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Comment by sbov | Hacker News Reader

I can't find the link but a youtuber tested various AOIs and air coolers and a Noctua air cooler did the best job cooling. Unless you like AOIs for some other reason (e.g. some people don't like all the space air coolers take), if you aren't running a custom loop you're probably wasting your money when water cooling.

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Add to that the extra hassle and maintenance you have to invest in water-cooling (plus the danger of leaks!), air cooling really starts to shine.

Was it the following video by Optimum Tech?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxcDeq4SQII

I recently purchased an NH-U12A and can confirm it is excellent.

Linus Tech Tips recently published a video called "why you shouldn't water cool your PC"; they found that a Noctua NH-U12A ran cooler and quieter than an AIO liquid cooler.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23vjWtUpItk

Interesting. Do you have any idea as to which Noctua cooler it was? Their highest end ones run really close in price to the lower end AIOs.

NH-U12A. And yeah, it's fairly expensive for an air cooler.

Thanks! Been a couple years since I built a new PC, and it's helpful to have that info for anything I might build soonish.

If you don't know about it, pcpartpicker.com is a fantastic resource for building a new system.

It makes researching and comparing a bunch of brands and parts as well as waiting for the best times to buy a breeze.

Yeah, I know about PCPP, used it to research/design my last build. The reason I was asking sbov questions is that I've kinda fallen off the wagon in terms of keeping up with hardware news since I did my last build.

Thanks for the recommendation, though; it really is an awesome resource.

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