Noctua NH-D14/D15 actually worth it? New Cooling (Eventually)

[TehCaucasianAsian]

I'm considering upgrading my current budget PC sometime in the second half of 2015, and I'm still a little skeptical of liquid cooling, especially AIO's. I'm interested in the NZXT Kraken X41, since according to Linus' own video, it's so close in performance to the X61, very VERY competitive to the NH-D15 which isn't that much cheaper and way uglier, but there's evaporation to worry about, and making sure my case has a 140mm fan mount and space for the radiator, because drilling extra holes... yeah, no thank you.

 

I'm perfectly fine with having to change some case choices if need be, and the case I want (NZXT H440) will work as it is, but my mind could change within 6 or more months by the time I upgrade. Why ask this quesyion so far from an upgrade? Well, cooling seems to take FOREVER to get upgrades. Take the NH-D14. released about 5 or so years ago, and THIS YEAR got an upgrade. Yeah, and it's still relevant. Asking now won't hurt, probably. Anyway, I digress. I know the NH Coolers are very premium, insanely quiet, and perform amazingly for such low RPM's on the fans. The engineering is amazing, and I'm quite impressed by it. However, Noctua coolers are rather large. But then again, so are other tower heatsinks. From what I read, the Hyper 212 Evo is just as tall as the NH-D14, just not as wide and smaller fan(s).

 

If this at least even a little true, then me having a 212 Evo currently would make me not want to upgrade it, instead just slapping some Noctua fans on it to run push-pull. Is the Noctua Worth it?? Should I get an AIO?? I want to build a PC that can overclock well (clock speed depends on CPU, probably a 4790K or a Broadwell chip, or if AMD releases early, their new architecture chips), but is also quiet. Would putting Noctua fans on an X41/X61 be a good idea?? Are all the issues of liquid cooling worth it? This guy needs some answers, and would appreciate the help. To summarize this mile-long post, should I keep the 212 Evo, get a Noctua, or an AIO? Thanks, broskis :3.

[Raudi_]

I'm considering upgrading my current budget PC sometime in the second half of 2015, and I'm still a little skeptical of liquid cooling, especially AIO's. I'm interested in the NZXT Kraken X41, since according to Linus' own video, it's so close in performance to the X61, very VERY competitive to the NH-D15 which isn't that much cheaper and way uglier, but there's evaporation to worry about, and making sure my case has a 140mm fan mount and space for the radiator, because drilling extra holes... yeah, no thank you.

 

I'm perfectly fine with having to change some case choices if need be, and the case I want (NZXT H440) will work as it is, but my mind could change within 6 or more months by the time I upgrade. Why ask this quesyion so far from an upgrade? Well, cooling seems to take FOREVER to get upgrades. Take the NH-D14. released about 5 or so years ago, and THIS YEAR got an upgrade. Yeah, and it's still relevant. Asking now won't hurt, probably. Anyway, I digress. I know the NH Coolers are very premium, insanely quiet, and perform amazingly for such low RPM's on the fans. The engineering is amazing, and I'm quite impressed by it. However, Noctua coolers are rather large. But then again, so are other tower heatsinks. From what I read, the Hyper 212 Evo is just as tall as the NH-D14, just not as wide and smaller fan(s).

 

If this at least even a little true, then me having a 212 Evo currently would make me not want to upgrade it, instead just slapping some Noctua fans on it to run push-pull. Is the Noctua Worth it?? Should I get an AIO?? I want to build a PC that can overclock well (clock speed depends on CPU, probably a 4790K or a Broadwell chip, or if AMD releases early, their new architecture chips), but is also quiet. Would putting Noctua fans on an X41/X61 be a good idea?? Are all the issues of liquid cooling worth it? This guy needs some answers, and would appreciate the help. To summarize this mile-long post, should I keep the 212 Evo, get a Noctua, or an AIO? Thanks, broskis :3.

I have the D14 on my i7 4770k and at 1.35v 4.6GHz gets me around 75C when rendering/encoding videos. gaming it barely creeps over 65C

[LancerBG]

I use an H100i and use to have a D14. Its a one degree difference pretty much for my uses which are mostly gaming and a mild OC sometimes...I use 2 profiles. Honestly for my use I think I will be ditching the self contained water loop units in favor of the D15 on my next build only because they are much quieter. Noise is really my issue not heat. I put Noctua fans on the H100i and it seemed to perform worse even after a reseat and a few performance tweaks. 

