[patriot20001]

hi there,

all new to overclocking etc but want to do it because the components allow and it is to be fair exciting if you have never done it before.
but need advice what is the best cpu cooler I can get for the asus motherboard. looking for simple install, midrange price and good at what it does.
can anyone help..

Intel Core i7 3770K
Win 7 Ultimate
Motherboard:4140 - NEW! Asus P8Z77-V
RAM: 5041 - 8GB Corsair 1600mhz Vengeance (2x4GB)
Hard Drive: 6028x - 1TB S-ATAIII 6.0Gb/s
& 120GB Agility 3 SSD Series SATA 6Gb/s 2.5" Solid State Drive Optical Drive:7003x - 22x DVD±RW DL S-ATA
Graphics card : Radeon 6950 2GB (OC Edition)
Sound card:10001x - Onboard 7.1 Audio
Case:17055 - NEW! Antec One
PSU:18039 - NEW! 700W Xigmatek

cheers guys.

[EndlessWaves]

What would you consider mid-range pricing? £30? £60? £100?

If you want simple install and good cooling then I'd look at one of the closed loop coolers. They're not as good as traditional watercooling but that's not mid-range pricing, however they are pretty decent and being lightweight are easier to install than an air cooler than gives comparable performance.

[patriot20001]

mid range i guiess is around £60? the 2 I am looking at now are Phantek’s PH-TC14PE & Noctua NH-C14
just wondering if they will fit easy with 4 sticks of Ram if I upgrade in the future from the 2 I will have and are they good? which is better..?

[McKnuckles]

If your vengeance RAM is the high profile stuff then the Noctua NH-D14 will not fit over it.

I recently purchased a Zalman CNPS-11x Extreme cooler which costs around £50 and has worked out very nicely for me (its effective and virtually silent). The closed water cooling systems that have great reviews are the Corsair H80 or H100 systems but they are a little more expensive (and a lot more noisy).

Edit: sorry .. noticed you said NH-C14 not the D14!! Noctua website has a handy table that shows what memory fits under their coolers. I have the pro version of your mobo, 16GB (4 slots) of Vengeance RAM and choose the Zalman air system over the Corsair systems due to the fact it was within a few degrees of their cooling effectiveness for much much less noise - the H100 with default fans is an excellent bit of kit but the radiator fans make it sound like a Dyson!

[Sliver]

Originally Posted by McKnuckles

the H100 with default fans is an excellent bit of kit but the radiator fans make it sound like a Dyson!

I have a H100 and it's only noisy if you run Intel Burn Test or Prime 95 maybe. How often do people do that ? During normal use and gaming, it's actually quieter than my old air cooler. As said, the fans can be changed for quieter ones but I haven't found the need to do so.