You don't need to have completely passive system or add CPU fan/multiple case fans as the other "extreme". You just need one almost silent slow-ish (outtake) case fan (ideally 120mm+ and nearby) to make it work just fine and it would be nice to see how it comparatively works in a real case in such (most likely) scenario with more than zero air flow, but still almost as completely passive in a real world sense.
The big issue, for me, is that passive cooling works (when it does), because there's some airflow in the case. If everything was passive, that will break down. So yes, you may get a passively cooled PSU, maybe even CPU, but probably no more than that.
If you're trying to passively cool a stock 3090 you're doing it a bit wrong, though. If you really needed all that compute power and RAM but silence is important enough to go passive, you'd benefit most by undervolting and sacrificing maybe 10% performance to drop nearly 100W of that TDP.
It would make sense to go with a more power-efficient prospect in the first place, though. With the current-gen cards that would likely be something like a 6800 / 6800 XT.
olde94, that was the Calyos case that people are still waiting to get in return for the money they put out for them, including the €3,820 copper version.
This is not for cases with any fan. The only use case for passive cooler like this is zero failure tolerance. Not cooling, not dust but have a PC with no moving parts to fail. Honestly there are better solutions for that. So this is kinda a pointless product, that a simple idling fan running at 300rpm will beat in every other use case.
I think with my other (total 6) rear, top and front case fans properly managed and active, that the NH P1 will be just fine for any required CPU cooling. With this I wish that passive cooling will be the future as anything mechanical and moving will always present problems and ongoing costs. Perhaps new and future chip development will ultimately reward us with cooling those not being required.
"You" in that sense would be a big chunk of this type of cooler's target audience. Moving parts are weak points, for sure, but having one 120mm FDB fan spinning at ~600rpm is hardly disastrous in that regard - and if your case has decent dust filtration at the intake, then you're probably going to get less of it on sensitive components than by having the sort of highly-ventilated chassis needed for fully-passive cooling.
it's not a desktop but a laptop, but i use an older laptop with an intel y-series passively cooled CPU in my workshop as any fan would cause saw dust to fill the internal.
Is the intent of this cooler to be used in a completely passive setup? Or is it relying on airflow from other components such as a case fan, PSU, etc? I ask because the Testing Methodology makes no mention of any kind of ambient airflow, which means this would be a worst-case scenario for the product. Even in a build meant to be nearly silent, there will be some kind of airflow. That airflow would add forced convection, which would do much more than the passive convection the test setup seems to provide.
This product seems like one of those edge cases where an open bench test rig isn't going to come close to creating real-world results.
Yeah, I imagine this is intended to operate with a case fan nearby drawing air across it. I actually have that setup in my HTPC, fanless heatsink on the processor (currently a i3-9100F, though it previously had an i5-2500k), but with two 120mm fans in the case so there's some airflow.
I can't find it right now due to a DNS problem making half the internet not work for me... but I seem to remember Noctua saying almost exactly that. It's meant to make a below-noise-floor PC, and having a tiny bit of airflow is important. This lets you use a big low RPM fan in an appropriate exhaust location.
The intention of this cooler is of course to build fully passively cooled setup. I have one with W-2123 inside recommended (by Noctua) case and it runs w/o any other fan there. Yes, GPU is old, passively cooled too, but the machine serves its purpose...
It will work in low airflow or fully passive. Both should work fine with this cooler. It would simply depend on your objectives. If you wanted 100% dead silent, as in middle of a recording studio quiet, then this could make a decently powerful build.
Yeah, depends what you want. If you want to have a system with enough horsepower to game (dGPU) even even with a fully passive CPU and GPU you likely need at least some casefans to get airflow thru the device.
On the positive side it means you can put in a larger / quieter fan at the case level so its /virtually/ silent - but at the moment its still hard to make a zero-moving-parts system.
I you were shooting for something lower power (HTPC w no dGPU?) I guess it maybe possible? At worst you could try and dig up one of those funky cases which act as a giant heat sink? (do they still make them?)
"do they still make them?" Yup! MonsterLabo even do "The Beast" which claims to cool 150W worth of CPU heat and 250W on the GPU without fans, while Streacom have a whole range of fanless HTPC chassis designs.
