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By slaveofconvention at 2012-06-25 16:09
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If you recall the original review of the Noctua NH-C14 CPU Cooler, back in June of 2011, all of the testing was carried out on a relatively modest AMD Athlon II X2 250 CPU running at 3.0Ghz. Like most of us, the upgrade bug has bitten me and my main PC is now running on an AMD FX-8120 - 8 cores at 3.1GHZ which self-overclocks to 3.9 under load. The question is, can this Editors Choice winning 10/10 CPU Cooler handle it? Read on to find out...
It isn't often we here at TBCS go back and look once again at a review but we're making an exception today. It is relatively obvious that Noctua are aiming it's NH-C14 CPU Cooler at higher end system, considering the size and price of the unit. Our original testing was carried out on a fairly mid-range system in order to acknowledge the coolers' HTPC suitability.
Having recently moved the cooler from the HTPC and into a much more powerful PC, it seemed only reasonable to re-test it in the interests being thorough.
In the original HTPC, the cooler was installed to cool an Athlon II X2 250 running two cores at 3.0Ghz and as the original review (available here) attested, the NH-C14 did an outstanding job, knocking almost 20 degrees C off of the stock cooler and 15 off of the Arctic Cooling PWM64 cooler, as you can see in the following chart.
The question before us today, however is will the cooler be as impressive on a 125W 8 Core CPU as it was on the 65W 2 core unit?
The revised core specifications of the test PC are as follows.
Antec 900 PC Case
AsRock 970 Extreme 3 Motherboard
AMD FX-8120 8-Core Bulldozer CPU
16GB PNY DDR3
As before, the tests were carried out using freshly applied thermal paste, although in this case a quality generic paste was used instead of the Noctua NT-H1 paste originally provided with the cooler. The same paste was used on all three coolers in this test for the sake of continuity.
The "stock" AMD cooler is different unit to the stock cooler used in the original testing - AMD provides a much better stock cooler with the FX-8120 than with the Athlon II X2 250, and the mid-range cooler used for comparison is a step up from the original Arctic Cooling unit - this time it's a Freezer Pro 64 with a single 120mm fan as opposed to the PWM64 with an 80mm unit installed.
The results....
Simply stunning. There is a MUCH much better level of airflow in the current case than in the Thermaltake unit used in the original review. The Thermaltake had no case fans whatsoever, relying utterly on the PSU fan to expel hot air whereas the Antec 900 has a pair of front mounted 120mm intakes, a rear mounted 120mm exhaust and a top mounted 200mm exhaust all of which almost certainly helped but there's no denying the difference between the coolers in the same system. Give or take a week or so, the time of year is the same, so ambient temperatures will be fairly close between the systems, and the tests were carried out in the same room.
The NH-C14 actually managed lower temperatures on the 125W 8-core CPU than on the 65W 2-core unit although the case airflow has to have been a contributing factor. Nevertheless, a drop in temperature from 47C (stock cooler) down to 29 is a great result and fully reinforces my previous conclusions.
With these results in mind, I have no problem whatsoever confirming both the Editors Choice award and the original 10/10 score. This is a serious CPU cooler which is more than capable of taming mid and high-end CPU's alike.
This product was provided free of charge by the manufacturer for the purpose of review.
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By TheGreatSatan at 2012-05-29 14:26
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Today's review is my first for 2012! We’ll be covering the new Toshiba Z835 Ultrabook available at Newegg for $829 The Z835 has a 13.3 inch screen and weighs only 2.47lbs! The similar sized Macbook air weighs another half a pound and will cost you an additional $500. The last laptop I reviewed of similar size was my Alienware M11x which was only one inch smaller, but weighed a lot more. Obviously, it had a huge battery and was made with a thicker shell to contain the beefy graphics. An Ultrabook is not a gaming machine by any stretch of the imagination, but more suited for business or casual use on the go.
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By SXRguyinMA at 2012-05-18 16:02
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Fans can be a touchy subject in the PC world. There's a billion different fans and fan designs on the market today. Some are just general, inexpensive all-purpose fans while others are designed for specific purposes. The new FZ fans we'll be looking at from NZXT today fall into the latter category. Read on for the details....
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By SXRguyinMA at 2012-05-15 01:30
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When NZXT debuted the Phantom full tower it was an instant hit. From the unusual styling to the laundry list of features, it was quite the impressive case. Building off of the Phantom platform came the Phantom 410. A mid-tower version of the famed Phantom. How does it stack up to it's big brother? Well lets take a look.
