To brighten up your otherwise slow Monday morning, TechPowerUp and Noctua bring you a chance to win one of three high-performance Noctua CPU coolers, including some of its most iconic models in recent times: NH-D14, NH-C14, and NH-L12. All you have to do is "Like" our Facebook page, fill up a short form (or make Facebook do that for you), to stand a chance. The giveaway is open from today (19/11) to the following Monday (26/11). Three winners will be randomly picked from the entries, one each for the three prizes up for grabs. The NH-D14 is Noctua's flagship dual-tower cooler, the NH-C14, is a category-defining high-performance top-flow C-type cooler, and the NH-L12 built quite the reputation as a low-profile performance heatsink. Good hunting!For more details, and to participate, visit this page.

Noctua today presented its new NH-L9i and NH-L9a low profile CPU coolers for Intel and AMD. At a super-low profile of only 37mm, the NH-L9 coolers are ideal for extremely slim cases and with footprints tailored to the respective socket keep-out zones, they provide full compatibility with tall RAM modules and VGA cards on mini-ITX mainboards. Topped off with the new NF-A9x14 PWM premium fan, the NH-L9 coolers fuse everything users have come to expect from Noctua's larger coolers into a super-compact package for slim HTPC systems.

"The response on our first low profile cooler, the NH-L12, has been overwhelming", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "However, users asked for even smaller, lower height models that also provide better compatibility for extra slim, ITX based HTPCs. We're thrilled that we can now meet this demand with the new NH-L9 coolers."

Noctua today introduced the first three models of its new A-series of premium quality quiet fans: The NF-A4x10, NF-A6x25 and NF-A9x14 all feature Noctua's novel AAO frames and the series' signature Flow Acceleration Channels for reduced boundary layer separation and improved aerodynamic efficiency. Reference class SSO2 bearing and 6 years manufacturer's warranty make the new models a stand-out choice for all noise-sensitive 40, 60 and 92mm applications.

"We have been getting a lot of requests for 40 and 60mm models both from our industry clients and customers who seek to replace noisy fans in network and storage solutions", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "We're confident that the new NF-A4x10 and NF-A6x25 are highly competitive offerings for these types of applications, their efficiency really pushes the boundaries in these form factors."

Noctua's booth at last week's Computex Taipei not only hosted world's first public demonstration of a PC fan with integrated Active Noise Cancellation (ANC) but also gave a stage to upcoming Noctua products such as the new A-series fans, third generation NF-S12 fan and 37mm low profile CPU coolers. In addition to these upcoming products, Noctua also gave an exclusive insight on some of its current development projects for its D-, U-, C- and L-series heatsinks.

Firstly, Noctua has displayed its completely new A-series fans that feature a novel aerodynamic design measure called Flow Acceleration Channels to reduce boundary layer separation as well as Noctua's AAO (Advanced Acoustic Optimisation) frames. The new A-series fans are scheduled for launch in September/October and will come in square 140mm, round 140mm, slim 92mm plus 60 and 40mm sizes.

Noise reduction specialist RotoSub and renowned quiet cooling fan manufacturer Noctua today announced a strategic partnership agreement for the development and commercialisation of PC fans with integrated Active Noise Cancellation (ANC). A first prototype of a Noctua fan with integrated RotoSub ANC technology will be shown at Computex Taipei next week.

Active Noise Cancellation (also referred to as Active Noise Control or Active Noise Reduction, ANC) is the technique of using sound waves to reduce noise by means of an effect called phase cancellation or destructive interference. Lars Strömbäck and Mårten Oretorp from RotoSub have invented a system (RotoSub Active Noise Control, R-ANC) that allows a fan to emit the sound signal that cancels out the original sound of the fan and thereby greatly reduces the overall noise emission.

Noctua today presented its new NH-L12 low-profile cooler for Small Form Factor cases and HTPC environments. The NH-L12 features a flexible NF-F12 (120 mm) / NF-B9 (92 mm) dual PWM fan setup that can be configured either for full performance in dual fan mode or extra-low profile (66 mm) with the top fan removed.

