Question Which Air Cooler would you pick for the price Ryzen 5 5600X?

[Fallengod]

Just looking for feedback on air cooling a Ryzen 5 5600X. Which air cooler for best bang 4 buck would you pick out of these?:

Scythe Mugen 5 ($49.99)
Scythe Fuma 2 ($59.99)
Noctua NH-U12S ($59.99)
Noctua NH-U14S ($64)
ID Cooling SE-224-XT($OOS most places? but normally $30).

Very intrigued on the ID Cooling SE-224-XT as it seems to be like $30 normally but OOS everywhere? I also see black friday it was $6 on sale @ newegg(wtf!?).

I am just curious what others would pick.

 

[DeathReborn]

Bang 4 Buck, ID Cooling, best cooling Fuma 2 followed by U12A with the U12S & ID Cooling not far behind that.

Funny thing isd TPU has covered them all bar the Mugen.

ID-Cooling SE 224 XT ARGB & SE 224 XT Basic Review

ID-Cooling looks to dominate the entry level cooler market by giving users a traditional tower cooler with an emphasis on solid performance in the SE 224 XT Basic. Taking things a step further, they add LED lighting with the appropriately dubbed SE 224 XT ARGB. Both versions certainly gave the...

www.techpowerup.com

 

[Fallengod]

Yeah. That fuma 2 man. Also the ID-Cooling SE-224-XT I have seen some pretty comparable results with all these coolers and it is normally only $30 when in stock, thats pretty crazy. I just dont see it in stock anywhere lol.

 

[WilliamM2]

I have a Mugen 5 on my 3700x. Cools very well, even better with a better fan. I put a red Arctic Bionix P120 on mine. Extra cost, but I would have done that with any cooler to match my setup. And still silent.

Beats the Noctua 12s in most reviews. And that's with the stock fan.

Scythe Mugen 5 Rev.B CPU Cooler Review

Scythe updates its Mugen 5 to Rev.B with new AMD AM4 brackets. Can the venerable cooler quietly cool our overclocked Core i7-5930K?

www.tomshardware.com

 

[Heartbreaker]

You don't need big cooling for 5600x.

I bought a Deepcool Gammax 400. It's cheap and it will do the job. Waiting in the box for a future build.

It cooled better than the Mugen 5 and the Noctua U12s in that Toms review linked in post above mine, and I got for about 1/3 the price of them.

Bang/buck is excellent, and it's all you need.

 

[CU]

I think it all comes down to noise. The Gammax 400 does seem to cool a few degrees better in that review, but is louder. I actually like the way the Mugen 5 Rev. B looks. It is quiet and cools really well based on reviews at tweaktown.

 

[Heartbreaker]

Yes but you can adjust the Gammax fan speed to cool similar to the Mugen and it will get quieter as well.

The big thing about the Gammax is the untouchable value. I bought it for $25 CDN, and Mugen is $65 CDN plus import fees, plus shipping, making it about 3X the price.

Paying 3X the price for something that can't cool as well, just because it looks nicer, or might be slightly quieter when noise normalized wasn't in the cards for me.

It was either Deepcool or if looking at spending a lot more, I want to make sure it beats the deepcool at cooling, so the only other option IMO was the Noctua D15S. Nothing between those two impresses me.

 

[CU]

In the US on Amazon they are only 2X difference in price. Still enough to make a difference though. At tweaktown they show the Mugen 5 Rev. B less than 1 degree from the D15 using PWM. They don't have the Gammax though. As new CPU and GPU prices are high and stock low it would be nice to see Anandtech or someone do a big cooler round up. At least I can find and afford a cooler now.

 

[Fallengod]

One of the things for me is noise. Its the reason I ditched the CM Hyper 212 cooler 4 or 5 years ago. By my logic, id rather go big on the cooler to the point where it almost doesnt need a fan at all. I would love a passively cooled heatsink, but in real-world practice that idea just doesnt work out.. just throwing on a fan even at a low 300rpm makes a world of difference. That kind of scenario is what I am looking for though.

The heatsink I really want to try out now because of the impressive reviews ive read on it is the ID Cooling SE-224-XT. I think that is what I am going to buy. Depending on how that performs I will make my decision after. Its just OOS like everywhere. And the places its in-stock are either overpriced or in a different country. So I am unsure of what I am going to do there....

I appreciate the The Gammax 400 recommendation, and I have read reviews on that in past, but I think the noise and such scared me away from it, though I have not tried it. In my mind I put that in the same category as the CM Hyper 212 evo. Its a great budget cooler, but have to sacrifice noise for the performance.

