Noctua NF-A4x20 FLX, Premium Quiet Fan, 3-Pin (40x20mm, Brown)
The NF-A4x20 is a highly optimised quiet 40×20 mm fan in premium quality, which uses future-oriented construction measures such as Flow Acceleration Channels as well as Noctua’s AAO frame system. The FLX version offers three speed settings via the included low-noise adapter (5000/4400/3700rpm) and thus ensures full flexibility between maximum flow rate and almost silent operation. Its excellent smoothness, the SSO2 reference class bearing and Noctua’s proven premium quality make the NF-A4x20 a sophisticated choice for the highest demands.
40 x 20 mm format.
Compared to Noctua’s award-winning NF-A4x10, the NF-A4x20 has double the depth. This allows for higher printing performance and makes the NF-A4x20 the perfect choice for higher air resistance applications.
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|---|---|---|---|
Flow acceleration channels.The impeller of the NF-A4x20 is equipped with so-called flow acceleration channel. By accelerating airflow in critical external regions of the fan blades, suction side vortex detachment, resulting in higher efficiency and lower turbulence-related noise emission. | SSO2 bearing system.The NF-A4x20 is equipped with the further optimised second generation of Noctua’s proven SSO bearing system. With SSO2, the rear magnet sits closer to the fan axis, resulting in even better stabilisation, resulting in further improved precision and durability. | Integrated anti-vibration pads.Made from extra-soft silicone, the anti-vibration pads reduce the transmission of minimal vibrations and are also compatible with all standard screws as well as standard mounting systems or fan clips used in CPU coolers. | Box contents:Low-noise adapter (L.N.A. Ultra-low noise adapter (U.L.N.A. OmniJoin 4-pin Y-cable, 30 cm cable extension, adapter set, NA-AV3, anti-vibration attachments, fan screws. |
AAO frame system.
Noctua’s AAO (Advanced Acoustic Optimisation) frames have integrated vibration buffer as well as a stepped inlet area and an internal micro-structure (inner surface microstructures) that allow even better performance/noise efficiency.
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|---|---|---|---|---|
| Connection & Pin Configuration | 4-pin PWM. | 3-pin. | 4-pin PWM. | 3-pin. |
| Operating voltage: | 12 V. | 12 V. | 5 V. | 5 V. |
| RPM. | Max. 5000 / min: 1000. | 5000. | Max. 5000 / min: 1000. | 5000. |
| RPM with L.N.A. | 4400. | 4400. | – | – |
| RPM with U.L.N.A. | – | 3700. | – | – |
| Noise: | 14.9 dB(A). | 14.9 dB(A). | 14.9 dB(A). | 14.9 dB(A). |
| Noise with L.N.A. | 12.2 dB(A). | 12.2 dB(A). | – | – |
| Noise with U.L.N.A. | – | 8.5 dB(A). | – | – |
| Format: | 40 x 40 x 20 mm. | 40 x 40 x 20 mm. | 40 x 40 x 20 mm. | 40 x 40 x 20 mm. |
| Weight: | 180 g |
| Dimensions: | 4 x 2 x 4 cm; 180 Grams |
| Brand: | Noctua |
| Model: | NF-A4x20 FLX |
| Colour: | Beige / brown |
| Batteries Included: | No |
| Manufacture: | NOCTUA |
| Colour: | Beige / brown |
Recently installed a new motherboard as an upgrade to my Ender 3 3D printer and as part of the installation process I decided to move both the new motherboard and Raspberry Pi (used for Octoprint) to the back of the the printer.
The case I printed to house the electronics had space for two 40x10mm cooling fans so I purchased two of these fans based on both positive user reviews and the manufacturers technical specifications regarding airflow and low noise.
The Noctua NF-A4x10 fans come well packaged and are shipped with a very useful set of cables/connectors and mounts that you seldom see supplied with other brands of cooling fan. The fans work well and although not completely silent, the are very quiet and push quite a bit of air.
These fans are used to cool four 2208 stepper motor drivers (which are known to run hot) and so far they have performed flawlessly and I have yet to see any skipping in a print due to the driver chips overheating, even after a long print.
Seriously considering buying another set of these to replace the stock fans on the Extruder and Hot End.
Must buy. Silent and efficient. that's what chinese fans cant do, even on low voltage
Awesome. Dont waste your money on chinese fans. Get quality ones
Amazing & whisper quie
Im using this in my UPS as the original fan has always been bugging me in the background but this is a beauty yes you can hear it but you have to listen for the hum rather than it be there
It makes my life so much bette
I got this fan to replace a very noisy one on SBC I have on my desk for everyday development work.