"The industry trend towards Small Form Factor and Home Theatre PCs is well-established, but there's still a lack of suitable high-quality quiet CPU coolers", explains Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "Building a powerful PC always requires a capable CPU, which in return demands a competent cooling solution. But who wants his HTPC to sound like a jet engine? This is precisely where the NH-L12 steps in."

Enlarging its portfolio of premium quality quiet fans, Noctua today announced PWM versions of its renowned NF-P12, NF-B9 and NF-R8 fans. Having received more than hundred awards and recommendations from the international press, the classic NF-P12, NF-B9 and NF-R8 fans helped to found Noctua's reputation as a top-tier manufacturer of premium grade quiet cooling components. The new PWM versions build on the proven designs and feature Noctua's novel NE-FD1 IC for fully automatic control and ultra-low power consumption.

"Our customers have been asking us for PWM versions of our fans for a long time, but the available PWM fan driver ICs simply weren't up to our quality standards", explains Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "With our NE-FD1, we've now got our custom-designed IC that allows us to build PWM fans that consume less power and remain quieter at low speeds."

Coolink today presented its first CPU cooler to support the upcoming Intel LGA2011 platform for Core i7-3000 series Sandy Bridge-E processors. Based on the award winning Corator DS, the new Corator DS - LGA2011 is equipped with the proven SWiF2 - 120P PWM high-performance fan as well as the latest edition of the SecuFirm 2 mounting system for LGA2011, featuring optimized mounting pressure for excellent cooling performance.

"The upcoming release of Intel's Core i7-3000 series Sandy Bridge-E processors will raise the computing performance for enthusiast and professional users alike, so they can look forward to an interesting platform. However, these high performance processors need an adequate cooling solution to unleash their full potential and the Corator DS is predestined for this task", explains Timothy Chu, Coolink CEO. "With the Corator DS - LGA2011, which is based on the successful and award-winning Corator DS, we are proud to offer an attractive Core i7-3000 cooling solution for customers who are looking for great performance at reasonable costs."

Noctua today introduced the new NF-F12 120mm Focused Flow fan. Teaming up eleven stator guide vanes with a specially conceived seven blade impeller, the NF-F12's Focused Flow system creates outstanding static pressure and focuses the airflow for superior performance on heatsinks and radiators. At the same time, a wide range of advanced aerodynamic design measures, second generation SSO-Bearings and Noctua's new, custom designed PWM IC for fully automatic control guarantee astounding quietness of operation.

"Our award-winning NF-P12 has become a standard choice for pressure demanding applications such as CPU coolers and radiators, but we've been striving to achieve even better performance in this domain, and this is how the NF-F12 was born", explains Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "Due to the stator guide vanes focussing the airflow, it can push the air through dense fin stacks more effectively. This type of design has mostly been used for noisy high speed fans so far, so our engineers have put a lot of thought into keeping the noise in check."

Noctua today presented a new special edition of its award-winning NH-D14 cooler for the upcoming Intel LGA2011 X79 platform. Having received more than 250 awards and recommendations from the international press, Noctua's NH-D14 has become a benchmark in premium quality quiet cooling. The new SE2011 version is a special edition for Intel's soon to be released Core i7-3000 (Sandy Bridge-E) CPUs and comes equipped with Noctua's SecuFirm2 mounting system for LGA2011 as well as an exquisite NF-P12/NF-P14 dual PWM fan configuration.

"Hardware enthusiasts have every right to be excited about Intel's upcoming Sandy Bridge-E processors, but to get the most out of it, you'll definitely need a high quality cooling solution", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "Our flagship model NH-D14 has earned a reputation as one of the finest high-end quiet coolers on the market, so we thought that this should be a perfect match. The new special edition for LGA2011 will keep your Sandy Bridge-E CPU cool no matter what you throw at it, and it will do so at minimum noise levels, thus appealing to overclockers and quiet enthusiasts alike."