 

My case is a high air flow case so its not designed to be quiet. It sits down and to the right of me, about 4 feet from my ears if any of that matters in your decision making. 

[VincentiusIV]

Keep the hyper 212 evo.

When your temperatures are stopping you from oc'ing further , but you want more? Buy the noctua nh d15.

If looks are big concern, buy the nzxt kraken x61.

Putting noctua fans on it will improve temps even more, but only for a few degrees.

And at the end of the day, you are paying 40 bucks for 2 noctua fans. If money is not an issue, go for the noctua fans. If money is an issue, then by all means don't buy them.

[bomerr]

I use an H100i and use to have a D14. Its a one degree difference pretty much for my uses which are mostly gaming and a mild OC sometimes...I use 2 profiles. Honestly for my use I think I will be ditching the self contained water loop units in favor of the D15 on my next build only because they are much quieter. Noise is really my issue not heat. I put Noctua fans on the H100i and it seemed to perform worse even after a reseat and a few performance tweaks. 

 

My case is a high air flow case so its not designed to be quiet. It sits down and to the right of me, about 4 feet from my ears if any of that matters in your decision making. 

Noctua fans are overrated in terms of performance. 

 

In short: you make fans more quiet by slowing the spin / moving low less air. 

 

Noctua air coolers feature such a massive heatsink that they don't need a lot of airflow. 

Therefore noctua can afford to put quiet yet weak fans onto their coolers.

Putting Noctua fans on a design that requires more air is a terrible idea. 

 

To the OP. I would recommend noctua air over AIO because eventually those AIO coolers will fail. 

As for the D14/D15 well not really unless you can find a sale. The U14S is what I use and it'll be good enough for most people. 

[TehCaucasianAsian]

Noctua fans are overrated in terms of performance. 

 

In short: you make fans more quiet by slowing the spin / moving low less air. 

 

Noctua air coolers feature such a massive heatsink that they don't need a lot of airflow. 

Therefore noctua can afford to put quiet yet weak fans onto their coolers.

Putting Noctua fans on a design that requires more air is a terrible idea. 

 

To the OP. I would recommend noctua air over AIO because eventually those AIO coolers will fail. 

As for the D14/D15 well not really unless you can find a sale. The U14S is what I use and it'll be good enough for most people. 

Are they actually weak? Cause people put them on cases, not just coolers, and get really good airflow at low speeds. I don't know, soooo yeah

[TehCaucasianAsian]

Keep the hyper 212 evo.

When your temperatures are stopping you from oc'ing further , but you want more? Buy the noctua nh d15.

If looks are big concern, buy the nzxt kraken x61.

Putting noctua fans on it will improve temps even more, but only for a few degrees.

And at the end of the day, you are paying 40 bucks for 2 noctua fans. If money is not an issue, go for the noctua fans. If money is an issue, then by all means don't buy them.

Alrighty, thanks for the reply and the help

[Raudi_]

Are they actually weak? Cause people put them on cases, not just coolers, and get really good airflow at low speeds. I don't know, soooo yeah

They are not weak they are pretty damn good for the noise level that they have have.

[bomerr]

Are they actually weak? Cause people put them on cases, not just coolers, and get really good airflow at low speeds. I don't know, soooo yeah

People don't know what good airflow is and/or have bought into the hype.

 

My Delta fans get GREAT airflow.... but they sound like a jumbo jet.

[Spev]

I have the NH-U14S, it's pretty good. AIOs look really nice, but you have to worry about failures. Many here on the forum favor AIOs and many have them, I have so far stayed away from them. I had a custom water cooling loop in my old PC for about 4 years, honestly I would rather make my own custom loop than buy an AIO. The pumps don't have to be crammed into a small CPU block, leaving less chance for failures especially if you get a nice one like the MCP655. Only cone is obviously the expensive and consuming your time. Anyways for now on my newly built PC I am using my NH-U14S I really don't know what I'm going to do in the future. A good number of the dual tower heatsinks cool JUST AS GOOD as the popular AIOs out there like the H100i, or even the Kracken x61, BUT you got that huge dual tower in your case..........so far I have stayed away. I like air cooling but that dual tower is just so massive idk if I wanna do that.