If you can manage airflow without the NH-D15 fans, then such build might be quieter. I really wish there was a second part of the review, which would test operating such setup.
might be a ~5-7yrs repeating task for 24/7 systems (and low rpm 120/140mm fans)? Since fans acoustics found being proportional to around 5th power of rpms, it might fit for some having 240/360mm fans for low rpm :) and airflow is what is needed for heat transfer: Having natural convection around an optimized passively cooled system might get to around 100W heat dissipation an given sizes for case and mainboard clearances and if there's no fan, a passive setup has to create its own 'air flow' speeds. Heat radiation is probably low percentage (with having shiny surfaces?) within device cases anyway? Some utilize ionic wind effects, etc.
inspired for searching dust filter for fans, learned that items are available (with intake air flow reduction/resistance mostly not quantified, what might get a future review and compared to passive cooling systems?)
Because a single fan to circulate air through the entire case is optimal for cooling everything inside the case. A heat sink with fan will move heat off the CPU … and around inside the case … still maintaining high ambient temperature inside the case, unless you have a second fan to move air through the case.
Reducing to a single case can also allow use of a single LARGE case fan (something like 200mm, even) that runs at a low speed, and produces background noise that is less distracting. Smaller fans produce higher pitched buzzing sounds, and have to spin at high speeds to move substantial air; the inverse is also true.
> Finally, we should note that we are testing the NH-P1 in its purely passive form, without any forced airflow at or even near it.
while you did test the product in an isolated way, giving you excellent values. They are are however not relevant to real world usage. If you install this cooler in your case, near a <500rpm exhaust fan, your system will still be silent and the performance of this cooler will be much better than what your results show here.
imho an unfair evaluation of a product that's not tested as it will be used.
like testing 2 cars on a dragstrip, then saying that the Minivan is slower than the Porsche; never mind the fact that real world testing would have had 5 passengers.
A review for a passive cooler better focus on the worst case scenario: a passive build. Let's not assume someone paying premium for a high end passive cooler will mount other fans in there or place this under the AC.
You now have the baseline performance and you know putting a 500RPM exhaust fan will improve performance. You'll never worry that the performance is better than expected, you worry when it's worse.
I have to agree here. Often a central element to a cooler review is how easy/hard is it to install, and of course how well it works (or doesn't work) when actually installed in a case. I feel like this would have been a royal pain in the derrière to install and test, of course, so I can sympathize with the author on that point. However, that raises the question of why try and review something you will not actually install and test in the environment which said product was designed for? That might be better than beginning a product review with a litany of the things you can't/won't be able to do...;) There are several low-power CPUs that might have been tested, imo, and that might function fine with this passive cooler. AT seems sometimes to shirk testing key elements of reviewed products--an advanced motherboard, for instance, with lots of hardware features was reviewed here. It was the kind of product a n00b would never buy because of its cost and complexity of features. Everything was fine until the review author said he wasn't going to look at the bios controls because, paraphrased, "hardly anyone messes with his bios these days." For that particular motherboard, nothing could be further from the fact of the matter...;) The people who would buy it have every intention of making adjustments according to their preferences in the bios. I would only suggest that AT editorial guidance be more insistence on completeness and thoroughness in the product reviews it publishes. Guesswork and estimations are all fine, but they are no substitute for real testing, imo.
I feel like the testing on this was a bit short sighted on the actual use case of this cooler. These testing done is still use full. But a good secondary test would be to have it in a situation where case air is going through it. Many cases use a front-to-back airflow setup. Are the fins oriented in a way to allow the air to go through the heat sink? And if so, how much better does it work?
I'm a complete noob in cooling but the price of bunch of aluminium plates (however well they are machined) and copper rods seems steep... 1,5 times of raspberry pi 4b 8gb (an actual pc) as steep
If you are not aware, aluminum and copper have risen in price. Shipping costs are also based on weight and dimensions, so these heatsinks are also not favorable in that regard as well. Add in the fact that these passive heatsinks are a niche of a niche product, and probably not produced in such high numbers for noctua to get a substantive discount, and you end up with this price. In fact, as far as passive heatsinks capable of handling this wattage go, this is competitively priced.
Welcome to the world of niche products, where nothing achieves economies of scale, so everything is "expensive"!
The only alternative for someone who needs this is making it themselves. Even just bending the heatpipes would stress me much more than paying $110 bucks.
That's funny because I was impressed at how cheap it was compared to Noctua's other offerings. Premium products have premium prices. Raspberry Pis are literally designed from the ground up to hit ultra low price points. There is no comparison.
