Wednesday, September 30th 2026

Thermalright Launches an All-Black Peerless Assassin 120H-A Dark CPU Cooler

Thermalright has added a fully black variant to its Peerless Assassin lineup with the Peerless Assassin 120H-A Dark, a twin-tower air cooler that builds on the existing black models but steps up the fan speed for more aggressive thermal performance. This follows the recently launched single-tower Assassin X 120-A Dark, an updated version of the Thermalright Assassin X 120 V2 series. The heatsink uses six 6 mm U-shaped copper direct-touch heat pipes running through a dual-tower fin stack. The cooler measures 125 x 135 x 159 mm (including fans) and has black covers on top for a clean, uniform look that avoids the mixed-finish look of some other "all-black" coolers. Socket support covers Intel LGA115X, 1200, 1700, and 1851, and AMD AM4 and AM5.

Where it differs from the standard Peerless Assassin 120 Black is the bundled fans. The two included TL-N12-R9 V2 units spin up to 2400 RPM, significantly faster than the 1550 RPM of the base model. Each fan is pushing up to 85.35 CFM at 2.95 mmH2O static pressure. Noise at maximum speed is rated at 33.3 dB(A), with S-FDB bearings and 4-pin PWM control. The higher fan speed makes this version better suited for more demanding CPUs where the standard fans might fall short under sustained load. Pricing and regional availability haven't been announced yet. However, the 120 SE Black is listed on Amazon for around $43, so we could estimate that the new Thermalright PE 12H-A Dark CPU cooler will be priced at around $55.
Source: Thermalright (product page)
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6 Comments on Thermalright Launches an All-Black Peerless Assassin 120H-A Dark CPU Cooler

#1
freeagent
When you mill down a heat pipe to make it flat, you are removing capacity.

Why do they have to do this.. so much disappoint.
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#2
wNotyarD
Holy mother of gaps! How much thermal paste would be wasted?
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#3
Hecate91
Interesting how this doesn't have a baseplate yet the Assassin 120 black does, I guess they're trying to hit a certain price point with 2 high performance fans.
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#4
thestryker6
I believe this is the first Peerless Assassin to use direct touch heatpipes. It would be interesting to see a performance comparison between it and the ones with a coldplate.
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#6
SteveS45
freeagentWhen you mill down a heat pipe to make it flat, you are removing capacity.

Why do they have to do this.. so much disappoint.
It's to save cost. HDT does not add performance. Although the tech is pretty stable, in theory you still lose out on spreading heat evenly to all heatpipes. And if a hot spot is only under a single heatpipe, most of the heat is only going to be spread by that single heatpipe. Not to mention also losing mounting pressure. Copper bases are pretty expensive, and you also need to add manufacturing cost for soldering the copper base to the heatpipes. In my memory CRYORIG had a patent that allowed for the copper base and top to be clamp'd together mechanically, that no other brand could do at the time.
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Nov 11th, 2026 07:08 CST change timezone

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