I can’t even hear it spin – it’s just wonderful !
I should have done this years ago instead of putting up with that annoying high pitched sound 40 hours a week. I’m delighted with the Noctua fa
High Quality
I’ve used these to replace the dabs in some 1u equipment. The airflow is close to the pen fans but much quieter. Installation was a breeze thanks to the included extras.
Replacement fan for my Ender 3 control box
My 3d printer had a very noisy fan in its control box and I decided to replace it with this one. I did mess it up the first time around and used the same connection (which by default is 24v). So this is my second fan .
Connect it to 5V and you won’t hear that fan ever again. The airflow is very decent when compared to the older 24v fan. Quite happy with it.
Amazing and quite
Brough to replace the fans in my MD array and OMG I have to keep checking it’s still turned on it’s that quite
These are the best fans I have ever had and I have always Ed used them on my servers with a little modification to the wiring
Using to cool a Pi4. Running a clean install of raspian lite, with a large heatsink sat at 51C idle, with the addition of one of these (and a 3D printed bracket to hold in place), now sits at 31C. Running it at 3V, it’s inaudible!
OK there are a lot cheaper fans, but you get what you pay for. I’ve used Noctua fans/sinks on a couple of PC projects and know that they’re well made, solid products.
Not perfec
Very quiet. But it didnt cool my device as the original fan.
Amazing quality and desig
A fan is a fan! Well you will be pleased to see what has to be a design that so much care has been taken on it. The box it comes in (product) is very informative and then you spot all the extras that come with it for various mountings. Truly stunning to have. Absolutely this is worth every penny and so is the Highly Recommended. Andrew.
would buy agai
very silent and worth the money made my 3d printer much better sound wise
Whisper quiet.
A great little fan that you will struggle to hear running at normal work loads.
A little bit pricey ...
… but I’ve not binned a Noctua fan yet.
These things do the job well … they are quiet and they are flexible in terms of fitment options.
Noctua doing what they do bes
Never been let down by a Noctua fan. Being so small you’d think it’s noisy but it actually runs pretty quiet. I’ve got no complaints about it at all. If you want a good fan and you want what you pay for, then this is the brand.
Quality fan..
Great quality – very quiet..
Comes well presented, with all required cables and connectors.
Best fans for the money
I bought several of these to put into a 48port Netgear switch that currently sounds like a jet engine.
Amazing difference putting these fans in, they probably aren’t as high air flow as my current fans, but the switch is not particularly stressed and doesn’t get very hot at the moment anyway.
Perfect for the USG-PRO-4
After replacing my USG-3 with a USG-PRO-4; the noise level from the gateway is dramatic and instant — the AVC fans that come built in are both loud and inefficient.
After debating between this and the 10mm model; I opted for this 20mm model and the sound difference is immediate. Don’t get me wrong; it’s not silent, but the “whine” from the AVC fans is gone — you’re just left with the noise of turbulence produced by the fans.
I also opted to go for the NA-RC12 Ultra Low Noise Adaptor (ULNA) after first testing the NA-RC10 LNA (both are included with the product) — which work ultimately by reducing the RPM of the fan (hence the reason to opt for the 20mm; to shift more air at lower speeds).
Even with the lowest RPM; the fans ran cooler than stock.
CPU with stock AVC: ~65c
CPU without LNA: not tested
CPU with LNA: ~29c
CPU with ULNA: ~34c
Cannot hear a thing!
I installed this on my 3D printer and it is dead quiet. Even when right in front of it I cannot hear the fan.
Performance is good, I don’t have a baseline to measure it against.
The packaging is great and you get a wealth of accessories with i
Top quality guaranteed...
An excellent product presented in a nice box with all you need to install correctly.
Silent and functional.
Absolute uni
I bought this to fit to my 3d printer as the stock 40x40x10mm fan could be heard from the other side of the house. This fan is better in every way except the colour, but it’s something I can live with as I don’t have to listen to it.
I had to cut and re-solder the wires as they’re not long enough to reach the board, once I’d finished the solder and tested the fan, I had to cut the wires so I could solder again as I hadn’t done it properly but realised once I cut it that the fan was working, it was just that silent!
silence
Installed on my LED panel. Now I can do interviews in a small room without any noises .
Quiet high quality
I have bought many of these to replace the stock 3d printer fans,
quiet and high quality, highly recommend.
Silence your Ubiquiti USG and Switch which fan to get!