I'd think not; your comment makes as much sense as claiming a $30 oil change "seems steep" compared to a $2 can of tuna.
Niche products sell in low volume no matter what, so the per-unit price has to be high to cover all the R&D, prototypes, custom machining, etc. etc. that a hardware business puts into designing a new product.
If you think it is bad value, then fine, what is the equal alternative someone could buy for less?
This is one area where PC OEMs have the advantage if they choose to use it. They have the flexibility of modifying the case, mb, etc to all work together better and can do a much better job of channeling appropriate airflow over the needed components without having to resort to a bunch of small noisy fans. Generally only in the higher end work stations and such. They can be much quieter than a home built system would be even with those high power Xeon or Threadripper parts by using 120mm+ fans on the case instead of smaller fans elsewhere.
My biggest concern would be that nothing seems to anchor this mass except the motherboard. It might withstand 1kg of mass from the top, but a sideways mount is already exerting a significant shearing force. Now pick a system up and carry it between rooms or--heavens forbid--driving it around in a car...
I've been able to keep noise levels at bay using mostly Noctua fans on my 24x7 machines, but I can sympathise with the want for 100% non-movable parts for reliability.
E.g. my firewall is an i7 T part with 35W TDP using an 65Watt Noctua fan in a small form factor Mini-ITX chassis that's all perforated for fully passive Atom boards and nice airflow, but it can't keep the dust out. While I do vacuum the chassis regularly, obviously that doesn't reach into the fan itself and yes! one day the fan seized and the system shut off hard, thankfully without any noticeable physical or logical damage.
Good thing I was home, though, not on one of these week-long business trips that I used to take before the pandemic. Having wife and kids diagnose and fix the issue over the phone would have been near impossible and the idea of facing a mob of 5 shut off the Internet for a week, makes such a fully passive system seem a bargain at almost any price.
And here it's only twice the normal price for a Noctua.
"My biggest concern would be that nothing seems to anchor this mass except the motherboard. "
same thought. AT Folks: I suppose that MB manufacturers specify maximum shear/torque for vertical mounting (including 'weight' by lever distance, to put it crudely), and similar for horizontal. do MBs typically have passive holes surrounding the CPU socket such that standoffs can be screwed to the case/sub-frame?
This would be great for a daily / non-gaming rig. I use a Noctua NH-D15S chromax.black with near silent fans and it's fantastic. Actually I could probably not use any fans at all with the Noctua NH-D15S chromax.black. Either way it's always nice seeing this frontier pushed,
When you go for a silent PC I can't recommend Streacom cases enough. I've been a happy owner of DB4 case for the last 5 years and so far it's been a smooth and silent ride. In case of DB4 the whole case is a heatsink!
“Even before the first Pentium era of the early 1990s, PC CPUs were already powerful enough to require meaningful and capable cooling setups to keep their temperatures in check“
Well, not exactly. The best way to put it would be:
Even before the first Pentium era of the early 1990s, PC CPUs were already power-hungry and inefficient enough to require meaningful and capable cooling setups to keep their temperatures in check
Zalman used to have these crazy designs. Passive cases (where the sidepanels of the case where the cooling bodies), watertowers, big passive blocks. I think that if they didn't blow themselves up, the whole PC cooling world would look totally different right now. I can't believe how few interesting AiO solutions are left. And Swiftech showed a decade ago how much is being left on the table.
I love this objective test rig! I have thought for a long time that a proper test rig for coolers would be much better than building a whole computer just to create an inconsistent heat source.
This is an excellent article. This is, in my opinion, one of the best posts ever written. Your work is excellent and inspiring. Thank you very much. <a href="https://buildnowgg.co/">build now gg</a>
This page lists all the latest Jobs in Qatar. To view jobs by category/industry use the category function on the right side. For all the job-related queries check our website. All types of job listings are available. jobs are listed on an everyday basis so that its easier to find your preferred job without making any difficulties. https://www.qatarloving.com/jobs
When you go for a silent PC I can't recommend universal remote cases enough. I've been a happy owner of DB4 case for the last 5 years and so far it's been a smooth and silent ride. In case of DB4
When you go for a silent PC I can't recommend universal remote cases enough. I've been a happy owner of DB4 case for the last 5 years and so far it's been a smooth and silent ride. In case of DB4 the whole case is a heatsink!
