Noctua Next-Generation A-Series Fans Demonstrated at Computex 2017

Noctua A-Series

When it comes to being the best in the air cooling market, you really have to work hard to set a new standard. However, Noctua has been working extremely hard on their new A-Series fans. You may remember we’ve mentioned these a lot over the years at various shows. That’s because Noctua has been working on them for over 4 years, and there’s still a little more work to be done!

0.5mm from Blade to Frame

It sounds simple to reduce that gap at the edge of the blades, but it’s really not. The fans have required expensive new materials to construct them. This was to prevent the blades stretching over time and contacting the housing. Sterrox LCP plastics are extremely expensive compared to the old hardware and require more careful construction. They also needed to improve the motor and bearing do deal with the new tolerances.

By removing that gap, they reduce the amount of airflow that can wash back through the fan, meaning that more airflow is going the right way, through your system/cooler/radiator.

So what’s the point? Well look at it this way. Both coolers on the same heat block, one with 2 x 120mm Noctua fans, one with 1 x A-Series fan. The demo was a little disturbed here, but Noctua say it will normalise to about 0.1c difference. That’s right, one fan doing pretty much the same level of performance as two fans!

They’re not quite ready yet, and they are going to be expensive. However, as the technology progresses, the price will reduce and the adoption will increase. Why buy two fans, when you can have one at twice the price; less fans = less noise anyway.