Hi,
I'm looking for the most silent cooler for my i7 2600 (or 2700) inside a Silverstone lc17 case. There is approx 140mm headroom for a cooler - I'm having a hard time finding a decent tower cooler with these specs, the only solutions i've found so far are the Scythe Grand Kama Cross and the Cooler Master GeminII SF524 which have both top mounted fans, but seem to be pretty quiet. Which of the two is better/more quiet? or would you have a smaller tower cooler to recommend that performs better?
Thanks for any advice!

I'd go for the Grand Cross, because there's a good chance a pair of slim (10mm) fans can be rigged to the bottom of the fins for push-pull.

Alternatively, the Prolimatech Genesis is both a tower and top-down cooler with excellent cooling performance. With some careful bending, the 'tower' part can likely be lowered 20mm to your clearance level.

Hi, I've tried both a Coolermaster Hyper TX3 and Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 on an i7-2600k. They are both capable of cooling it quietly, even under full load.
Unless you over-clock the CPU, then you need a massive tower cooler, not to mention a bigger, higher air-flow case, but as you have a HTPC case I doubt heavy over-clocking is part of the plan.

Regards, Seb

I'd also go for the Grand Kama Cross. If it can cool an i7 965 (130W) (see the SPCR review) it can also cope with a 2600, probably overclocked mildly as well.

Here take a look at the small Noctua Tower. It has more than enough cooling capacity for a 2600.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6835608016

Here is a review of the older single fan version

http://www.frostytech.com/articleview.c ... cleID=2270

I second CES suggestion of the noctua. Another to consider, probably among the best coolers below 140mm, Noctua NH-C14 140mm x 2 SSO CPU Cooler, with the top fan mounted is 130mm height and without top and only bottom its 105m, check your mobo and components to see if it would fit.

Humm, NH-C14 in the LC17 HTPC case is going to look like a good fit... Although I found someone with NH-C12P in LC17.
I don't think these large top-down coolers, including the grand cross, are going to work in this case as there isn't enough room above the fan for it to breath, unless you want to cut a hole in the lid...

Unless you're overclocking I really don't think anything more than a good 92mm fan tower is needed. The NH-U9B would no doubt serve fine but it's $60 vs the Hyper TX3 at $18 and the Noctua's don't come with PWM fans, which most modern motherboards need to control the fan speed. Granted you may find that the Noctua can be run at a low speed on the included resistors that's both quiet enough and cooling enough for full load. To me controlled fan speed seems a better solution...
[said the nutcase that bought a very expensive NH-C14 and then a pair of 140mm PWM fans and PWM splitter to go with...]

Seb

Another vote for the CM TX3. Even if the fan turns out to be mediocre the total cost of the cooler plus replacement fan will be lower than that of the NH-U9B.