We’ve updated our terms. By continuing to use the site and/or by logging into your account, you agree to the Site’s updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
66 Comments
Back to Article
Klapper.cz - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
You don't need to have completely passive system or add CPU fan/multiple case fans as the other "extreme". You just need one almost silent slow-ish (outtake) case fan (ideally 120mm+ and nearby) to make it work just fine and it would be nice to see how it comparatively works in a real case in such (most likely) scenario with more than zero air flow, but still almost as completely passive in a real world sense.Oxford Guy - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Who is ‘you’?Fans accumulate dust and are a moving part. Moving parts are a weak point.
The big issue with passive cooling is the GPU, for gamers.
bug77 - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
The big issue, for me, is that passive cooling works (when it does), because there's some airflow in the case. If everything was passive, that will break down.So yes, you may get a passively cooled PSU, maybe even CPU, but probably no more than that.
Oxford Guy - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
Use a mesh or partially open-air case. It is possible to have a fully-passive system.Flunk - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
A fully open case works much better, but then you have a dust problem.Although trying to cool a high-end GPU like a Geforce 3090 with a 350W TDP is a tall order.
Spunjji - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
If you're trying to passively cool a stock 3090 you're doing it a bit wrong, though. If you really needed all that compute power and RAM but silence is important enough to go passive, you'd benefit most by undervolting and sacrificing maybe 10% performance to drop nearly 100W of that TDP.It would make sense to go with a more power-efficient prospect in the first place, though. With the current-gen cards that would likely be something like a 6800 / 6800 XT.
olde94 - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
It would be a fun engineering task to try and make a 100% passively cooled system for something like a 3090, if we base it off a 250W TDPOxford Guy - Saturday, February 19, 2022 - link
olde94, that was the Calyos case that people are still waiting to get in return for the money they put out for them, including the €3,820 copper version.mr_tawan - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
I'd say, put the pc in another room, might be the better option (although it come at cost). Not everyone can have this option, however.sharath.naik - Monday, February 21, 2022 - link
This is not for cases with any fan. The only use case for passive cooler like this is zero failure tolerance. Not cooling, not dust but have a PC with no moving parts to fail. Honestly there are better solutions for that. So this is kinda a pointless product, that a simple idling fan running at 300rpm will beat in every other use case.Tom Sunday - Wednesday, February 16, 2022 - link
I think with my other (total 6) rear, top and front case fans properly managed and active, that the NH P1 will be just fine for any required CPU cooling. With this I wish that passive cooling will be the future as anything mechanical and moving will always present problems and ongoing costs. Perhaps new and future chip development will ultimately reward us with cooling those not being required.Spunjji - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
"You" in that sense would be a big chunk of this type of cooler's target audience. Moving parts are weak points, for sure, but having one 120mm FDB fan spinning at ~600rpm is hardly disastrous in that regard - and if your case has decent dust filtration at the intake, then you're probably going to get less of it on sensitive components than by having the sort of highly-ventilated chassis needed for fully-passive cooling.Oxford Guy - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
Passive systems are less affected by dust.Review - Saturday, February 12, 2022 - link
Nice postolde94 - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
it's not a desktop but a laptop, but i use an older laptop with an intel y-series passively cooled CPU in my workshop as any fan would cause saw dust to fill the internal.pSupaNova - Friday, February 11, 2022 - link
Yes, I used to use the same too, now I use a Mac m1 Air as that has no fan.I think having a fan in a laptop is nearly as silly as putting one in a smartphone.
oleguy682 - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Is the intent of this cooler to be used in a completely passive setup? Or is it relying on airflow from other components such as a case fan, PSU, etc? I ask because the Testing Methodology makes no mention of any kind of ambient airflow, which means this would be a worst-case scenario for the product. Even in a build meant to be nearly silent, there will be some kind of airflow. That airflow would add forced convection, which would do much more than the passive convection the test setup seems to provide.This product seems like one of those edge cases where an open bench test rig isn't going to come close to creating real-world results.