[bomerr]

I have the NH-U14S, it's pretty good. AIOs look really nice, but you have to worry about failures. Many here on the forum favor AIOs and many have them, I have so far stayed away from them. I had a custom water cooling loop in my old PC for about 4 years, honestly I would rather make my own custom loop than buy an AIO. The pumps don't have to be crammed into a small CPU block, leaving less chance for failures especially if you get a nice one like the MCP655. Only cone is obviously the expensive and consuming your time. Anyways for now on my newly built PC I am using my NH-U14S I really don't know what I'm going to do in the future. A good number of the dual tower heatsinks cool JUST AS GOOD as the popular AIOs out there like the H100i, or even the Kracken x61, BUT you got that huge dual tower in your case..........so far I have stayed away. I like air cooling but that dual tower is just so massive idk if I wanna do that.

 

From the reviews I have seen the dual towers only get like 1-3C better temp then our single tower coolers. Idk, just guessing here, but maybe for polonged rendering getting the dual tower could matter but def not for gaming. 

 

Plus with 2 towers there are two fans making noise. 

 

Oh ya btw I would not advise getting the D14. The D15 and U14S both feature the more efficient construction with the closed sides. (look at pics, you'll see what i mean)

[Spev]

From the reviews I have seen the dual towers only get like 1-3C better temp then our single tower coolers. Idk, just guessing here, but maybe for polonged rendering getting the dual tower could matter but def not for gaming. 

 

Plus with 2 towers there are two fans making noise. 

 

Oh ya btw I would not advise getting the D14. The D15 and U14S both feature the more efficient construction with the closed sides. (look at pics, you'll see what i mean)

Yeah I know pretty much about all the CPU coolers from Noctua. My U14s has the closed sides, and if I did go with a dual tower heatsink from Noctua it would be the D15 because it's the latest version. If you are interested in dual tower heatsinks you might wanna check out Cryorig. They have an R1 ultimate and R1 universal. They have proven in benchmarking tests to cool just as well or slightly better than the NH-D15, however it's like 5DB louder but that's pretty small. A plus to those is they look better IMO and kinda have a cool design, also they are designed to not sit over your ram but to sit more towards the back of the case unlike most dual tower CPU coolers that sit over all our ram slots.

[SurvivorNVL]

Noctua fans are overrated in terms of performance. 

 

In short: you make fans more quiet by slowing the spin / moving low less air. 

 

Noctua air coolers feature such a massive heatsink that they don't need a lot of airflow. 

Therefore noctua can afford to put quiet yet weak fans onto their coolers.

Putting Noctua fans on a design that requires more air is a terrible idea. 

 

To the OP. I would recommend noctua air over AIO because eventually those AIO coolers will fail. 

As for the D14/D15 well not really unless you can find a sale. The U14S is what I use and it'll be good enough for most people. 

To be fair Noctua's are considered well regarded and hyped fans due to their relatively high static pressure, decent move of ariflow between the 30% - 100% ranges of speed(be it voltage or PWM), and silence even at max fan loads.  They're not great in price to performance, but the premium is worth it for people who want fans that'll last a -good- long while and be versatile not only in airflow and silence, but static pressure for eventual watercooling setups(Proper ones, though they'd be good on AIO's).

[bomerr]

To be fair Noctua's are considered well regarded and hyped fans due to their relatively high static pressure, decent move of ariflow between the 30% - 100% ranges of speed(be it voltage or PWM), and silence even at max fan loads.  They're not great in price to performance, but the premium is worth it for people who want fans that'll last a -good- long while and be versatile not only in airflow and silence, but static pressure for eventual watercooling setups(Proper ones, though they'd be good on AIO's).

It's all marketing spin and/or hype.

 

Test a real server grade fan and you'll see what performance is. 

[Fragsa1]

It's all marketing spin and/or hype.

 

Test a real server grade fan and you'll see what performance is. 

 

Server grade fans don't give any assurances to silence.

 

Delta fans get up to +60dBa, that's insanity for a desktop computer. 

[bomerr]

Server grade fans don't give any assurances to silence.

 

Delta fans get up to +60dBa, that's insanity for a desktop computer. 

Ya exactly my point.

 

high performance = high noise. 

Inversely low performance = low noise.

 

My Noctua CPU fan is dead quiet it barely moves any air compared to my old Delta fan.