Tator Tot's Big "Quiet" 120mm & 140mm Fan Round-Up - Page 26

There are a lot of good options in the ~$10 price bracket:

Hyperborea

- Out of stock at the moment, and not as smooth at higher speeds as GT's but still very competitive for the price.

Cougar Vortex HDB (or in black)

- Smooth bearing, good pressure but could be better. Would be enough for the H100i or Khuler 920.

RFX-120

Cheap, seriously cheap. The 2 ball bearing is not the smoothest in the world, but at 1200 RPM it's PQ curve is very hard to beat. It's also only $7 shipped at the moment. That's a deal.

On the other hand, there is some slighty bearing noise at 1200 RPM on both of my samples but it wasn't too bad.

Still, they'll only go down to about 1000 RPM at their lowest possible speed so not much range on them. Better as performance fans instead of quiet ones.

Cooler Master Blade Master

- Another good & inexpensive option. Like the Rosewill above, it doesn't go down very low, but it does do a pretty good job on PWM.

In the 600-1200 range on PWM there's a very faint & quiet click that moves up in pace with the fan though.

Lepa 70D

- Probably the best option of the round-up; I haven't taken it apart to find out what the bearing is yet but it's the best performer out of the bunch. Not as quiet as the Cougar, but still very strong in terms of PQ curve & quiet operations.

You'll still want to add some anti-vibration mounts if you have them, as well as an inline resistor if your cooler doesn't support fan throttling.

Quote:

Originally Posted by chas1723 

What about in the under $20 bracket?

GT-AP14 / AP-15

- depending on what speed you're looking for. Their best operating conditions are -400 to nominal RPM (so 1050-1450 or 1450-1850 RPM.)

Noctua NF-F12

- Great PWM functionality. And overall great fan, usually costs more than $20 though.

GeLID Wing 12

- Overall good fan, better at $15 but usually closer to $20. Pressure is a little weak in comparison to some other fans (~2mmH20) but still higher than others.

Corsair SP120 Quiet Edition 2 pack

- Basically, a great value since you can find the 2 pack for ~$14/fan online at the moment. A bit of bearing noise to them, but overall a good package.

Noctua's are probably my best recommendation.

Quote:

Originally Posted by adridu59 


Nice, they're dirt cheap here. So you think they're better than the Cougar's ?

Not as quiet, but more pressure and definitely a more solid fan in terms of construction.

Depends what the price difference is; if it's $5 less than Cougar's and you're not so much a silence fanatic. I'd go for them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by adridu59 


I see.
On a side note, found 2 reviews about Lepa fans lineup, one in German and one in French.
But since I speak both languages...

I'm not so good with the French, but do you think you could take a crack at translating the page they wrote about the bearing in the 70D for me?

I'd like to see what they said.