Noctua NF-A4x20 FLX, 3-Pin Premium Quiet Fan (40mm, Brown) – 12 VOLT
That is the exact model you need for the Ubiquiti UniFi USG (Security Gateway) [2 required]
and for the UniFi Switch 250/500W [4 required]
Make sure its the 12 VOLT FLX version!!! {NOT THE PWM VERSION]
Lots of extras, decent fan.
Excellent fan with lots of accessories but would be nicer if it came with a shroud or rubber seal.
Genuinely whisper quie
Used to replace noisy fan in Creality CR-10 3D printer’s extruder. Can hardly tell the fan is running without putting my ear right next to it. Premium packaging and lots of accessories, most of which I didn’t use, but I’ve no doubt they’ll be useful at some point!
Used in Netgear GS724
Massive improvement over the original fan. Switch is in a data rack under the stairs and could hear the original fan in the next room. Now you can hear the fan while under the stairs, but once the door is shut you cant hear it anywhere else. This is on a 2pin setup with no speed control as well.
Very quiet!
Wasn’t sure about this – but decided to buy. Glad I did. Very impressed, so much so I’ve ordered another one to help cool raspberrypi. Super quiet compared with the old fan on my 3-D printer. Package came with a good selection of cables, even a snap type set which was helpful as my 3-d printer had a non-standard connector.
Everything you could need included
This really is a great fan. Its quiet, it performs very well and comes in the box with all the accessories I needed for my set up.
Excellent Cooling fa
No doubt these are much more expensive than any other brand, however they do have value for money. You will start to notice by the quality of the packaging, material and assembly. Very very silent, and efficient flow. I believe they are the best cooling fans on Amazon.
Prefect for beefier devices that the A4-10 can't quite handle
This is a chunkier version of the A4-10, designed to give more air flow for beefier devices (like network switches, set top boxes etc) that need a little more oomf to move air around.
Super Sile
These fans are so good! it has transformed the noise output from my 3D printer considerable! There not cheap but in my opinion worth the expense. The PWM is generally cheaper and still operates as per standard 12V fan just don’t connect 3rd cable.
excelle
my OEM fan died in my switch, decided to splash the cash on this and it’s worth every penny. excellent build quality, and so much quieter than the original one. good stuff.
The difference with these fans installed is night and day,
I have installed these in the Ubiquiti UniFi Security Gateway Pro, it is enterprise grade equipment that has been designed with function as a priority, so as stock the noise levels are ridiculous for a home / home office environment.
After installing these fans I immediately saw a reduction in sound, there is still an audioable noise level, it’s not silent but there 40mm so you have to expect some noise.
These are a direct swap for the fans installed in the UniFi USG and come with an array of mounting and speed adjusting parts, I have just mounted mine with the main cable, without adjusting the speeds or using rubber mounting hardware.
Unbelievably quiet!
I bought this fan for the hotend of my 3D printer, now I can’t hear it unless I put my ear right next to the fan, and then only just. The loudest part of my 3D printer is now my PSU for sure. Buy this fan, you won’t be disappointed.
Just what was needed
Used it ti replace a noisy fan in my Swann cctv unit. First class product, comes with all the fixtures and fittings, connectors. Very well packaged.
Whisper quie
Brilliant little fan, perfect size for attaching to the top of my Odroid gold heatsink. Totally silent comes on and off automatically.
I bought this as a replacement for the one in my Netgear rackmounted switch, which had suddenly gone very noisy. As the original fan was only two-pin, yet this is a three-pin, I expected that I would need to cut-and-shut with the original connector. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find a handy little adapter and some small gel-filled Scotchlok connectors. I still had to cut the connector (and its wires) from the old fan, but then it was just a moment’s work to join it to the adapter and have everything ready to plug in. No solder, nor heatshrink required.
I used two of the included anti-vibration mounts to fit it in place, rather than the screws. They were a little fiddly, but anything that helps reduce vibration can only be a good thing.
That said, it’s incredibly quiet for a 40mm fan, so I doubt vibration would be much of an issue anyway.
So, not the cheapest fan, but worth if for the peace and quiet along with what will hopefully be, a long service life.
PERFECT to replace switches fans
I have a ES-48-500W which is not the noisiest but the pitch of the fans were quite piercing and there is no way to tune the fan speed. Replaced the original fans with these NOCTUA ones, which took a bit of a trick, but the result is fantastic. The switch runs them a 90% duty cycle all the time as they are not as pressure good as the original ones, but the volume of air moved (I also changed the flow sense to match my rack air extraction) keeps the switch cooler than the original fans at about 60db quieter !
