Silence versus looks
After looking at your build, I've come up with a few questions that I think will give me everything I need.
1) How quiet is the be quiet!? Can you even tell when the machine is on?
2) How are the temperatures with it in relation to the D15? Is it a few degrees or more like 10? Do you think the temperature difference is worth how much better it looks than the noctua?
3) I saw you have the titanium R5, how does it look? I was thinking about getting one until I looked it up on YouTube, and it seemed like the black model with an ugly plastic mirror on the front.
1) Unfortunately I can't run my system at the moment, due to what appears to be a dead PSU. I'm waiting on an RMA replacement and crossing my fingers that the dying PSU didn't take out any other components. In the couple of hours I had it running I didn't have side panels on and I hadn't done any custom adjustments to the fan profiles. It was quite quiet, and gave me hope that I could get it to be almost silent at idle and low load.
2) From the reviews I read of the Dark Rock Pro 3 and the NH-D15 it appeared as though the temperature difference was significant, but not excessive, as long as you aren't intending to do heavy overclocking or have almost zero airflow in the case. This roundup from AnandTech is probably worth a read.
3) Having seen it in the flesh I might recommend the Black over the Titanium now. I think you're probably right about the looks. I thought it looked quite good in YouTube videos I watched, but it's not so great in person (to my eyes, at least). I went for the Titanium model because my current desktop (until I get the new one up and running...) is in an Antec P182 in gunmetal grey, and I really like the look of that.
Thanks for all your help so far, you've already convinced me to go with air cooling over water, now I just need to iron out the details
Edit: realised that was way more than a few questions, but I was trying to accurately define what I wanted to know
Double Edit: Just discovered the Phanteks PH-TC14PE, how do you think that would work? Looks good, and does well in the benchmarks I've seen.
The TC14PE is included in the Anand Roundup (already linked above). It appears to be somewhere in between the Dark Rock Pro 3 and NH-D15, in terms of cooling performance and noise. I don't think you could go wrong picking any of those 3 - they should all do a great job. Good luck with whichever one you end up selecting.
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