And for the record, I didnt disclose it in the OP because I wanted objective comments, but my current cooler on this rig is the Scythe Mugen 5 rev.b. Its an amazing cooler. I just want something different for a second rig im building. Or put the mugen in that rig and something different for this rig, I dunno yet.

 

[CU]

Le Grand Macho RT cost a little more than your other options, but about as close as you are going to come to a passive cooler. Although the base seems to be convex, so it may not work as good on AMD. I haven't seen a review state or show that though. Just what I have read in different posts here and there.

 

[Fallengod]

Le Grand Macho RT cost a little more than your other options, but about as close as you are going to come to a passive cooler. Although the base seems to be convex, so it may not work as good on AMD. I haven't seen a review state or show that though. Just what I have read in different posts here and there.

Ya I read reviews on it. Its $80 so I dont think worth it since it seems to perform about the same as the others for cheaper.

 

[CU]

Ya I read reviews on it. Its $80 so I dont think worth it since it seems to perform about the same as the others for cheaper.

Yeah, you really start paying a lot for one degree after a certain point. Given that different reviews show coolers that are close swapping places, most of the upper end ones really seem +/- 2 degrees within each other and that is probably more than the margin of error.

As fans die I would focus on heatsink design / size. If you need more cooling you can always get a faster / louder fan, but not much you can do if it already has a fast loud fan. As the car saying goes their is no replacement for displacement.

 

[SamMaster]

You don't need big cooling for 5600x.

I bought a Deepcool Gammax 400. It's cheap and it will do the job. Waiting in the box for a future build.

It cooled better than the Mugen 5 and the Noctua U12s in that Toms review linked in post above mine, and I got for about 1/3 the price of them.

Bang/buck is excellent, and it's all you need.

I got the Deepcool GAMMAX GT A-RGB myself for my 5600X, and made speed curve that makes it ramp up when the CPU starts to hit higher temps. With Auto OC on it reaches a max of 77C.

 

[thigobr]

Thermalright True Spirit 140 Power is always a good option around $50 as well

Amazon.com: Thermalright True Spirit 140 Power: Computers & Accessories

Buy Thermalright True Spirit 140 Power: Case Fans - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases

www.amazon.com

I tried it on my 5950X and it can keep with the heat even when using some more moderate PBO limits

 

[VirtualLarry]

[JayzTwoCents][YT]

Jay has some surprising results (good ones) with a 'Ventroo' black RGB tower heatsink / fan cooler he bought off of Amazon. Five heatpipes, standard AMD and Intel mounts, black coated heatsink, had better results than his FD AIO LQ, LOL.

 

[BonzaiDuck]

Ya I read reviews on it. Its $80 so I dont think worth it since it seems to perform about the same as the others for cheaper.

I gathered several comparison reviews for study before I purchased my Grand Macho. We all remember the ThermalRight 120 -- I think it was their first tower cooler. It definitely had a convex base.

But I don't think that's true about the Macho.

To the point. There's the simple axiom "If A > B and B > C, then A > C" or other ways of stating it. You may have a review that rank-orders coolers X, Y and Z. But it doesn't include cooler W, and you want to know whether X is better than W. Another review contains a comparison between Y and W. So you make your inferences and draw your conclusions.

The Macho outperforms the NH-D15 by about 1 to 2C. It underperforms a handful of AiO coolers by 1 or 2C. I posted another recent thread asking for input about this, but nobody seems able to offer any "new" coolers as possible improvements. I bought my Macho four years ago.

As much as I got immersed in overclocking and temperature control going back to maybe 2007, I became a bit spoiled. I'd stop short of sticking my toes in the water, but I had to have the most effective heatpipe cooler available.

Unless I'm building a system for a family member who doesn't crave over-clocking, I'd rather pay the $80 even if a $30 Hyper 212 EVO will do the job. But it won't do the job if you're going to push the voltage and Mhz, so . . . there you are . . .

 

[UsandThem]

[JayzTwoCents][YT]

Jay has some surprising results (good ones) with a 'Ventroo' black RGB tower heatsink / fan cooler he bought off of Amazon. Five heatpipes, standard AMD and Intel mounts, black coated heatsink, had better results than his FD AIO LQ, LOL.

So funny he just did a video review about a cooler brand nobody heard of before, and now it's also on Slickdeals a week later.

Talk about the new way of doing an ad hidden as a review.

However, it does seem like a decent cooler for the money, but since they are a pretty well unknown brand, who knows how their overall QC is. But I guess for only $25, it's not too much of a risk to most people.