Absolutely recommend.
PS: DO get the 40×20 for that kind of equipment. The 40×10 are just not suitable for that work.
Very silent, efficient and supplied with a handy cable adapter if you need i
Bought this to replace a cheap and noisy OEM 5V cooling exhaust fan in my CCTV recorder. Fitted fine and very silent, it still pulls out enough warm air from inside the 1U sized metal case, whilst drawing in cooler air from the opposite side’s grill vents. The supplied cable adapter was ideal to fit the fan to the original 2 pin cable which fitted to the fan header. The packaging and design is overkill as others have said, but it’s clear it’s a good quality product.
Amazingly quiet and efficient little fa
Very quiet and moves plenty of air for cooling my hot-end on my Creality Ender 3. It comes with plenty of useful accessories. I’m super satisfied!
Quiet and easy to install
Love the fact its so quiet, and came with a 3pin –> 2pin adaptor. Word to the wise – if you’re using on a 3D printer then print out a fan cover asap. I managed to slice off a fingernail less than an hour after installing it while I was fiddling about rearranging wires 😀 Well worth the money.
Not silent, but very quie
Not silent, but very quiet. Happy with purchase as I needed it to replace the noisy case fan on a DVR box.
Super Quie
Excellent quality fan, really quiet. Used to replace a worn out/noisy fan in a SwannView DVR unit.
Noctua make the best fans
or maybe you could get a specific other brand for a particular job – but if Noctua make one that fits my need, I’ll just get that.
Stupidly over-packaged, loads of rubber mounts, screws, click-to-join-wire thingies, extension cables, voltage drop cables, everything you could ever need – sure you’re paying a bit more for all this – but not that much more than chinesium alternatives and they just work.
So much quieter!
I used this fan as a replacement for the main heart sink fan on the hot end of my cr10s. It is near silent in comparison . I didn’t even have to solder it, the snap links provided did a wonderful job. The fan is worth the extra few pounds compared to the competition.
Noctua fan really worth the money
Very quiet actually thought it was broken at first really worth the money Thanks again .
Quite, well spec'ed and comes with everything
Used to replace the loud fan in my reolink rln8-410 Nvr. Chose this fan as it come with extension leads, 3 to 2 pin adapter and a noise reducer (which I just think half’s the fans speed). Simple to fit and although I can hear fan, it is much less high pitch and unlike old one I cannot hear it when a meter away. I’ll try fitting speed reduce cable when I get 5 minutes. Wish price was alittle cheaper is my only moan.
Four Stars
Great fan, the only reason its not getting 5 stars is the price, over priced for what it is.
Quiet and practical
Bought these to use on a 3D Printer in place of the originals that permanently screamed at full speed. I really find it hard to tell if they are on or not without looking or putting my hand in the airflow
Super Quie
I use this to cool the hotend on a custom built 3D printer and really can’t fault it – or even hear it!
Outstanding
I wish that I could replace all my fans with Noctua ones! They are absolutely outstanding, & the only drawback is that when you first use them, they are so silent that you have to look at them to check that they’re actually on. You’ll be absolutely amazed & they’ve made a world of difference to my 3D printer, which used to sound like a big airliner taking off.
Great fan - wwwway quieter than the one it replaced. Impressive.
Replaced a worn fan in a cctv recorder box with a vanilla replacement from maplin. It worked well and moved a lot of air, but really made a racket – too much. I bought this looking at the db levels, and Noctua is known for quiet fans. It was more than double the cost of the maplin vanilla, but I just needed this sorted. Fan arrived quickly really smartly packaged with a range of adaptors and some useful rubber mounting pegs. I used the 2 pin adaptor and quickly installed the fan – and… tbh the noise difference was pretty incredible. Really impressed. A key things seem to be every contact point with the chassis it’s mounted to is insulated by rubber pads and tbh the bearing is prob just really well made / balanced – barely any noticeable viration even touching the fan casing. I think it moves a very tiny bit less air – so perhaps drop on rpm prob helps it too. Either way – I’m very pleased with this buy.
Four Stars
Good product and service. Turned my 3d printer from a hoover to a humming bird
Ahh.. silence..
Very quiet fan that has helped to cut down considerably the noise from my 3D printer. I bought two of these, one for part cooling and the other in the printer’s control box.
