Noctua NH-C14S Low Profile CPU cooler review

Cooling 189 Page 10 of 10 Published by

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Final words and conclusion

Final words and conclusion

The Noctua NH-C14S is a bit of a myriad when it comes to functionality, its main trump card however is the incredible noise level - and I do mean the lack of it. Under normal conditions and with a processor clocked at defaults (not overclocked), you'll have a very hard time hearing this unit as it was simply completely silent based on a normal RPM profile managed in the BIOS by the ASUS motherboard. Obviously overclocking remains an option. Taming the beast that is the Core i7 4790K always remains a challenge with heatpipe cooling. Up-to 1.30 Volts this cooler has no problem whatsoever in terms of noise and cooling performance under the condition that you do not stress the processor for hours 100% continuously. But yeah we measure 34 DBa at defaults under processor load (and we consider a cooler to be silent if it stays under 39 DBa). 


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Aestethics & Design

This chapter will be repetitive: We stated many times that Noctua could really use a change in their color scheme in regards to their products. The brown/beige colors simply are not in line with today's high-end preferred and colored products. Despite the colors the end-users are willing to look away, as the quality of the coolers themselves are just too good, which matters more. Noctua, how about a black cooler with darker brown/beige fans? We do understand the dilemma at hand for Noctua though, Gigabyte uses Blue, ASUS ROG used Red and each company really has their own house color design and thus trademark for company branding. Also with that market growing, we would REALLY like to see Noctua engage the AIO Liquid cooler segment, an area where they could be very popular with their low-noise and high quality fans.

Performance

Cooling wise the NH-C14S performs well, but we do need to mention that we armed our test system with the difficult to cool Core i7 4970K, obviously on purpose as we test that other side of the spectrum (liquid cooling) on this setup as well. The default clock frequency performance is excellent, nothing more, nothing less. Overclocking with a CPU like this on heatpiper cooling typically is ill-advised though. The NH-C14S kept things relatively well in line, our 4790K processor at 1.3 Volts / 4600 MHz heat jumped to over 76 Degrees C, not recommended with long term (hours and hours) CPU stress, but definitely comfortable enough for short utilization bursts. 


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Pricing

Mind you that the prices below are suggested prices (MRP). Shave off another five bucks for each cooler once they are available in good volume in e-tail. The manufacturer suggested retail pricing is as follows:

  • NH-C14S: EUR 74.90 / USD 74.90
  • NH-D15S: EUR 79.90 / USD 79.90
Remember this is Noctua quality with great after sales and pure silence. You get 6 years warranty and we all know the fantastic after sales. 

Final Words

For the NH-C14S you need to understand the purpose, it is silence. Looks aside (and remember you can mount that fan on top as well) it does perform as expected and what you may expect from a proper heatpipe based cooler. The Core i7 4790K we used remains within great temperature levels if long as we do not overclock it. Once overclocked with 1.30 volts we sit at just over 75 Degrees C, which still is comfortable enough for a proper overclock in the 4800 MHz range. As always, in regards to looks and aesthetics, well you either love or hate the Noctua design, there is nothing in-between it and as such that remains trivial to discuss. The NH-C14S is a good performing product in a dense heatpipe cooling market, the cooler becomes truly magical at default processor clock frequencies versus noise levels, I am still a little perplexed by the sheer noise level (the lack of it). The NH-C14S can be found in the stores as we speak for roughly 70 bucks, it is covered by a 6-year carry in warranty. And remember, with Noctua products come great after-sales. If you need an upgrade kit towards a new future socket and if the cooler supports it, Noctua almost always will send you an upgrade kit for free. That's the kind of stuff people love.

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