What is best: SilentiumPC Fortis 3 HE1425 VS Hyper 212 EVO VS Corsair H100i GTX

[GrimjoeEX]

Hi there guys,

I'm losing sleep at night because of this.

I'm planning on switching my CPU cooler from my CM Hyper 212 EVO to one of these: Corsair H100i GTX or SilentiumPC Fortis 3 HE1425 from Malik Customs.

These are the three points guiding my choice: looks, performance, silence

With the Hyper 212, I've reached temps around 65 degrees celsius with 4.3ghz of maximum overclock on my 6600K in a Corsair SPEC-01 and two thermaltake riing 12 in push-pull. The temps stayed the same after switching to the standard blademaster 120 in push configuation that comes with the hyper 212, getting a Mastercase pro 5 instead of the corsair case, and taking down the overclock. Silence is incredible at this point (I have just two fans).

The problem is this cooler is not aestethically pleasant as I wish it was and it doesn't fit my build (all MSI with black and white krait gaming motherboard, black and red GTX 970 4G, and black corsair vengeance lpx rams). 

My future plan was to get an aio liquid cooler with rgb lighting on the water block (corsair h100i sounds just right, but I would have liked a swiftech 240 x2 more - too bad there's no trace of it yet in Italy *sigh*), put on dual thermaltake riing 12 rgb pwm, and a gigabyte gtx 980 ti (with rgb logo on side), so my build would have been all black and white with colored lighting that I can switch according to my will. Eventually, I'd have put a rgb led strip around the case to complete the scheme.

After some further research, I found out temps on the H100i GTX are not that exceptional compared to what I had on the CM Hyper 212 (5 degrees celsius with the same overclock), and of course, it was way noisier than the push-pull configuration I had.

At this point, a new idea has put its roots into my mind. What about a better air cooler for now, and getting a custom loop (or the swiftech H240 x2) in the future? The Malik Customs SilentiumPC Fortis 3 seems to be a great choice, it's customizable and beautiful compared to the CM Hyper212 and it's also pretty cheap. But what about the temps? Or silence? There's no comparison on internet between the Fortis and the Hyper212.

What do you think guys? 

 

[thekeemo]

The NZXT x61

Bigger rad and quieter fans.

[GrimjoeEX]

I'm trying to stick to these 3 because I would like to mount it on top of the mastercase, which has clearance only for a 240. Thank you for the suggestion tho, Kraken x61 was in my mind too.

[LogicalDrm]

H100i would be better in terms of pure performance. Fortis 3 is about same with Dark Rock 3 (based on http://hardwareoverclock.com/SilentiumPC-Fortis-3-HE1425-CPU-Cooler-5.htm and

)

 

[GrimjoeEX]

Thank you for your answers. That's an interesting post. Actually I found out this video from Cooler Master 

 where you can see how to mount a 280 radiator on top with a pull-only configuration. X61 Kraken is starting to be more appealing.

My last concern is regarding performance: in the comparison attached to this post, we can see fortis 3 vs kraken at min/max on a 4770k at 4.6ghz. A 7 degree difference between them but at least the kraken seems much more silent than fortis when set on minimum, which is still kinda weird imho. Am I missing something?

[LogicalDrm]

17 hours ago, GrimjoeEX said:

Thank you for your answers. That's an interesting post. Actually I found out this video from Cooler Master 

 where you can see how to mount a 280 radiator on top with a pull-only configuration. X61 Kraken is starting to be more appealing.

My last concern is regarding performance: in the comparison attached to this post, we can see fortis 3 vs kraken at min/max on a 4770k at 4.6ghz. A 7 degree difference between them but at least the kraken seems much more silent than fortis when set on minimum, which is still kinda weird imho. Am I missing something?

 

Kraken is AIO. So set to minimum, you have fans spinning at 600rpm (or so) and only pump making noise. Versus having air cooler blowing at or almost at full speed.

[GrimjoeEX]

Actually, I thought AIO to be noisier than air cooler. I measured the overall noise produced from my PC with my Hyper 212 EVO in push-only configuration and one 140mm fan for exhaust, with a 15db ambient noise, and it reached around 24db-28db in idle, so it's already pretty low (maybe?). I can't really imagine something more silent than that considering the major source of noise is my wd caviar blue 7200rpm when it kicks in (being my secondary drive and having a 850 EVO for OS, it is usually off).

Thank you guys for your answers. 

[LogicalDrm]

22 hours ago, GrimjoeEX said:

Actually, I thought AIO to be noisier than air cooler. I measured the overall noise produced from my PC with my Hyper 212 EVO in push-only configuration and one 140mm fan for exhaust, with a 15db ambient noise, and it reached around 24db-28db in idle, so it's already pretty low (maybe?). I can't really imagine something more silent than that considering the major source of noise is my wd caviar blue 7200rpm when it kicks in (being my secondary drive and having a 850 EVO for OS, it is usually off).

Thank you guys for your answers. 

AIO IS noisier. But that wasn't what you asked. It was why AIO set to low speeds is more quiet than air cooler running at normal speed. If they both would run at normal speed, air cooler would be more quiet one.