Fantastic!! I put this in my Marshall JMT615 Valve Amp, as there is is known over heating issue with these due to heat rising from the power valves and into to the chassis head containing the capacitors, resistors, wiring, pcb, etc. I placed an aluminium plate between the power valves and the head housing the capacitors, etc. This fan then draws heat from the head housing down onto the aluminium plate (not the valves), keeping the enclosure relatively cool, but allowing the valves to get as hot as they need to.
Anyway – it’s super quiet – If I place my ear close to the amp I can only just hear it with the amp off. If you weren’t listening for it, you wouldn’t notice it at all. With the amp on I can’t hear it at all.
I used this to replace a normal 40x10mm fan that put out the usual fan noise and you easily hear that one, and was unbearable. The accessories supplied with the fan were really useful for replacing this. Basically converting this 3 pin fan to my 2 pin supply.
Now no noise. Well worth the money. Happy Days!!
Excellent Product.
My CCTV NVR had a very noisy cooling fan, which was very annoying when you spend a large sum of money on the system itself, after some research, I found that a large number of NVR’s and DVR’s seem to come with these cheap cooling fans made in China which are very noisy in operation.
I found that a vast number of people were experiencing the same problem and were fitting this fan to rectify the high noise levels, so I took the plunge and ordered the fan after removing the outer casing of my NVR to measure the fan size first. Make sure you check the voltage which will be printed on the sticker attached to the fan, as you can get 5 volt and 12 volt fans.
The fan arrived quickly as it was kept in stock by Amazon, the outer packaging of the Noctua fan was high quality which was a good start.
I removed the cheap Chinese fan and fitted the new Noctua unit, I required the (NA-AC2) lead which converts the 3 pin fan connector to a 2 pin connecter, this plugs straight into my Reolink NVR Motherboard socket. The fan unit kit also comes with a further noise reduction lead (NA-RC11), this slows the fan down to a lesser RPM rate which gives you an even quieter fan while still giving me enough cooling capacity for my NVR.
The Low-Noise Adaptor lead (NA-RC11) plugs in-line in-between the fan plug and the 3-2 pin converter lead (NA-AC2).
All leads come provided with the kit.
The result was excellent, I now have a quiet NVR unit.
Whisper Quie
Replaced fans in a Dell PowerEdge R310 with these and the noise difference is amazing. The hard disks are the loudest part now. Some significant manipulation was required to connect these to the proprietary Dell connectors, but the included accessories made this much easier. The little snap-connector blocks are fantastic.
Sturdy and very quie
Yes it’s sturdy and very quiet which is what was important to me. I use it for external cooling a laptop running straight off the laptop’s USB port (5V) works fine. Nicely packaged with accessories as shown in the description.
A great little fan that moves plenty of ai
A great little fan that moves plenty of air and makes very little noise. Would prefer an option to purchase it without the huge box and unwanted extra cables/connectors and adaptors but I guess you can’t have everything!
I have fitted these to Kenwood TM-V71 Amatuer Radios and they are a huge improvement over the standard fan.
Great, quiet fan, bought for a 3d printer. However, I’ve since read elsewhere that this is less powerful than standard 40 fans, such as that come with the printer. To get the same flow as those, apparently I’d need a 60×60.
Silent Fa
I bought this to replace the fan in my old AV reciever as it sounded like it was taking off. This however is completely silent. Was going to buy a cheaper fan but bought this knowing how the good the brand is and is well worth the extra couple of quid.
Good fan, silent.
great! keeps my 2.5 drive bay cool and is practically silent. Came with a load of cool little extras too, shame I don’t have occasion to use them.
he attention to detail is astounding and quality is second to none.
So silent you have to check it’s still running.
I love Noctua products, the attention to detail is astounding and quality is second to none.
Great, quiet 40mm PCM CPU / chipset fa
Very very good – I bought this for a old Sapphire Fusion E350 mini ITX box running as an HTPC. Several previous fans were too noisy so as to be annoying. This is great, very quiet and keeps the temp’ stable. Good packaging and presentation, along with lots of extra cables if you should need them.
Well Engineered but Expensive Fa
This is really quiet well engineered fan which I’m using to cool the Northbridge chip on an old motherboard.All accessories are supplied. I knocked off 1 star since the product is a tad expensive.
Nice quiet fa
Putting the price aside as they are a primium price, these are great little fans. They come with everything you need to fit them to a pc and are as quiet as a fan gets
Its noctua enough said
If you know notctua then theres no point reading this review. But for anyone else This will probably be the best fan you will find. Near silent, high air flow, amazing packaging. This is my first noctua fan but i know their reputation but seriously their reputation is nothing compared to the actual quality of their fans perfect for my 3D printe
Love Noctua fans - need I say more?