Don't get me wrong, this is
fcth - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Yeah, I imagine this is intended to operate with a case fan nearby drawing air across it. I actually have that setup in my HTPC, fanless heatsink on the processor (currently a i3-9100F, though it previously had an i5-2500k), but with two 120mm fans in the case so there's some airflow.evilspoons - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
I can't find it right now due to a DNS problem making half the internet not work for me... but I seem to remember Noctua saying almost exactly that. It's meant to make a below-noise-floor PC, and having a tiny bit of airflow is important. This lets you use a big low RPM fan in an appropriate exhaust location.kgardas - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
The intention of this cooler is of course to build fully passively cooled setup. I have one with W-2123 inside recommended (by Noctua) case and it runs w/o any other fan there. Yes, GPU is old, passively cooled too, but the machine serves its purpose...FreckledTrout - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
It will work in low airflow or fully passive. Both should work fine with this cooler. It would simply depend on your objectives. If you wanted 100% dead silent, as in middle of a recording studio quiet, then this could make a decently powerful build.RSAUser - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
If you're in a recording studio, then you'd run the cabling from another room.Oxford Guy - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
The electrical noise from a system I put together that’s in an adjacent room is loud enough to inflame my tinnitus.My assumption is that the bulk of it is coil whine from the Fury X GPU.
I am using a passive system right on my desk and it doesn’t bother me at all.
RSAUser - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Just to add other use-cases: e.g. dusty area.Jon Tseng - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
Yeah, depends what you want. If you want to have a system with enough horsepower to game (dGPU) even even with a fully passive CPU and GPU you likely need at least some casefans to get airflow thru the device.On the positive side it means you can put in a larger / quieter fan at the case level so its /virtually/ silent - but at the moment its still hard to make a zero-moving-parts system.
I you were shooting for something lower power (HTPC w no dGPU?) I guess it maybe possible? At worst you could try and dig up one of those funky cases which act as a giant heat sink? (do they still make them?)
Spunjji - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
"do they still make them?"Yup! MonsterLabo even do "The Beast" which claims to cool 150W worth of CPU heat and 250W on the GPU without fans, while Streacom have a whole range of fanless HTPC chassis designs.
bogda - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
If the system is not completely passive cooled, why would anyone choose this over nearly completely quiet, similarly priced NH-D15?GL1zdA - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
If you can manage airflow without the NH-D15 fans, then such build might be quieter. I really wish there was a second part of the review, which would test operating such setup.Oxford Guy - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
Tower coolers designed for very low RPM fans have wider fin spacing. Thermalright’s Macho RT is probably an example.Oxford Guy - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
Cleaning the dust out of those is no fun.back2future - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
might be a ~5-7yrs repeating task for 24/7 systems (and low rpm 120/140mm fans)?Since fans acoustics found being proportional to around 5th power of rpms, it might fit for some having 240/360mm fans for low rpm :) and airflow is what is needed for heat transfer: Having natural convection around an optimized passively cooled system might get to around 100W heat dissipation an given sizes for case and mainboard clearances and if there's no fan, a passive setup has to create its own 'air flow' speeds. Heat radiation is probably low percentage (with having shiny surfaces?) within device cases anyway? Some utilize ionic wind effects, etc.
TheinsanegamerN - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
Try 5-7 months. 5-7 years is a 1 way ticket to a system with a coating so heavy you can draw in it.back2future - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
inspired for searching dust filter for fans, learned that items are available (with intake air flow reduction/resistance mostly not quantified, what might get a future review and compared to passive cooling systems?)shelbystripes - Wednesday, February 9, 2022 - link
Because a single fan to circulate air through the entire case is optimal for cooling everything inside the case. A heat sink with fan will move heat off the CPU … and around inside the case … still maintaining high ambient temperature inside the case, unless you have a second fan to move air through the case.Reducing to a single case can also allow use of a single LARGE case fan (something like 200mm, even) that runs at a low speed, and produces background noise that is less distracting. Smaller fans produce higher pitched buzzing sounds, and have to spin at high speeds to move substantial air; the inverse is also true.
jmke - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
> Finally, we should note that we are testing the NH-P1 in its purely passive form, without any forced airflow at or even near it.while you did test the product in an isolated way, giving you excellent values. They are are however not relevant to real world usage. If you install this cooler in your case, near a <500rpm exhaust fan, your system will still be silent and the performance of this cooler will be much better than what your results show here.
imho an unfair evaluation of a product that's not tested as it will be used.
like testing 2 cars on a dragstrip, then saying that the Minivan is slower than the Porsche; never mind the fact that real world testing would have had 5 passengers.
at_clucks - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
"near a <500rpm exhaust fan"A review for a passive cooler better focus on the worst case scenario: a passive build. Let's not assume someone paying premium for a high end passive cooler will mount other fans in there or place this under the AC.
You now have the baseline performance and you know putting a 500RPM exhaust fan will improve performance. You'll never worry that the performance is better than expected, you worry when it's worse.