As Intel's Core i7 "Sandy Bridge-E" processors in the LGA2011 package inch closer to their mid-November launch, there is already hectic activity among manufacturers of related components such as motherboards, memory, and coolers. By now, a large section of the industry has engineering samples to help design and test their components. OCWorkbench was witness to one such pre-release setup on which a Core i7 "Sandy Bridge-E" (unknown model, could even be quad-core for all we know), overclocked to 4.92 GHz with a "regular" air-cooler. The chip was idling at 45°C.

Sandy Bridge-E, as we know, can be effectively overclocked by increasing its base clock (BClk). On this particular setup, the BClk was set at 120 MHz, with a multiplier value of 41X, and core voltage of 1.51V. The memory used was DDR3-2400 MHz with CAS latency of 10T. This is particularly encouraging, not just to enthusiasts on a tight budget, but also the cooling products industry in general. Core i7 "Sandy Bridge-E" retail boxes don't contain a cooling solution, and Intel has been showing off its branded closed-loop water-cooling solution (to be purchased separately) as something that's "recommended" for Core i7 "Sandy Bridge-E". This gave many an impression that you need at least closed-loop water coolers for any hope of achieving decent overclocked speeds with these chips, and that perhaps these chips are bad overclockers in general. The likes of Xigmatek, Thermalright, Noctua, and Scythe can breathe a huge sigh of relief.

Noctua today announced its new NM-I2011 mounting kit for LGA2011. Continuing Noctua's tradition of supplying its customers with SecuFirm2 mountings free of charge, the NM-I2011 kit allows Noctua users to upgrade to Intel's upcoming LGA2011 socket for Core i7-3000 (Sandy Bridge-E) processors. The new mounting is backwards compatible with all Noctua retail coolers since 2005 and will be supplied to Noctua users free of charge after uploading a proof of purchase on the company's website.

"We feel that product quality and service quality should always go hand in hand, so we're determined to give the best possible support to our customers. Having provided free mounting upgrades for the last generations of Intel and AMD platforms, we're happy to announce that we will continue this tradition with the NM-I2011 kit for LGA2011", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "We always like to think of our coolers as safe long-term investments, and even if you bought one of our first models six years ago, you'll still be able to upgrade it to the latest socket technology free of charge."

Noctua is designing a new double fin-stack D-type CPU Cooler its prototype is on display at Computex. Its heatsink follows the same design principle as the NH-D14, and is roughly the same size, but with a few design optimizations. First, the two aluminum fin stacks aren't cuboidal. Towards the bottom, the fins are narrower, creating more room for components on the motherboard, next to the heatsink (such as memory modules and VRM heatsinks). The recessed lower fins create 60 mm of height clearance for memory modules. The density of the aluminum is also increased, with 50 fins, increasing surface area. The 120 mm NF-P12 from the original NH-D14 design are replaced by the company's new Focused Flow 120 mm fan.

After many distinctive heatsink designs, Noctua is making a return to the conventional single aluminum fin stack tower-type heatsink (U-type), the company showed off its prototype at Computex. The new heatsink uses a slim aluminum fin stack that adds to the clearance with the motherboard's memory area, but compensates for that with a taller fin stack, that can hold 140 mm fans, in this case, it's supplied with a NF-P14.

The design consists of 7 nickel-plated copper heat pipes passing through a base, that conveys heat to the aluminum fin stack. The heat pipes are spread apart as they pass through the fins, allowing uniform heat dissipation. Thanks to the slim heatsink design approach, Noctua assures 100% memory area clearance. Noctua will bundle one fan, but there's the provision for a second "pull" fan. Expect a value price on this one.

Noctua is one of the last bastions of high-performance top-flow design CPU coolers, but that doesn't come in the way of Noctua keeping top-flow alive, in fact the company is coming up with more ways to push the performance barrier, and compete with side-flow and closed-loop water cooling kits. Seen here is a new "downdraft" type CPU cooler prototype. The design involves large aluminum fin stacks that propagate along the plane of the motherboard, over the CPU socket and memory slot area. Don't worry, there's 70 mm of clearance with everything below, letting you install certain kinds of tall memory modules.

