get z690 unless z790 has something you want, thing is you are prob best off swapping platforms every 3-5 years since theres gonna be a massive performance gap when jumping 3 or more gens ahead and 700 boards are gonna be the end of the line for lga 1700 before the next socket since intel keeps swapping sockets. Also im talking platform upgrade not full pc upgrade so if you wanna  futureproof i reccomend overkilling the psu, good expandable case, overkill cooler, ssd, basically everything thats not the cpu mobo or gpu (though more ram is useless if its not needed and fast ram as i mentioned can be obtained for cheap via bare pcbs)

[LapisSwordfish]

47 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Gen5 will be useless for a very long time so dont bother, and actually gen4 can go for very good deals, i mean theres a freakin gammix s70 blade 2tb at 200$ which has the same speeds as a 980 pro, prob still useless but it doesnt hurt to spend an extra 30 ish $ over a gen3 for futureproofing unlike the >100$ likely for gen4 -> gen5 gap

 

if you do wanna save a few $ later on and problably outspeed the ddr5 standards of the next few years then ddr5 6000+ or hynix bare pcb with 16gbit a die, you can run slow speeds for now and as platforms get better theyll be able to clock higher so for a conservative estimate id say 8000mhz capable in the next few years, i mean look at crucial 2666 bare pcb with rev e, those can go 4600+ cl18, so i dont see why ddr5 wont do the same. Sure you are prob not gonna save that much but hey atleast you get a minor performance uplift and prob bragging rights that your old ram is outspeeding new standard ram

 

also just get z690 unless z790 has something you want, thing is you are prob best off swapping platforms every 3-5 years since theres gonna be a massive performance gap when jumping 3 or more gens ahead and 700 boards are gonna be the end of the line for lga 1700 before the next socket since intel keeps swapping sockets. Also im talking platform upgrade not full pc upgrade so if you wanna  futureproof i reccomend overkilling the psu, good expandable case, overkill cooler, ssd, basically everything thats not the cpu mobo or gpu (though more ram is useless if its not needed and fast ram as i mentioned can be obtained for cheap via bare pcbs)

Very informative, thank you. I unfortunately have some serious health issues so I don’t really plan on upgrading again. Do you think it’s wise to buy a GPU like a 7900 XT this fall as I hear that GPUs are now hard to get, and then buy the case/psu/cooler followed by cpu/mobo/memory when Meteor lake drops? LGA 1700 isn’t even a year old, will the next socket really be that mind blowing to make holding off worth it?
 

I won’t have the money to upgrade individual parts besides a maybe crossfire in the future when gpu prices drop, if multi GPU is even still relevant.

[Somerandomtechyboi]

7 hours ago, LapisSwordfish said:

Very informative, thank you. I unfortunately have some serious health issues so I don’t really plan on upgrading again. Do you think it’s wise to buy a GPU like a 7900 XT this fall as I hear that GPUs are now hard to get, and then buy the case/psu/cooler followed by cpu/mobo/memory when Meteor lake drops? LGA 1700 isn’t even a year old, will the next socket really be that mind blowing to make holding off worth it?
 

I won’t have the money to upgrade individual parts besides a maybe crossfire in the future when gpu prices drop, if multi GPU is even still relevant.

Multi gpu has been dead for a long time so no

 

And by platform upgrade i mean just swapping the cpu and board since everything else is futureproofed