WaltC - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
I have to agree here. Often a central element to a cooler review is how easy/hard is it to install, and of course how well it works (or doesn't work) when actually installed in a case. I feel like this would have been a royal pain in the derrière to install and test, of course, so I can sympathize with the author on that point. However, that raises the question of why try and review something you will not actually install and test in the environment which said product was designed for? That might be better than beginning a product review with a litany of the things you can't/won't be able to do...;) There are several low-power CPUs that might have been tested, imo, and that might function fine with this passive cooler. AT seems sometimes to shirk testing key elements of reviewed products--an advanced motherboard, for instance, with lots of hardware features was reviewed here. It was the kind of product a n00b would never buy because of its cost and complexity of features. Everything was fine until the review author said he wasn't going to look at the bios controls because, paraphrased, "hardly anyone messes with his bios these days." For that particular motherboard, nothing could be further from the fact of the matter...;) The people who would buy it have every intention of making adjustments according to their preferences in the bios. I would only suggest that AT editorial guidance be more insistence on completeness and thoroughness in the product reviews it publishes. Guesswork and estimations are all fine, but they are no substitute for real testing, imo.Dantte - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
That beast is beautiful and is going to look great in my submerge build!Stuka87 - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
I feel like the testing on this was a bit short sighted on the actual use case of this cooler. These testing done is still use full. But a good secondary test would be to have it in a situation where case air is going through it. Many cases use a front-to-back airflow setup. Are the fins oriented in a way to allow the air to go through the heat sink? And if so, how much better does it work?ington - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
I'm a complete noob in cooling but the price of bunch of aluminium plates (however well they are machined) and copper rods seems steep... 1,5 times of raspberry pi 4b 8gb (an actual pc) as steepmeacupla - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
If you are not aware, aluminum and copper have risen in price.Shipping costs are also based on weight and dimensions, so these heatsinks are also not favorable in that regard as well.
Add in the fact that these passive heatsinks are a niche of a niche product, and probably not produced in such high numbers for noctua to get a substantive discount, and you end up with this price.
In fact, as far as passive heatsinks capable of handling this wattage go, this is competitively priced.
kgardas - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
You don't need to buy it. If rpi serves your purpose, then good for you!Wereweeb - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Welcome to the world of niche products, where nothing achieves economies of scale, so everything is "expensive"!The only alternative for someone who needs this is making it themselves. Even just bending the heatpipes would stress me much more than paying $110 bucks.
Einy0 - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
That's funny because I was impressed at how cheap it was compared to Noctua's other offerings. Premium products have premium prices. Raspberry Pis are literally designed from the ground up to hit ultra low price points. There is no comparison.grant3 - Wednesday, February 16, 2022 - link
Is a raspberry pi 4b 8gb an effective cpu cooler?I'd think not; your comment makes as much sense as claiming a $30 oil change "seems steep" compared to a $2 can of tuna.
Niche products sell in low volume no matter what, so the per-unit price has to be high to cover all the R&D, prototypes, custom machining, etc. etc. that a hardware business puts into designing a new product.
If you think it is bad value, then fine, what is the equal alternative someone could buy for less?
xenol - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Randomness but I wanted to look up that Zalman case mentioned, but Google pulled up two other sites that basically plagiarized this site.Did I stumble into one of those places that recycles the internet for a quick buck?
Hulk - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
I think the title of this review should have been "Silent but Deadly."GreenReaper - Friday, February 11, 2022 - link
I mean, that's *one* way to win a deathmatch . . .kpb321 - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
This is one area where PC OEMs have the advantage if they choose to use it. They have the flexibility of modifying the case, mb, etc to all work together better and can do a much better job of channeling appropriate airflow over the needed components without having to resort to a bunch of small noisy fans. Generally only in the higher end work stations and such. They can be much quieter than a home built system would be even with those high power Xeon or Threadripper parts by using 120mm+ fans on the case instead of smaller fans elsewhere.Oxford Guy - Monday, February 7, 2022 - link
Would be nice to see against the large and small NoFan products. Too bad that company is out of business.abufrejoval - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
My biggest concern would be that nothing seems to anchor this mass except the motherboard. It might withstand 1kg of mass from the top, but a sideways mount is already exerting a significant shearing force. Now pick a system up and carry it between rooms or--heavens forbid--driving it around in a car...I've been able to keep noise levels at bay using mostly Noctua fans on my 24x7 machines, but I can sympathise with the want for 100% non-movable parts for reliability.
