Phanteks PH-TC14PE vs Noctua NH D14

[Maximilian]

Which is best? They are the same price. Reviews seem to point towards the phanteks being cooler but i dunno. A guy on youtube says the noctua is still better. Noctua seems tried and tested whereas the phanteks are newer.

Ease of mounting the thing would also be a massive factor for me, I have bad memories of socket 939 coolers that were a PITA to install/remove, looking at you SI-120!

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

I have the Phanteks, and love it. Great cooler. Good fans. Phanteks has been around for a bit, but not in the consumer realm.

 

[cantholdanymore]

About the same but with color options:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR1k...xt=C3686ba7UDOEgsToPDskIvgjCALq-olE0F_-cSAAff

I think this guy has been labeled as a Noctua fan boy.

 

[Maximilian]

About the same but with color options:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR1k...xt=C3686ba7UDOEgsToPDskIvgjCALq-olE0F_-cSAAff

I think this guy has been labeled as a Noctua fan boy.

Yeah thats the guy i saw on youtube, ive watched quite a few of his reviews now and theyre pretty good.

What really draws me to the D14 is that he says hes been using it for ages because its easy to mount/unmount, its shown mounted in the background on plenty of his reviews as well.

Think im gonna go with the D14 and see what the fans are like (non PWM is a bit bleh) and if need be i can get 2 of the same fans that are on the silver arrow for it, best of both worlds there.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Phanteks is easy to mount/unmount too. The only thing the D14 has over it is the PWM fans which are easy to replace. The Phanteks has color options too (which look great)

 

[Grooveriding]

I used the NH-D14 for a long while on 1366 and 2011, mounting is a breeze and you get a good mount every time in my experience. The cooler also performs amazingly well, but we all know this from benchmarks.

Looking at the Phantec, it looks like a straight copy of the NH-D14 with some tweaks and I'm sure it performs really well as well.

Myself I would still go Noctua because when people say their products are quality and well made, it's not like when you generally hear that and it's just brand preference speaking, these guys really make quality stuff. Everything is made in Austria, they also have a solid history making excellent fans, of which you get two of with the NH-D14.

Customer support is also excellent. I lost some mounting hardware and emailed them, the next day they sent me replacements. When I moved to a 2011 mobo, same story, day after my email they sent me a 2011 mounting set. The only drawback is it comes by regular post from Austria and takes about 10 days to arrive.

My vote goes to the NH-D14. Also if this is still the case it's another bonus; when I bought my NH-D14 it came with a large 10g tube of NT-H1 paste - one of the past TIMs out there.

 

[cantholdanymore]

Everything is made in Austria

Are you sure about this? I didn't see any "made in Austria" in the box

 

[MichaelZ]

From the reviews I've seen, the Phanteks usually comes out on top marginally.

If you're after that last degree on air, grab yourself the Phanteks, it's the king right now.

 

[Piano Man]

From the reviews I've seen, the Phanteks usually comes out on top marginally.

If you're after that last degree on air, grab yourself the Phanteks, it's the king right now.

They trade blows, but the phanteks are louder. Toms just did a big roundup, and the Noctua came out on top in both cooling and noise compared to the Phantek.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/LGA-2011-i7-3960X-Air-Overclocking,3130-17.html

 

[Grooveriding]

Are you sure about this? I didn't see any "made in Austria" in the box

Just took a look at my d14 box, looks like Noctua pulls an apple 'designed in austria', not made. :/

 

[birthdaymonkey]

I recently picked up a D14 when it went on sale for $49 (even though I don't really need it). It mounts nicely and performs well.

The thing I like best about Noctua, as others have indicated, is the customer service. If you need a mounting kit, they'll send you one for free, as I experienced when I needed to change the orientation of a U9B-SE2 on an AMD system. E-mailed them and the kit arrived ten days later free of charge.

I heard you could even ask for an extra set of fan clips for the D14 (to mount a 3rd fan!), so I asked for one (even though I don't really need it), and got it a few days ago... free of charge.

 

[birthdaymonkey]

They trade blows, but the phanteks are louder. Toms just did a big roundup, and the Noctua came out on top in both cooling and noise compared to the Phantek.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/LGA-2011-i7-3960X-Air-Overclocking,3130-17.html

Interesting. I just read a similar roundup on xbit and it showed the Phanteks and Thermalright Archon outperforming the D14 and Zalman, which were Tom's winners.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/coolers/display/super-cooler-lga-2011_6.html#sect1

W0hy the difference, I wonder?

 

[Piano Man]

I've looked at pretty much all of the reviews, and they trade blows (not sure about Archon), but the commonality in all of them is that the Phanteks have been louder by a smidgen up to 5db.

The new Thermalright Silver Arrow SBE HS is going to be a monster I hope. May have to give up the D14 for that baby.

http://www.thermalright.com/products/?act=data&id=189&cat_id=37

 

[Sunny129]

Interesting. I just read a similar roundup on xbit and it showed the Phanteks and Thermalright Archon outperforming the D14 and Zalman, which were Tom's winners.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/coolers/display/super-cooler-lga-2011_6.html#sect1

W0hy the difference, I wonder?

different labs? different ambient room temps? could be due to any of a number of factors...

 

[gramboh]

When the temperature differences are within a few degrees between reviews, it's just margin or error or changes in ambient temperatures, since these are not really being tested in totally controlled environments (on most review sites anyway). To me, that leaves noise, price, customer service and build quality as the relevant differentiating factors.

 

[Maximilian]

Holy god this cooler is absolutely amazing... It makes me wonder what i could've gotten out of my old i7 920 if i had bought this 2 years ago instead of the H50 which was cool to look at but not so cool temperature wise.

Mount was pretty easy, not intel push pins easy but definitely not rocket science, instructions were easy to follow, everything was labelled and in separate bags, fans are quiet, on full they arent all that bad either.

Im getting 76*C during linX at 1.36v at 4.6ghz. No idea what my ambient is but it feels very warm in here which is typical of my house. I cant compare this with others tbh because i dont know the delta temp but the H50 at these settings would be over 100*C and the comp would shut itself off automatically so... yeah, definitely a step up. Should have gotten this thing 2 years ago.

 

[TheUltimateEye]

Overclockers club had the Phanteks beating out the D14 by a few degrees but every other review i've seen showed the opposite. I just installed my Phanteks the other day and it's a great piece, just a little overpriced imo. The white fans go great with white cases too! (switch 810)