Top positive review
5.0 out of 5 starsNoctua NH-U14S delivers excellent cooling with silence, a reasonable price, and is extremely stable when mounted.
Reviewed in the United States on July 25, 2014
Decided to go with air instead of liquid cooling even though I have an i7-4770K overclocked to 4.4Ghz so like all Haswell chips, they run hot anyway. I almost purchased the Noctua NH-D14 but I am glad I didn't. After researching CPU Coolers during the process of picking out parts for my new build, I found that the NH-U14S had great results in comparison to some larger, twin tower heat sink coolers like the NH-D14 or the Dark Rock 3 Pro. This is a very large heat sink itself and weighs 1.7lbs with the fan which I am as of now, only running one 140mm fan on it. At idle, my CPU is stable @ 30C - 31C on average at it's stock speed of 3.5Ghz and 35C at 3.9Ghz. This is after installing a Geforce GTX 770 (also at 31C - 32C idle) and I thought clearance might be an issue but it turns out I have about one inch or so which is more than I actually expected. Mounting this CPU Cooler is VERY simple and the brackets used are well designed, it will NOT move.
I will be putting another 140mm fan on but it is not because the CPU is reaching extremely high temperatures even at 100% load when I was testing it using various stress/blend testing software. It reached a high of 65C @ stock 3.5Ghz and 78C +/- 2C when overclocked to a stable 4.4Ghz with a +0.001V offset. My ambient room temperature is around 21C or 70F just to use as a control.
Basically, this CPU Cooler is worth every penny and rivals it's twice the size big brother NH-D14 and even liquid cooling to a point. I have never liked liquid cooling because even if it is securely hooked up, one mess up and everything is ruined. I looked at the Hyper EVO 212 and am glad I did not purchase it. It simply can not keep up this with cooler at all. Once I put another fan on there (I may go with the redux version from Noctua) I will not be expecting a dramatic decrease in temperature but enough to warrant the purchase and the redux versions have an even higher performance rate.
I would definitely suggest this CPU Cooler to ANYONE who wants to go with air cooling instead of liquid. Even with liquid, don't expect more than 3C - 5C difference... just not worth the money nor risk to me, sorry. I must also say that the thermal paste which comes with it, the NH-T1 rivals Arctic Silver and IC Diamond. It has zero curing time and very little goes a long way. I used it on my old box and was astonished at a 14C decrease in temperature. However, that was applied to a stock cooler so it was expected to improve but I didn't realize it would do so by that much.
A couple of things to keep in mind if you do purchase this CPU Cooler... you will probably lose your first PCI slot on your motherboard and it's height can cause issues with a lot of cases. I have a Fractal R4 so it is a large mid-sized ATX case and I have plenty of room to spare so make sure you have a wide case, take measurements!!. It cleared ALL RAM slots however only by enough to stick a piece of paper between them so even though I don't use high-profile RAM, you could probably get by with Corsair vengeance RAM but the heat shrouds will stick up far enough to block about an inch of the fan so I would definitely research everything before making a final decision.
Anyway, I took a gamble on a very nice CPU Cooler that has nothing but great reviews and was not disappointed at all. The benchmark temperatures were dead on accurate but it also helps that I have a large case and all my case fans are 140mm Fractal silent series fans.. it is absolutely silent. I hear the GPU fans over anything else and because my case is has silent proofing foam and even with a window, you simply can't hear it unless you are sitting in dead silence. The CPU fan produces the least noise of all however. Simply put... the Noctua NH-U14S is an awesome cooler and handles my i7-4770K like a champ at stock and overclocked although I do not run it at 4.4Ghz except for certain times.
Watch Dogs was the first game I tested the CPU with and it didn't get over 47C (I believe that number is correct.) What is correct is that for $60, I would use this cooler on any build as long as the case dimensions allow for it!