The heatsink, with its 25 mm thick fans installed isn't much higher than most high-end side-flow tower type heatsinks. The design involves a CPU base from which 7 nickel-plated copper heat pipes shoot up a height of 70 mm, before passing through the two fin stacks. The surface area of this heatsink is said to be 20% higher than that of the NH-D14. The heatsink is ventilated by two 120 mm Focused Flow fans, blowing air downwards. Everything else on the upper-half of the motherboard (such as VRM), gets cooled under the air-flow.

One of the most interesting CPU coolers in the show, this prototype from Noctua is a sort of an "inversion" of the NH-D14 design. While the NH-D14 has two aluminum fin stacks with room for three fans (intake for the first stack, exhaust for the second stack and one in between the two stacks), this prototype uses three stacks, with two 120 mm Focused Flow fans in between (or any 140 mm fan). So now you have an aluminum fin stack before the first 120/140 mm fan, which conveys air onto a large central stack, from which air is drawn by the second 120/140 mm fan, and onto the third stack which is the size of the first one.

Heat is conveyed to the three stacks by eight nickel-plated aluminum heat pipes that pass through the CPU base. The heat pipes that pass through the central portion of the base pass though the central stack, while those that pass though the peripheral portions pass through the peripheral (1,3) stacks. The relatively slim central stack coupled with the high peripheral stacks leave plenty of room for RAM and VRM heatsinks, by up to 70 mm, should be plenty for Corsair Dominator modules. Noctua claims that this heatsink has 20% higher surface area than NH-D14, more surface area is always better.

Noctua displayed a new low-profile, top-flow CPU cooler prototype, that's capable of low-profile mode with a height of just 66 mm, making it fit for certain slim form-factor ITX cases. The prototype uses a C-type top-flow heatsink, similar to the NH-C14, only much smaller, and thinner. It uses four heat-pipes to convey heat to a dense aluminum fin array. Unlike on the NH-C14, this prototype uses a dual-fan design in which the bottom fan is smaller. While the top-fan is a 120 mm Focused Airflow, while the bottom fan is a 92 mm NF-B9. The cooler can be run in dual-fan mode with both fans installed (cooler height will be 91 mm), or single-fan low-profile mode with the top fan removed (cooler height of 66 mm). A "high-clearance mode" with the bottom fan removed also looks possible.

Weren't we all both surprised and touched that Noctua gave away free mounting kit upgrades to all owners of compatible Noctua coolers, when the industry was waking up to LGA1366 from LGA775? Noctua plans a similar move, giving away LGA2011 mounting kits to owners of Noctua coolers (any cooler released after 2005). The company showed off its LGA2011 mounting kit prototype at Computex. The kit builds on the SecuFirm 2 design, and lets you install Noctua heatsinks on socket LGA2011 motherboards that seat Sandy Bridge-E processors. Any user of a Noctua CPU heatsink released after 2005 with a proof of purchase will get the kit free of charge. Even otherwise, the kit will be sold at a nominal price, like it did with the LGA1366 mounting kit.

Noctua displayed its new innovation in fan design, called Focused Flow. One of the first fans that use this design come in 120 mm size. Its design goal is to channel (or "focus") air flow towards the center of the fan, making it ideal for use with heatsinks and radiators. The biggest design change here is the stator guide vanes, that are a set of structures permanently fixed between the frame and the center. There are a number of innovations that improve air flow and reduce noise. Notable features are micro-structures on the inner-walls of the frame that dampens the whipping noise made by rotating fan-blades, and integrated vibration dampening material at the edges. The new Focused Flow 120 fan will be used by Noctua on all its upcoming CPU coolers.

Noctua today updated its DO line of CPU coolers for AMD Opteron based servers and workstations. The new NH-U12DO A3 and NH-U9DO A3 coolers come with two of Noctua's renowned premium quality fans, achieve further improved quiet cooling performance and support AMD's socket G34 platform.