Supremely quiet and was a perfect replacement for my 3Com switch. Not quite as much air displacement as the OEM unit
but nonetheless the end result is perfect.
Silent Fans, literally no noise!
The best fans out there on the market. I use 3 of these on my 3D printer and you literally cannot hear them. Shame on the colour scheme as they are FUGLY!
Quality, Quiet Fan with working RPM/Sense outpu
I needed a fan to replace one in a NAS box that had got loud and annoying. The NAS box needed a fan with a “sense” (rpm) wire, and my previous attempts to buy 40mm fans from that-auction-site just ended up with fans with no sense wire (the one that did have a third wire had it just connected to the +12v line). This one is pretty quiet, better than the original, and came with an impressive collection of bits and pieces. Time will tell, but this looks like one case where paying more gets you better quality.
Nice Fa
Very quiet with adaptor, good fitting accessories. Not the colour I would choose but works well. Buy a 40mm fan guard though as it is bare when fitted.
Great little fans
I bought two of these to replace the fans in a Netgear router, one had failed and the other was very noisy.
These are very high quality fans very well made. They are completely silent as far as I could tell – with my ear right next to them the only thing I could hear was the air being moved.
Supplied with a great selection of connectors and fittings too.
The rubberised corners of the fans where they are fastened with screws is a great touch.
Outstanding quality fan, you pay the price but its a cut above the cheap alternatives, good quality build, whisper silent, rubber noise dampeners, plastic PC case mounts, numerous adaptors, omnijoin adapter included.
I have added a few pictures, you cant go wrong with these, 6 year warranty too.
i used this fan to replace a stock noisy 40x40x10mm fan on my 3d printer, works great.
Almost noise-less, but pricey.
Pros:
1. Extremely quite.
2. Comes with loads of accessories.
3. Noctua build quality is amazing.
Conns:
1. Quite pricey for 40mm fan.
2. Quite low airflow.
3. Rubber mounts looks like not made for this fan.
Conclusion:
If you need a very quite fan, almost noise-less – perfect purchase. Price is quite high but if noise level is more important than saving couple of quid – go for it.
Extremely quiet premium fa
The fan is extremely quiet, and comes with accessories including a low-noise adaptor (to reduce RPM), extension cable, various socket adaptors, and mounting screws. Everything, from the fan itself to the accessories and packaging, have a premium build quality. I’ve used several Noctua fans over the years, and all have been extremely quiet and reliable: in my experience, Noctua make the best computer fans, by far. A pair of these 40mm fans made a good replacement for the noisy stock fans in a network switch.
Worth every penny
This fits ASUS Z97 SABERTOOTH MK1 motherboard (with a little persuading).
Bought as a replacement fan for the above motherboard as the one ASUS supplies it incredibly noisy. This however i cannot hear! Excellent and worth the money.
Good product.
Remember that these fans are 40mm – they are not completely silent, miracles cannot be performed. HOWEVER they are the quietest 40mm case fans I have ever owned, and having neeeded to use the low noise adapter on one of my 2, can confirm that this also helps considerably.
I was very short on options for cooling a passive SoC (AMD A4-5000) ITX system which I built, and apart from a mesh side panel the case has very little venting, and the board only has 1x CPU fan and 1x Case fan connector – installing the fan has reduced CPU temperature by 15c which I am very impressed about.
Noctua fan - Need I mention the silence?
Fantastic Noctua quality in a 1U chassis size, great for switches or 1U builds.
Be aware that you cannot replace the delta fans of some switches with this as it doesn’t spin up anywhere near as fast as the deltas, and the switches may think the fan is broken.
Replaced the 2 stock fans in a Ubiquiti Switch (US24250W) with 2 of these. It went from aircraft carrier to summer meadow. I noticed the switch had 2 more fan headers and space for another 2 fans (probably used in the 500W version of the switch) so bought 2 more of these to help with airflow as they do push slightly less than the stock fans they replaced.
One thing to note (which may explain some of the negative reviews on here) is that the fans themselves are utterly silent, power one up outside an enclosure and you have to hold it right up to your ear to detect any noise at all.
When you put the fan into the enclosure, the airflow itself may be audible depending on how much restriction there is – in my case the fan vents have quite a lot of material in the way and hence there is a detectable sound. I suspect an entirely open vent with a wire grill over it would minimise this.
Still even with the restriction on the switch chase these are massively better than the stock fans they replaced. 10-20dB reduction if i had to guess.