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By OvRiDe at 2010-08-14 03:50
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by Curtis Gauger (OvRiDe)
The folks at Enermax have decided to put a little fire in your system with the new Volcanus midsized tower case. Whether you like it subtle or bold, they have a Volcanus that is guaranteed to add a bit of Hot Rodder style to your case. The Volcanus semi gloss black exterior comes adorned with a subdued set of gloss black flames, but this case is not all show and no go. It's got plenty of airflow, so the performance matches its snazzy exterior.
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By blueonblack at 2010-02-14 01:12
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Here I am again, finally stepping into the 21st century. I recently got broadband Internet for the first time, getting my first cell phone and cutting my land line at the same time. I bought a plasma television and a DVD recorder for my living room. After all this wonderful new tech, I realized that I needed to upgrade what is arguably one of the most-used pieces of hardware in my home: my mouse. For this, I turned to the people at Cyber Snipa...more.
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By Oneslowz28 at 2009-09-22 08:32
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Just a few years ago, every high-end computer build included a Plextor optical drive. When you priced out your build you would cut corners here and there just so you could include a Plextor. Highly regarded for their performance and longevity Plextor drives became a staple in every computer geek’s arsenal. Then all of a sudden Plextor dropped off the map for about a year. Today, Plextor is once again a go to source for all of our optical drive needs.
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By blueonblack at 2009-09-21 09:23
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Like everyone, I’ve got my own tastes and my own needs when it comes to computer cases. I’ve seen some absolutely gorgeous cases from companies like Zalman, Lian Li, Hiper, and NZXT; cases that I would be proud to own and to put my hard-earned hardware into. It looks like the folks at Thermaltake have raised the bar with what, to my eye at least, is the best-looking and most functional chassis I have seen to date.
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By Oneslowz28 at 2009-09-12 17:06
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In today’s world of custom computers it’s tough to stand out from the crowd. Everything has pretty lights, radical front panels, and enough fans to get the case air-borne. Cooler Master recognized this and set out to create a product line that was different from the rest. Thus the CM Storm series was born. Intrigued by the features of this series I asked Cooler Master to send me a sample to review. A week later a CM Storm Sniper was at my doorstep.
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By Datech at 2009-09-10 19:10
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By Datech
The Thermaltake BlackX SATA Hard Drive USB Docking station is the perfect, hot swappable solution for drive docking, migration, and backup on the go. The storage peripheral is a useful – and now my preferred – alternative to external hard drive enclosures and removable drive bays.
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By Oneslowz28 at 2009-09-03 06:51
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As I sit here and type this I can hear the constant hum of the five fans in my current case. The hum is annoying to say the least and drives me crazy at times. I have been looking for a solution for months now and until recently was drawing a blank. Then I came across the NZXT Whisper full tower chassis. The Whisper has noise dampening foam-lined panels and vibration isolating dampeners on all contact points where vibrations could be transferred to the chassis causing unnecessary noise.
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By blueonblack at 2009-08-31 09:28
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I'm an ATI guy. For reasons I won't get into, they're my first choice for video hardware, and I've never been disappointed by them. Having said that, they could really use some of the marketing personnel and budget that Nvidia has. When was the last time you saw an ATI advertisement that was a fraction as cool as Nvidia's? It was this superb marketing machine that drew me to the source of today's review: the Cooler Master NV690.
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By Eclecticos at 2009-08-17 05:15
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Looking for a cool little monitor to put all of your miscellaneous widgets on? Maybe you want to watch a video on while surfing other sites, or monitor computer stats while gaming. Well Eclecticos picked him up one of these cool Mimo USB monitors, and gives us the full scoop on it!
Check it out HERE.
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By blueonblack at 2009-08-05 22:05
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I finally did it. I've officially crossed the line from air cooling to water.  I felt that I'd tried some of the best air coolers on the market with good results, and wanted to dive in to water cooling because... well, because it's water cooling. Completely aside from its obvious advantages over air cooling (silence and performance), it's just cool to be able to say that my PC is cooled with the same system as that Mopar I've lusted after for more years than I care to mention. There's something I like about the very term "liquid cooled".
You can read the full review here
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By Eclecticos at 2009-08-03 23:00
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AzzAs Mission is simple, Your satisfaction is our success!
I am impressed with the overall design, and features of the AzzA Fantom 900 case.
It features many unique quality's that are not included in any other case design. I especially like the removable HDD cage with the pre-mounted 140mm blue led fan, and the oversized 230mm fan on top, and side panels. The front panel is visually attractive, and well constructed. The Fantom 900 includes a total of (4) fans that have been optimized for noise reduction.
Read the full review here
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