[SOLVED] Arctic vs. Noctua air cooler

[ZuluGapurtu]

Hello. I got an old Arctic I bought years ago and it’s time to change it. I’m thinking about buying Noctua, do you guys have any recommendation on those? And is Arctic more reliable?

 

[Lafong]

Noctua is generally excellent, but you need to be sure the cooler will fit in your case. If your case is rather narrow, you may have to buy a shorter cooler.

 

[tennis2]

I don't think you'll find anyone that says Arctic is better than Noctua on a performance metric. Obviously the price of the respective products reflects that conclusion.

The only real component on a CPU air cooler that is measured in reliability is the fan. Arctic is more well known for having good performance at a low cost. Generally a failed CPU fan won't damage anything (the CPU will throttle if it gets too hot). It also depends on how many hours your machine is running for. If you can buy 3 Arctic fans for the price of 1 Noctua fan, does it make any difference if your stock Arctic fan dies? All factors that each person will weigh differently.

 

[hotaru.hino]

The first thing to answer is what CPU do you have? Its TDP rating will help limit what products we should throw on it.

But for something like say the everyman 65W TDP cooler? Taking things in a vacuum Arctic generally has better value.