"Our DX and DO line of coolers for Intel Xeon and AMD Opteron have made a name for themselves in the professional server and workstation market, but recently, many of our industry clients have requested support for the latest G34 based Opteron CPUs", explains Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "The new A3 models now allow us to satisfy this demand and we're confident that many G34 builders will be relieved to hear that there's finally a quiet cooling solution for this platform."

Noctua today announced that owners of older Noctua CPU coolers who wish to upgrade to the upcoming LGA1155 socket will be able to obtain the appropriate NM-I3 SecuFirm2 mounting kit free of charge. Recent models such as the NH-C14, NH-D14 or NH-U12P SE2 already include the NM-I3 mounting kit and are fully compatible with LGA1155 out of the box.

"We're determined to provide the best possible support to our customers and we've sent many thousands of NM-I3 mounting kits free of charge to users who wanted to upgrade to LGA1156", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "With Sandy Bridge just around the corner, we're pleased to announce that we'll extend this offer for LGA1155 users. Everyone owning an older Noctua heatsink that doesn't support LGA 115x out of the box will be able to upgrade to the new socket free of charge!"

Noctua today officially introduced its new NH-C14 CPU cooler. Sporting an exquisite, uniquely flexible 140mm dual fan setup of two Noctua NF-P14, the NH-C14 is a highly customisable, premium-class top-flow solution that further boosts the renowned quiet cooling performance of the company's much acclaimed NH-C12 series.

"Our NH-C12 coolers are renowned to rank among the most capable top-flow cooling solutions on the market, so we're truly proud to offer a further substantial improvement in quiet cooling performance with the new NH-C14", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "This model really closes the gap to good tower coolers while being much lower in height and ensuring better component cooling."

Last week's Computex Taipei trade show saw the first public showing of several upcoming Noctua products and prototypes such as an upgrade to the C-series of down-draft CPU coolers, possible additions to the U and D-series as well as a new low profile heatsink. Giving an exclusive insight into our current projects, we've gathered excellent feedback from our sales partners, visitors and members of the international press.

First off, we've been exhibiting four tower-style prototypes following in the footsteps of our current U and D line of CPU coolers. The two D-style heatsinks pick up the dual-radiator design of our award-winning NH-D14 and adopt it to 120mm and 92mm size. Due to the asymmetric construction of the 120mm prototype, the heatsink doesn't overhang the RAM slots on LGA1156 and thus allows for improved compatibility with tall memory heatspreaders. Measuring 95mm by 95mm, the prototype with 92mm fan is the same size as the LGA1156 socket square and hence allows for optimal compatibility with high profile RAM or chipset heatsinks too.

Noctua today announced the availability of the new NM-A90 Upgrade-Kit for NH-U12P SE2 and NH-U9B SE2 users. The upgrade makes it possible to install the heatsink turned by 90° on AMD motherboards. NH-U12P SE2 and NH-U9B SE2 users can order the NM-A90 kit free of charge on Noctua's website.

"We've received excellent customer feedback on our new SE2 coolers", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO, "but some AMD users expressed the wish to have the possibility to change the alignment of the coolers on AMD motherboards. We've always been convinced that premium quality products and premium quality service should go hand in hand, so we're responding to this demand by offering the new NM-A90 kit as a free upgrade."

Noctua today officially introduced its new NH-C12P SE14 premium cooler. Building on the proven basis of the successful NH-C12P, the NH-C12P SE14 now comes with Noctua's new, already award winning NF-P14 140mm fan for further improved quiet cooling performance and adds support for LGA1156 as well as LGA1366 via the latest SecuFirm2 multi-socket mounting system.

"Ever since its introduction last year, our NH-C12P has been a very popular choice among customers who seek excellent cooling performance close to our signature NH-U12P series at much lower height", says Mag. Roland Mossig, Noctua CEO. "More than 100 awards and recommendations from the international press are a testimony to the NH-C12P's broad appeal, so we've decided to issue a special edition that adds compatibility with the latest Intel sockets and further improves the coolers renowned cooling efficiency by using our new NF-P14 fan."