- Review -

25.05.2007 HardwareCanucks.com

The performance results for these fans are absolutely amazing. While these fans were purring along at only 600rpm they were cooling off the case as well (and better in some areas) than the stock fans running at 900rpm. This goes to show how efficient blade design through engineering genius can increase airflow exponentially. When the speed of the NF-S12 fans was increased to 1200rpm, the contest wasn't even close. The Noctua fans completely overwhelmed the competition by decreasing some temperatures by as much as 7°C! It is absolutely shocking to see the temperature of an overclocked CPU drop by nearly 5°C just by changing to these Noctua fans. [...] Two words come to mind when thinking of the noise level of the Noctua NF-S12: dead silent. When operating at 1200rpm the 4 Noctuas were actually quieter than the stock fans running at 900rpm. Even though the opinion about what constitutes noise and the amount one can hear varies from person to person, even those with the sharpest hearing will have trouble hearing these fans.

"After running through the tests it is more than apparent that a lot of thought and state-of-the-art engineering went into the design of this Noctua fan. Not only did they operate at a lower noise level than the already-quiet stock case fans but they did so while pushing more air through the case. That is efficiency at its finest folks!" (Michael Hoenig, HardwareCanucks.com)