Thermalright Peerless Assassin is the air cooler to go with. You can just mount the front fan up a bit for ram clearance, both myself and my dad did this and it works fine. I have a 9800x3d and it will not go above 77 degrees no matter what you do to it.

the pretor has a 130mm fan and 120mm fan
better than the assassin 120 with 2x 120mm fans

https://youtu.be/-AJL3G-O_Fg

Originally posted by bossman150:

Thermalright Peerless Assassin is the air cooler to go with. You can just mount the front fan up a bit for ram clearance, both myself and my dad did this and it works fine. I have a 9800x3d and it will not go above 77 degrees no matter what you do to it.

I went with the Peerless Assassin myself after a motherboard and CPU upgrade because my expensive and massive Noctua NH-D15 wouldn't clear my GPU. I did replace the fans with Noctua fans though. I've been happy with the performance so far. No OC on a 9900x.

i miss the FROST TOWER....its the assassin with server grade fans.....it keeps my CPU under 72C at full load in a open air garage in Florida heat.....it will keep it at 72C even when its 95F in the garage!!!

so is it worth getting one of the thermalright ones and changing the fans or is it harder work to install and does it make any real difference to temps and noise?

Originally posted by Haruspex:

my expensive and massive Noctua NH-D15 wouldn't clear my GPU. I did replace the fans with Noctua fans though. I've been happy with the performance so far. No OC on a 9900x.

same. i just left off one of the fan clips, turned the desdktop on its side, and forced the gpu.

now i built a new computer, the gpu is bowed so bad it sags almost a half inch in the motherboard.

now i use a riser cord.


noctua is the only brand ill use for air, arctic silver for water.

Just looked at some of the thermaltake range and here are the prices :


royal pretor £39
Thermalright RK120 SE £35
Thermalright Royal Knight £39
Peerless Assassin 120 se £30
Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 £35

whats my best option as there really is not much price difference.

Esports duo is perfectly fit for that cpu if you need to go "compact" as in all the sink sitting over the cpu with no hang over the ram.

If that space is not interesting, peerless assassin is great or if you really want to add some extra, phantom spirit.

Originally posted by Bryan999:

Just looked at some of the thermaltake range and here are the prices :


royal pretor £39
Thermalright RK120 SE £35
Thermalright Royal Knight £39
Peerless Assassin 120 se £30
Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 £35

whats my best option as there really is not much price difference.

your best option is a 360 AIO if running 1440 or 1080res.at 4k air cooling will work
alright but anytime your using a cpu intense app or game you will run hotter than
a 360 AIO.

thanks for the replies, prefer to stick with air cooling.

hi just found these prices :

Thermalright Royal Knight £25.59
Thermalright Royal Pretor 130 £37.52

so cheaper than i thought but is the pretor worth the extra £11.

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/4gDQzy/thermalright-rk120-se-6617-cfm-cpu-cooler-rk120-se
both fans are 120mm
25mm thick fan in the middle, and 15mm thick fan on the outside of the stack

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/66cgXL/thermalright-royal-pretor-130-8188-cfm-cpu-cooler-royal-pretor-130
middle fan is 130mm, outer is 120mm
both are standard 25mm thick

9800x3d is a higher power cpu, the larger rads and more airflow will cool it better if only by a few c, but can help it stay at higher boost clocks longer

You are thinking of buying the best gaming CPU out but want the cheapest cooler possible while pairing it with a motherboard that won't use all the pcie lanes it has for dual M.2 off the CPU, bit of a mixed bag choice of parts.

Originally posted by wing0zero:

You are thinking of buying the best gaming CPU out but want the cheapest cooler possible while pairing it with a motherboard that won't use all the pcie lanes it has for dual M.2 off the CPU, bit of a mixed bag choice of parts.

mostly, but if the goal is best gaming performance at the cheapest cost it will do that

games wont be pegging the cpus max tdp, or need all the pci-e lanes

the board can give the cpu cores ~350w (14+2+1) all with cooling, = 14x25w to cores +2 igpu, +1 imc

as for nvme, the board has 2x m.2 nvme slots pci-e 5.0 x4 from the cpu
and 2x m.2 nvme pci-e 4.0 x4+x2 from sb
but any ssd is good for games, even sata/m.2 b key
so thats a non issue

the only thing im not a fan of is bios flash and bios reset buttons on the rear io of the board
if you need it that often, just plug the case reset button into the clr_cmos jumper
and only hdmi on the rear io, no dp? odd choice


just make sure to get a good ram kit, 6000+ cl30-
and good enough power supply
and case with good airflow

Originally posted by wing0zero:

You are thinking of buying the best gaming CPU out but want the cheapest cooler possible while pairing it with a motherboard that won't use all the pcie lanes it has for dual M.2 off the CPU, bit of a mixed bag choice of parts.

Well, could be they are getting that in a bundle. If so, who would really want to spend more money on a motherboard before seeing if the bundle is good enough first?

I would not, otherwise the bundle has no point.