Noctua NH-L12S is a high performance low profile CPU cooler at 70mm in height. The height can be increased using an additional slim 15mm fan or 25mm thick top fan for slight increase in cooling performance.
SPECIFICATIONS
| NOCTUA NH-L12S | NH-L12S |
| DIMENSIONS | L: 128 x W: 146 x H: 70mm (including 15mm thick fan) |
| MATERIALS | Copper (base and 4x heat-pipes), aluminium (cooling fins) |
| COMPATIBILITY | Intel: 115X/1200/1700 AMD: AM4 |
| FANS | 1x NF-A12x15 (1800RPM) |
| RAM CLEARANCE | 33mm |
TEST SYSTEM
Testing is carried out on BC1 Mini v2 (open testbench), using the following hardware, in 20°C ambient room temperature. We noise normalised the cooler fan speed to 35dBA at distance of 50cm. This helps eliminate brute force cooling from higher RPM fans.
| CASE | BC1 Mini v2 (Open Testbench) |
| MOTHERBOARD | Rog Strix B650E-I Gaming WiFi (paid link) |
| CPU | R5 7600X / R7 7700X (paid links) |
| CPU COOLER | Noctua NH-L12S (paid link) |
| PSU | Extreme 850R (paid link) |
| RAM | 32GB Gskill DDR5, 6000MHz, CL30 (paid link) |
THERMAL BENCHMARKS
We use Cinebench R23 multicore (stability test), for period of 30 minutes. This provides worse case scenario for a given CPU. CPU coolers are tested across range of CPU’s for data validation and to reduce risk of errors in testing. This also helps account for variables between CPU platforms.
CONCLUSIONS
Noctua NH-L12S has good build quality and is straightforward to mount. It has quiet operation, even at full load. The NF-A12x15 fan reached maximum of 35dB at 100% load; recorded from distance of 50cm in our testing.