Noctua D12L or U12A for the most quiet operation possible?

[cifroes]

I need to a buy a new cooler for a 5800x to put on a case cooler master silencio 352. My main goal with this upgrade is to be as quiet as possible in low usage of the cpu. 

 

I was gonna buy the D12L to fit my case since it says the limit for the cooler is 155mm but I've since saw many builds with that case using 158mm coolers so it seems there's a bit of tolerance there. Per Noctua performance rating the U12A is better and in my country it's only 7€ more expensive than the D12L. 

 

My question is if the U12A will be quieter and is worth the extra bucks or the D12L is more than enough for my needs?

[filpo]

1 minute ago, cifroes said:

I need to a buy a new cooler for a 5800x to put on a case cooler master silencio 352. My main goal with this upgrade is to be as quiet as possible in low usage of the cpu. 

 

I was gonna buy the D12L to fit my case since it says the limit for the cooler is 155mm but I've since saw many builds with that case using 158mm coolers so it seems there's a bit of tolerance there. Per Noctua performance rating the U12A is better and in my country it's only 7€ more expensive than the D12L. 

 

My question is if the U12A will be quieter and is worth the extra bucks or the D12L is more than enough for my needs?

Neither, get a liquid freezer 280 ii or the 240

[szaszm]

Anything but the crappiest coolers will be quiet when not under load. But even under load, it's not that difficult to keep a 5800X from thermal throttling. My SFF build achieves that with an NH-L9a, which is significantly less capable than either of your options. Based on that, both of your suggestions are more than capable of keeping the CPU temps under control, and it will be super quiet when not under load.

 

edit: You may need to limit or disable PBO, or slightly undervolt if you want it to be quiet even under load. If your definition of quiet is "not audible in an empty, rural library", as opposed to "rarely noticeable in a typical flat", then you may need to disable PBO even with the D12L.

Edited May 23, 2023 by szaszm
added details

[Somerandomtechyboi]

Dont be so glued to noctua and get yourself a peerless assassin/phantom spirit 120 which will annihilate both of those overpriced noctuas, equivalent to a d15 in performance so you can turn down the fans and now its quieter than both while being alot cheaper

[NF-A12x25]

another good one is the silver soul 135

[cifroes]

4 hours ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Dont be so glued to noctua and get yourself a peerless assassin/phantom spirit 120 which will annihilate both of those overpriced noctuas, equivalent to a d15 in performance so you can turn down the fans and now its quieter than both while being alot cheaper

Would love that but can’t get thermal right stuff in my country and my local Amazon has those very very overpriced so it makes them similar to noctua  

[Somerandomtechyboi]

8 minutes ago, cifroes said:

Would love that but can’t get thermal right stuff in my country and my local Amazon has those very very overpriced so it makes them similar to noctua  

What country?

[cifroes]

On 5/23/2023 at 4:53 PM, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Dont be so glued to noctua and get yourself a peerless assassin/phantom spirit 120 which will annihilate both of those overpriced noctuas, equivalent to a d15 in performance so you can turn down the fans and now its quieter than both while being alot cheaper

Looks like I get them from amazon.es. 

 

peerless assassin 120 at 55€

peerless assassin 120 SE at 42€

 

They are cheaper with probably same performance. Question is: are they gonna be quieter than a noctua?

[Somerandomtechyboi]

5 hours ago, cifroes said:

Looks like I get them from amazon.es. 

 

peerless assassin 120 at 55€

peerless assassin 120 SE at 42€

 

They are cheaper with probably same performance. Question is: are they gonna be quieter than a noctua?

I mean theyll cool better than either of the two so you can just lower the fan speed and get the same temps with less noise

 

And go for the se theres no diff between the regular and se aside from aesthetics and i dont see a reason to pay 13€ for some random aesthetic you wont notice

[RevGAM]

6 hours ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

I mean theyll cool better than either of the two so you can just lower the fan speed and get the same temps with less noise

 

And go for the se theres no diff between the regular and se aside from aesthetics and i dont see a reason to pay 13€ for some random aesthetic you wont notice

That is incorrect. The SE has a somewhat different design, including dimensions, fewer fins

 

Peerless Assassin 120 SE

• L125 mm x W110 mm x H155 mm

• Weight：730g

Peerless Assassin 120

• L125 mm x W135 mm x H157 mm

• Weight：750g

• No cover

Ultimately, though, aside for fitting different mobo/RAM configs, and the SE being lighter, there shouldn't be any significant performance differences. 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

57 minutes ago, RevGAM said:

That is incorrect. The SE has a somewhat different design, including dimensions, fewer fins

 

Peerless Assassin 120 SE

• L125 mm x W110 mm x H155 mm

• Weight：730g

Peerless Assassin 120

• L125 mm x W135 mm x H157 mm

• Weight：750g

• No cover

Ultimately, though, aside for fitting different mobo/RAM configs, and the SE being lighter, there shouldn't be any significant performance differences. 

Idk they look the same aside from the top cover thingy being removed

[RevGAM]

21 minutes ago, Somerandomtechyboi said:

Idk they look the same aside from the top cover thingy being removed

And they have the same af & sp.

[cifroes]

On 5/30/2023 at 7:32 AM, Somerandomtechyboi said:

I mean theyll cool better than either of the two so you can just lower the fan speed and get the same temps with less noise

 

And go for the se theres no diff between the regular and se aside from aesthetics and i dont see a reason to pay 13€ for some random aesthetic you wont notice

Thank you very much for your suggestions, I also always had that doubt about the SE. I'll investigate if the PA120SE will fit properly with my RAM and all of that.

The SE is actually more expensive today (prices float a lot) so today it's PA120 -42€   PA120 SE - 47€. I would probably just get the cheaper one at the time.

 

Problem with noctua is it's price tag. It's 100€. For 100€ I don't buy my intended 5800x but the 5800x3d which would be a great upgrade

 

 

Although I do have some coupons and partner discounts so my final prices would be:

noctua D12L - 52€

PA 120 - 34€

 

thanks again for great feedback

[Whatisthis]

Enjoy the PA. You can probably run it on just minimum fans without hitting thermal limits (I.e. set the fan curve to be at like 20% all the way to 80c+).