Noctua NH-L9i, Premium Low-Profile CPU Cooler for Intel LGA1200 & LGA115x (Brown)

Bought around 2021, has lasted me so long and given me no issues. Thinking it's time for paste reapplication, so thought to review. It's as quiet as it can get, and while it looks ugly, you can buy the RGB rings that go over the fans. This goes right over my i7-4790k.

Wow... The quality of this product is apparent at the moment of unboxing. This is meticulous attention to detail at it's finest. I am not acquainted with Noctua's customer support, but I imagine this is one of those companies which prides itself on over-delivering there as well.The box contains the 95mm by 95mm heat-sink with the fan attached, proudly displayed at center in very secure packaging. You will notice, quickly, the folded note in the lid of the box. The note is from the Noctua CEO, and it unfolds into the instructions. A nice touch. Also contained therein are four quality mounting-bolts; a metal square-inch case sticker; a four-inch "Low-Noise Adaptor (L.N.A.)" cable; and a 1.4mL tube of Noctua's own NT-H1 thermal compound, which would run you another ~$6 on it's own. There is also a pack of four elongated screws, provided as an option for those looking to replace the included fan with a 92x92x25mm, higher-performance version.The heat-sink and fan combine to create a very solid unit. It is minor details such as the rubber pads at the eight corners of the fan, reducing vibrations, which enable this product to stand out among it's competitors. The tooling of the heat-sink itself is superb, and even the wrappings on the 4-pin cable exude excellence. The L.N.A. cable is equally well-crafted, and while I cannot speak for the quality of the thermal paste myself, the general consensus on Amazon tends to be laudable.The 95x95x37mm design allowed me to squeeze this into a tightly-wired super-micro case, which I have fabricated as a custom blade-system for two independent mini itx boards. It isn't even fair to say it was a tight squeeze, as despite the small area to work with -- approximately 102mm x 122mm x 78mm -- it only stands 37mm tall, so has plenty of clearance. I found the included L.N.A. cable to be unnecessary, but if you find yourself in a situation where you could afford a few degrees for a bit less noise, it would be the part for the job. The fan is already so quiet anyhow though, so I feel it is probably more often misused as an extender.While I am building/fabricating this dual-chassis mostly as a personal project (experiment?), I have had to sacrifice nearly all of the design aspects in the rack-mount case which contribute to proper airflow. Gone is the array of deafening aircraft turbines that attempted to present themselves as commercial fans, albeit poorly; instead replaced with more subtle cooling techniques. The Noctua NH-L9I has proven to be a key component in that design.How does it perform though?Quite well, in fact. Closed in the super micro case, which has been segmented into two air-tight halves, it does not seem to go above 68 to 70 degrees celsius at the absolute highest for an Intel i7 4770. A similar build of mine in a larger case with a Corsair H70 runs at about 58 to 65 degrees celsius under load, so it is doing a respectable job. I let it idle in a game overnight with my switched PCI cooler off, and the logs say it never went above 72 degrees celsius. This is under entirely non-ideal circumstances, akin to a multiple-fan-failure, so an additional 2 degrees celsius over previously-recorded heights is frankly impressive. If you are not confined to the 37mm of vertical clearance within which this fits, swapping the 14mm NF-A9x14 fan for a 25mm replacement is something to consider. It is honestly not necessary from what I can tell; though we shall see if the so far exceptional cooling ability stands up to heavy use.Verdict:The Noctua NH-L9I is a phenomenal product. It squeezes better manufacturing and performance into a 95x95x37mm space than many other brand-name products can accomplish with 120+ millimeter tower-sinks. Perhaps the best testament to my satisfaction with this product is this simple fact: just 24 hours after receiving this product, the morning after the "stress-test," I purchased a second for the other half of the super micro chassis. Noctua makes what I feel are the finest quality cooling products on the enthusiast-circuit today, and the NH-L9I just proves they can do amazing things with tiny spaces; the latter of which are becoming more commonplace these days.

Been using in a firewall build. Haven’t designed the case yet but I knew I’d need the lowest profile cooler I could find. Luckily I found this, and it couldn’t be any cooler!

Configuration:CPU: Intel Core i7-4770K, M/B: Gigabyte GA-H87N Chassis: Chenbro SR30169T2-250Cooling Performance:I'm very happy with the performance of this cooler! The stock Intel cooler saw >100C when loaded by stress on Linux (while stress --cpu 8 --io 4 --vm 2 --vm-bytes 128M --timeout 3600s; do sleep 10m; done --- in bash), and up to 80C at idle. While the specs say that is in range, I decided to try this cooler. What a difference! 40C to 60C at idle (no external load), and same stress load pattern rarely peaks to 80C. That's more than 30C off the low-end and more than 20C at the high-end. I've been cycling full load for 1 hr with 10 min breaks in between for 2 weeks to burn-in the system, and it is performing very well. The heat load from a 1 hr run can be dissipated fully in 3 min to 5 min, depending on how long the 120mm front case duct fan runs at peak speed (1400 RPM) before calming down to idle (1000 RPM). Ambient room temperature never fell below 75 F, and has gone as high as 87 F. The stock Intel cooler showed a disturbing secular trend of growing peak temperature during a 1 day of 1hr-10min cycle testing, which I stopped when peak hit 105C. Noctua's cooler does not display this trend, and 82C seems to be a sharp upper bound. I attribute the very small/rare excursion above 80C to ambient temperature swings and brief exposures of the chassis to direct sunlight.Fan Noise:It's no surprise that the fan makes noticeable noise above 60C, but that's to be expected with high thermal load. It's not the high-pitched whine of 1U rack server fans, but certainly noticeable. With the fan speed at 2400 RPM, I measure about 70 dB right at the side case vent next to the cooler (about 2" past the vent into the case) and roughly 55 dB about 1 ft away. The 120mm front case fan duct fan is also running at 1400 RPM, which adds to the noise floor. For comparison, if your central air system is on and blowing, noise right at the vent will likely be in the 65 dB to 75 dB.Note of caution on applying thermal paste:If it's your first rodeo, read some articles about how to apply thermal paste/grease to best effect. I used the paste that came with the cooler, and it is performing just as well as expensive 3rd party paste. If you mess up, make sure you have some >=98% isopropyl alcohol or 100% acetone to clean up and start over---Using powder free, nitrile gloves will save your fingers! Also, avoid residual cloth fibers which will interfere with the heat transfer.