At stock we saw impressive numbers. The black Megahalems matches the Scythe Ashura which is an immense, but cheaper, 140mm tower heatsink.
Acoustics weren’t great but it really does depend on your choice of fan. The fans we were provided with weren’t that quiet but are still significantly quieter than a watercooling AIO.
Overclocking showed equally as impressive numbers. I’d say the main competitor of the Black Megahalems is the NH-U14S and you can see it beats that by about 2 degrees.
Although as you can see it is much louder than the NH-U14S. Again your choice of fan will reflect the acoustic levels. I’d say that you take our results with a certain degree of flexibility as there is room for significant noise/cooling fluctuations depending on the type of 120/140mm fans you pick. Either way we can clearly see the Black Megahalems has the potential to be epic if you pair it with this Vortex 14 Aluminium fans from Prolimatech. 
Did you test the system with the RAM in slot 3 and 4 as is shown in the pictures meaning its not running duel channel? If you did then I cant help but think this cooler is just far too big to actually be practical when combined with a 140mm fan…
No it wouldn’t work like that. I just failed 😛
Haha, I was wondering! So how did you have the ram laid out when testing? Reading through what you said as well that it would rest on even normal RAM isn’t really that great because the vibrations from the fan will go straight into the socket and the mobo which would add extra stress on the socket and potentially extra sound. Overall it seems to perform well but for £70 its just not good enough to be worth the hassle of the massive amount of space it takes up.
slot 2/4. It does depend what fan(s) you use tbh. You can pick up to £6 120mm fans have push pull and it’d be like £62 total
Some BitFenix fans are poor yes but these ones actually rivalled the Noctua fans pretty closely in terms of performance and noise, and they cost much less (Review here – http://www.eteknix.com/bitfenix-spectre-pro-pwm-and-spectre-led-fan-reviews/). We will do our best to source the new Phanteks PH-F14SP fans but I no longer do cooling reviews so will past the request onto our new cooling reviewer David Key!
Yeah they don’t look to bad, looking at the reviews the NF-A14 still beats it but not by much and whilst being less than half the price. At the end of the day though I would probably still got with the Noctuas as their warranty service is amazing as well. These new Phanteks should be better than the NF-A14s as well so really nice fans. Thanks for passing on the request!
Great review very good comparision ! Stands up to someof the best currently out on the market it definatly to me would be great for those of you that are apprehensive about water Cooling! Nice kit and very Attractive appearane to the enthusiast and modders out there! I have no problem trusting the Prolimatech’s Black Megahalems in my RIG
Hi,
Test system : Intel Core i5 3570K with Gelid GC Extreme under the IHS
Does that mean that the processor has been deildded ?
Yes it does.
Thx, sorry for the typo (delidded off course). i’m looking to build a budget Pc based in the i5 3570k and i’m looking for a fairly priced air cooler. i have 3 choices for the moment, the prolimatech basic81 (budget megahelems), alpenfohn brocken II or Scythe Ashura….don’t know which one i should choose anyway. Great review btw.
The Scythe Ashura is a great cooler. Personally I’d go for that. Scythe make some wonderful CPU coolers. Also later down the line if you decide you need more cooling you can easily add another fan as they provide the fan clips for it and they sell the fan that is bundled with it individually.
We actually reviewed it here ( http://www.eteknix.com/scythe-ashura-cpu-cooler-review/ ) it is also really well priced for what it is, you can pick it up for as low as £43 delivered (that;s if you’re in the UK not sure what pricing is like elsewhere).
That said I haven’t had a chance to test the Alpenfohn Brocken 2 but given the performance of the Brocken 1 that looks like it could be a great product too!