E.g. my firewall is an i7 T part with 35W TDP using an 65Watt Noctua fan in a small form factor Mini-ITX chassis that's all perforated for fully passive Atom boards and nice airflow, but it can't keep the dust out. While I do vacuum the chassis regularly, obviously that doesn't reach into the fan itself and yes! one day the fan seized and the system shut off hard, thankfully without any noticeable physical or logical damage.
Good thing I was home, though, not on one of these week-long business trips that I used to take before the pandemic. Having wife and kids diagnose and fix the issue over the phone would have been near impossible and the idea of facing a mob of 5 shut off the Internet for a week, makes such a fully passive system seem a bargain at almost any price.
And here it's only twice the normal price for a Noctua.
FunBunny2 - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
"My biggest concern would be that nothing seems to anchor this mass except the motherboard. "same thought. AT Folks: I suppose that MB manufacturers specify maximum shear/torque for vertical mounting (including 'weight' by lever distance, to put it crudely), and similar for horizontal. do MBs typically have passive holes surrounding the CPU socket such that standoffs can be screwed to the case/sub-frame?
529th - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
This would be great for a daily / non-gaming rig. I use a Noctua NH-D15S chromax.black with near silent fans and it's fantastic. Actually I could probably not use any fans at all with the Noctua NH-D15S chromax.black. Either way it's always nice seeing this frontier pushed,Cheers
Oxford Guy - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
Tower coolers without fans perform poorly. Their fins are too dense and they don’t have the design elements needed to improve convection efficiency.Oxford Guy - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
The hybrid models (widely-spaced fin towers) need some fan input to work efficiently.kubafu - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
When you go for a silent PC I can't recommend Streacom cases enough. I've been a happy owner of DB4 case for the last 5 years and so far it's been a smooth and silent ride. In case of DB4 the whole case is a heatsink!https://streacom.com/products/db4-fanless-mini-itx...
Duto - Tuesday, February 8, 2022 - link
“Even before the first Pentium era of the early 1990s, PC CPUs were already powerful enough to require meaningful and capable cooling setups to keep their temperatures in check“Well, not exactly. The best way to put it would be:
Even before the first Pentium era of the early 1990s, PC CPUs were already power-hungry and inefficient enough to require meaningful and capable cooling setups to keep their temperatures in check
…with love
FLORIDAMAN85 - Thursday, February 10, 2022 - link
I want this thing rising out of my mineral oil PC. Call it deep water horizon.Foeketijn - Saturday, February 12, 2022 - link
Zalman used to have these crazy designs. Passive cases (where the sidepanels of the case where the cooling bodies), watertowers, big passive blocks. I think that if they didn't blow themselves up, the whole PC cooling world would look totally different right now.I can't believe how few interesting AiO solutions are left. And Swiftech showed a decade ago how much is being left on the table.
COtech - Saturday, February 12, 2022 - link
I love this objective test rig! I have thought for a long time that a proper test rig for coolers would be much better than building a whole computer just to create an inconsistent heat source.irene167 - Tuesday, February 15, 2022 - link
This is an excellent article. This is, in my opinion, one of the best posts ever written. Your work is excellent and inspiring. Thank you very much. <a href="https://buildnowgg.co/">build now gg</a>snair123 - Friday, February 18, 2022 - link
This page lists all the latest Jobs in Qatar. To view jobs by category/industry use the category function on the right side. For all the job-related queries check our website. All types of job listings are available. jobs are listed on an everyday basis so that its easier to find your preferred job without making any difficulties.https://www.qatarloving.com/jobs
sero9685 - Monday, February 28, 2022 - link
it was so usefull thanksshah954 - Saturday, March 5, 2022 - link
When you go for a silent PC I can't recommend universal remote cases enough. I've been a happy owner of DB4 case for the last 5 years and so far it's been a smooth and silent ride. In case of DB4shah954 - Saturday, March 5, 2022 - link
When you go for a silent PC I can't recommend universal remote cases enough. I've been a happy owner of DB4 case for the last 5 years and so far it's been a smooth and silent ride. In case of DB4 the whole case is a heatsink!https://allheadgear.com/
grich99 - Wednesday, March 9, 2022 - link
You should for fun, try adding 2 noctua fans to this NH-P1 cooler. Maybe combined with fans it's the ultimate air cooler ever created.