Quite but airflow a little weak
Very quite but not quite as powerful as the standard fan it replaced. Has its place for low heat generating appliances such as tv or home entertainment devices that are close to people.
Very quiet compared to OEM fan.
Installed to studio flash head where OEM fan was damaged. Required pin reconfig but no biggie. Could hardly hear it running compared to the OEM fan. Time will tell for longivity.
brilliant little fa
brilliant little fan seems to produce more air at a lower volume than other fans of the same size definitely recommend and will be purchasing again when i next need a 40mm fa
Exellent fans, impressive range of accessories in pack
Very good quality fans.
Used to install some extra cooling into an Acer SFF case that had passive only cooling.
Very impressive packaging and great choice of accessories/cables in the packet (only thing we had to purchase extra was a y splitter (Noctura – NA-SYC2) to let us install 2 onto a single Motherboard header). Basically you can replace pretty much any fan setup you may have with the various cables or universal adapter if needed. Documentation for the accessories was impressive with instructions on how to use their universal adapter in an easy to understand format (although we didn’t use it opting for the 3 pin header instead – due to SFF case layout)
Only gripe would be that due to the lower power of the fan motor one of them did stick once until the machine was restarted when the case was bumped however since these are designed for switches and not cooling a case (Given the dimensions of the case this is the largest fan we could fit into it) that’s hardly a complaint. Impressive airflow for such a small fan.
If only Noctura sold their fan range with colour options or LEDs then I would be putting these into my own personal case. As it is a great range of fans and we will certainly be considering them in future for client upgrades/repairs/custom builds.
For a few bucks more than ya cheap and cheerful fans you get an amazing well packaged fan which comes with many cables etc ...
What a fan. For a few bucks more than ya cheap and cheerful fans you get an amazing well packaged fan which comes with many cables etc to tweak to your heart’s desire. I dropped one star due to its noise being the same as the fan I had before in my shuttle PC. Was hoping for something super quiet.. but I can hear this as the one before.. maybe I need to look at water cooling or something…?
Does what it says, and allows a lot of scope for fitting and wiring. Very quiet!
Very quiet as expected, and the various adapters allowed me to trial-and-error the best solution for me. I fitted this to a Marshall guitar amp, notorious for their noisy and unreliable case fans. Not the cheapest solution, but perfect if not sure in advance exactly how you will fit it.
Quiet yet shifts ai
I bought two of these to provide extra cooling for a Mini ITX computer that I was building, they are nice and quiet and seem to shift quiet alot of air considering the size of them. I would highly reccomend these if your looking for a small enough fan to fit a HTPC.
I did have to swap the wires around for the DVR as the negative/positive was round the wrong way but it's been working good fo
Bought to replace an extremly noisy fan in a CCTV DVR, I have full Noctua fans in my PC so i already knew the quality was unmatched. I did have to swap the wires around for the DVR as the negative/positive was round the wrong way but it’s been working good for the last month and you barely hear it running now.
Bought a couple of these fans to fit in a Zyxel PoE switch that made a serious racket with its standard fans. The switch is now almost silent, and doesn’t seem hot in the slightest. But…. can’t give them 5 stars because they really don’t move much air at all (with or without the speed reducing adapters). For me it was a risk I’m willing to take with a cheap switch, but in other situations, using these might reduce the lifespan of the device they’re supposed to be cooling considerably. That said, I did use the adapters to run them slower because for me, at least up to a point, silence is more important than the lifespan of the equipment. Time will tell 🙂
Excellent! I’ve just installed this in my media centre, with the noise reduction adapter, and this really is very quiet …. not silent, but much much quieter than the cheapo fan I replaced with it. Barely noticeable above the whirring of hard discs. The PC kept thermalling out when the room was warm, but only occasionally and the case was always quite hot when this happened, so even a small amount of airflow should be adequate to keep it running now, and I should actually be able to hear videos at a low volume now.
Premium price for a premium produc
I used this to replace the stock fan in an FSP FLX (1U) PSU.
The PSU in question was used to replace the DC-to-DC converter in my slimline Silverstone ML-02 case so a) there is very little room for the PSU and b) there are no vent holes for it in the case so it vents inside the case. Bearing all that in mind, my PSU has not overheated or failed once. It gets a little warm but not too much and if I turn off the other fans in the case, you can barely hear this one – which is impressive for a 40mm fan.
