What are your goto's for fans?

[CrazyMatt]

Hi, I haven't really changed the insides of my computer for quite a few years now and frankly am just waiting for a dramatic enough increase in price-to-performance for CPU to justify ditching my i7-4770 and 16 gigs of DDR3 (I know, it's archaic, but it gets the job done).

 

In the meantime however, I've gotten increasingly annoyed by the loud sound of my computer's fans, and I've been wondering what the best modern fans are for performance and quietness. My config is two 120mm fans on the front, one 120mm on the heat sink, and one 120mm on the back.

Right now I'm looking a lot at the Noctua NF-F12, but is there anything better I can get today? My budget at most is about $25 per fan.

[orbitalbuzzsaw]

The Corsair ML Pro series are better in terms of noise. I've got the regular MLs on my rad and a Noctua Industrial. I'd get the ML Pros if you don't need the absolute best airflow for the extra silence

[orbitalbuzzsaw]

1 minute ago, Pangea2017 said:

Noctua a12x25 if they are on sale you can get them for $25.

Other option would be SilentWings 3 or noiseblocker eloops in push configuration.

Corsair ML Pro much? https://pcpartpicker.com/product/wPFXsY/corsair-co-9050041-ww-750-cfm-120mm-fan-co-9050041-ww

[WoodenMarker]

What are your specs and which fans are too noisy? Have you tried lowering fan speeds?

 

Moved to Air Cooling.

[Mooshi]

Definitely not Corsair, loud AF underperforming garbo. This system uses a combo of various Noctua fans (even a 200mm!) and a Fractal Venturi.

[Alex Atkin UK]

I'd still got for the Noctua personally.  I bought the Corsair ML120 double pack and wasn't impressed with their noise level at all.

Looking at the specs, the Noctua is WAY quieter, although its hard to compare the airflow as they use different metrics.

[CrazyMatt]

3 minutes ago, WoodenMarker said:

What are your specs and which fans are too noisy? Have you tried lowering fan speeds?

 

Moved to Air Cooling.

Stock Hyper 212 Evo fan on the cooler, stock Corsair fans on the back, and two Corsair SP120 High Performance Edition given as a gift. Clearly not too much thought was given into cooling. As for specs, i7-4770 with a GTX 760 (which I will upgrade soon), and three hard drives. 

[WoodenMarker]

6 minutes ago, CrazyMatt said:

Stock Hyper 212 Evo fan on the cooler, stock Corsair fans on the back, and two Corsair SP120 High Performance Edition given as a gift. Clearly not too much thought was given into cooling. As for specs, i7-4770 with a GTX 760 (which I will upgrade soon), and three hard drives. 

That's plenty of cooling and you should be able to safely lower fan speeds. What rpm are your fans running at? Have you tried lowering fan speeds?

[LienusLateTips]

Arctic A12 for cheap, otherwise usually the Fractal white and black ones or the Cooler Master jetFlow

[CrazyMatt]

13 minutes ago, WoodenMarker said:

That's plenty of cooling and you should be able to safely lower fan speeds. What rpm are your fans running at? Have you tried lowering fan speeds?

I remember trying that a long time ago and remember giving up because my MB began just running everything at 100% either because it was being buggy (or more likely because I was messing it up..!) but didn't really care because it wasn't really in a place where that mattered to me. I can't restart my computer at the moment but when I get the chance I will look up some tutorials later for adjusting fan speed. Even then though I've had to move my computer in to my room and sometimes it has to be left on overnight, but I still want to get the most quiet experience withing a reasonable budget, and I'm willing to spend a little bit on it.

[Jurrunio]

Corsair ML for me. I run 1 at max RPM of 1600 all the time because I dont have enough PWM headers, yet it's as loud as an NF-A15 at 1100RPM, i.e. noticeable noise but not loud.

[wONKEyeYEs]

43 minutes ago, CrazyMatt said:

I've gotten increasingly annoyed by the loud sound of my computer's fans,

MB?

[CrazyMatt]

5 minutes ago, wONKEyeYEs said:

MB?

 

Gigabyte Z97-HD3

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/KTdqqs/gigabyte-motherboard-gaz97hd3

[wONKEyeYEs]

4 minutes ago, CrazyMatt said:

Gigabyte Z97-HD3

 On the manufacturer's website download the App Center and  System Information Viewer.

Follow the installation instructions.

System Information Viewer contains Smart Fan which lets you set custom fan curves.