Best repacement for the AP-15 fan

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RickSinGA

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Scythe has discontinued the AP-15 Gentle Giant. Any recommendations on a replacement for a new build? Also need 140mm High Static Pressure PWM fan recommendations?

Thanks
Rick S.
 
Noctua NF-F12s and Arctic F12s are excellent fans and will do a good job replacing AP-15s... for 140mm Noctua NF-A14 PWM or NF-A14 FLX will be perfect for any radiator or case use... you can also check for Arctic F14 but IMO noctua can perform a bit better...
 
If you want GT's you can still find them on Ebay for ~$18-25 a pop. Only reason I hate Noctua products is the horrible coloring. I almost didnt get the GT's for that reason but grey isnt as bad as tan and brown(wtf?) .
 
Thanks for the reply guys.

I have decided I want to go all 140mm fans as120/140 adapters, original thought, will not fit with the Push/Pull configuration I want to do. I have 1x420 and 1x240 radiators. That's 10 fans x $$=$$$$$$

I originally thought of the Noctua's but their mmH2o rating is pretty low, they are $$$ pricey and Martin doesn't give them really good marks.

I looked at Corsair but they don't do a SP 140.

BGears has a BGears B-PWM 140mm x 25mm High Static Pressure PWM 1800rpm Fan that looks interesting but still pretty expensive $17+ after adding sheathing etc. Some reviews say they tend to be pretty loud at higher RPM's. Noise is not a killer but carries some weight.

Not familiar with NB, Aaska or Artic but I guess I should do some research.

It looks like the AP-15's were made by Servo, do they have a 140mm SP fan that is worth a damn?

Thanks
Rick S.
 
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article1342-page9.html
measured noise vs temperature rise on an air cooler for a few fans.

http://www.hardware.fr/articles/874-1/comparatif-63-ventilateurs-120mm-dc.html
measured noise vs airflow for 63 fans in dc mode. unfortunately I don't read French and google translate doesn't do a great job. but I do understand the numbers :p

they test on this radiator: http://www.hwlabs.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7&Itemid=4

9FPI, 54mm thick. so basically a thick low fpi radiator.

weird how the noiseblockers don't do as well as in the spcr reviews.

lol@corsair af doing better then corsair sp on a radiator at equal noise levels.
google translate said:
If we compare [the performance of the sp120 with] the performance of the Scythe Gentle Typhoon, 12V, for a slightly lower noise level (35.4 dB (A) vs 35.8 dB (A)), the Scythe offers a greater flow of air over the radiator off as restriction. Worse, if you compare it with the AF120 on the radiator, it is less efficient than the latter at equivalent speed! From there, why buy as specific as the SP120 fan since other more versatile do better?
Click to expand...
I suppose sp120 may perform better on a thick high fpi radiator...

http://www.hardware.fr/articles/867-1/comparatif-40-ventilateurs-120mm-pwm.html
40 pwm fan comparison

noctua nf-f12 performs worse than nf-p12 on the radiator....

yea.....

>wait wtf?? shouldn't "static-pressure" optimized fans be better on radiators????
see this: http://martinsliquidlab.org/2013/02...w-specs-are-poor-measures-of-fan-performance/

my personal views:
if you're aiming for minimal noise, just get some decent fans and set the rpm to 700 or something. there isn't much difference between the decent fans.
if you just want a lot of airflow, get the reallllllly fast delta fans
if you're running fans at medium rpm (1k-2k rpm) as case fans and you care about noise, corsair AFs and many others are just as good at GTs and sometimes better.
if you're running fans at medium rpm on a radiator and you care about noise, well unfortunately it looks like nothing comes close to GTs.
if you want to blow up a balloon as large as possible, go get some fans optimized for static pressure.
 
I'd look at noise blockers if your looking for 25mm fans....are you interested in 38mm thick fans by chance? (Inherently they have higher static pressure)
 
RickSinGA said:
Thanks for the reply guys.

I have decided I want to go all 140mm fans as120/140 adapters, original thought, will not fit with the Push/Pull configuration I want to do. I have 1x420 and 1x240 radiators. That's 10 fans x $$=$$$$$$

I originally thought of the Noctua's but their mmH2o rating is pretty low, they are $$$ pricey and Martin doesn't give them really good marks.

I looked at Corsair but they don't do a SP 140.

BGears has a BGears B-PWM 140mm x 25mm High Static Pressure PWM 1800rpm Fan that looks interesting but still pretty expensive $17+ after adding sheathing etc. Some reviews say they tend to be pretty loud at higher RPM's. Noise is not a killer but carries some weight.
Click to expand...

martin also looked at some 140mm fans: http://martinsliquidlab.org/2010/12/10/r7-140mm-fan-testing-on-a-hwlabs-sr1-radiator/

and at push pull:
http://martinsliquidlab.org/2012/01/15/radiator-shroud-testing-v2/

hardware.fr compared some 140mm fans:
http://www.hardware.fr/articles/886-1/comparatif-ventilateurs-140mm.html

anyway about this whole "radiator fans need high static pressure" idea:
here's an analogy I just thought of:
static pressure is like how much weight a person can carry.
max airflow is like how fast a person can run.
real world performance is how fast a person can run with a heavy backpack
 
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We can really safely assume that the OP is not interested in the SR-1 radiator because he was using GT's already. He's probably working with something in the 14 to 30FPI category.

The SR-1 radiators are designed for <1000RPM fans, and actually perform better than any other radiator in the 600RPM fan category. But you'd never put a GT on it. The FPI is so low you don't need much static pressure to put air across it.

eLoop seems to be the way to go these days for 120mm based rads, now that GT's are no longer a thing. I'm so glad I have a bunch of AP-00's and AP-15's...
 
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