I was also greatly impressed by the packaging. However, I do feel they could have dialled it back a bit and made the fan cheaper! I also liked the quality of the included adapter wires. All-in-all, it’s a premium price for a premium product.
It's super quiet and it seems to be of excellent build ...
I bought this to replace a heatsink fan on motherboard with hard wired CPU. It’s super quiet and it seems to be of excellent build quality. I think its a little expensive, and i’m not sure all the fancy claims about its design really make much difference overall but it works much better than the stock fan I had and is lovely and quiet which Is what I wanted.
Silent but deadly... to your wallet.
Great fan, really quiet. Replaced the stock fan in my DNS320L with this and wasn’t disappointed. Reading through the back of the box shows you what they have done to improve the fans design and theoretically it seems sound. Or doesn’t sound as the case is. Very quiet, decent air pressure and flow and bought another for my Dad’s NAS
I was aware this fan is a little more expensive than some of the others on the market. However, I was in dire need of a small, silent and powerful CPU fan and had heard this brand described as “the Rolls-Royce of fans”.
It can recommended from multiple sources and I have to say, the recommendation is well deserved. I have this fan in a tiny HTPC build so it needs a good bit of air pumped onto the cpu to keep it cool in an already hot and confined case. It works amazingly well. I have it running at full power and, though not silent at full speed, I can’t hear it over the dehumidifier fan I have running three rooms over behind a closed door.
The only possible downside I could see to the fan is, if you have some kind of colour scheme going; this fan looks a little odd. But for me, with it shut up away inside the case, I can’t complain. 5 stars. Excellent product. I’d recommend even despite the higher price.
The accessory kit for this little fan was impressive. Screws, rubber nubbins, adapter cables, extension cables, the works. The noise level was pretty standard though, I wouldn’t say it was especially quiet unless you compared it to a broken fan or something that moves a lot more air.
Mine lasted 14 months of continuous use before the bearing went and no amount of lubricant would bring it back.
A comprehensive kit of parts comes with this fa
As others have commented, this is a decent little fan, with a kit of parts “to suit every occasion”. Desperately over-packaged – shame there isn’t an option to buy just the fan, as that’s all I needed. Time will tell how robust it is.
Quality item
After buying this product, I still think that the price point was a bit steep. However I have to admit that it is an extremely good product of the highest quality. Lots of accessories in it and very smartly packaged too. Bought two of those for a high end piece of networking equipment that I keep in my flat instead of the data centre and they converted it from a deafening beast to a silent appliance. Highly recommended.
I bought a couple of these to replace existing 40mm fans that were on their last legs in a 5.25″ internal hard disk enclosure. What sold me were the extras that come with the fan. The enclosure has custom connectors, but because of all the extras in the box I was able to use the connectors from the old fans without a soldering iron.
Initially I was disappointed with the fans. It is always going to be hard to make a silent fan this small, after all, the smaller the fan the faster it has to spin to move sensible volumes of air. At the default speed the Noctua fans actually have a slight wining noise to them which I could hear from a long distance away. The extras saved the day however. The fans come with an adapter that lowers the fan speed and after installation became silent against the noise of the other fans in the case. The temperature inside the enclosure suffered not a jot.
Now if only they could make them in a nicer colour!
Great fan, but only quiet when using the supplied LNA adapto
I got hooked on Noctua products 2 years ago when i built a beast of a PC cooled by 2 140mm Noctua fans and one of their crazy NH-D14 heatsinks.
Straight away their products impressed me due to their exceptional performance and relatively low noise.
This 40mm fan did initially disappoint me as it was noisier than the stock fan on my PulseBox media center, but once i added the Low Noise Adapter to slow the fan down to 3700rpm it was virtually silent. Temps only increased by 2 degrees from stock fan but i’d rather that than a noisy fan. Would be 5 stars if the temps would have kept the same or lowered but still a great purchase and still loving Noctua.
op quality
The packages alone make this product stand out from the rest. I am yet to throw away the box as they are so well made. This matches the product inside. Lots of extras mean that any combination of form factors are accounted for, there will be no configuration these fans wont fit or be able to be made to fit. The products themselves are quieter than my motherboard supplied originals and are more effective at around 1/3 of the RPM. Overall very pleased indeed. Quite expensive though, it would be nice to simply buy the fan without all the extras that sadly I will not be using anyway. This would make them simply the best in their field.
Great quality
The price is pretty high for such a tiny fan, but I feel that the generous accessories pack makes this a good value package overall. I would have gladly paid 5 for the accessories, which means that you get the very high quality fan for the same price as a dodgy ebay no brand fan.