SilverStone NT06 Pro Low Profile CPU Cooler Review

The SilverStone NT06 Pro costs £45 in the UK. At that price it would be batting above the average if it was a tower heatsink. Yet this excellent level of performance has been crammed into a product measuring in at just 82mm in height. So we’ve got the excellence of a high performance tower heatsink and the innovation of an incredibly small form factor cooler, all rolled into one awesome product.

The NT06 Pr0 is priced very competitively for what you are getting. The performance as we have seen is excellent and you’ll certainly be able to have a serious overclock in a HTPC or Small Form Factor system if that is your kind of thing. The mounting kit is excellent, it stays well within all socket specifications and will mount any modern socket, but no doubt the favourite sockets for most people will be either FM1/FM2 or LGA 1155 as most HTPC systems run these sockets.

Aesthetically the SilverStone NT06 is a good looking product, being entirely nickel plated or aluminium it has a quality feel and finish to it. The provided fan is also well produced as it comes with a black braided cable, PWM support and a slightly thinner-than-standard design which helps keep the form factor of the product so small. Another thing that I really liked, which many may see as a minor thing, is that SilverStone provided extra fan clips if you want to buy another fan for push-pull. This would be useful if you have enough room and want extra cooling performance or two low RPM fans instead of one high RPM fan. It is little touches like this that set companies apart and SilverStone have ticked all the right boxes with this product.

Finding negatives is tough with this product. If I were to be really pedantic I would say the fan is on the noisy side when you put the system under overclocked-stress. This 100% Prime 95 stress situation is unlikely to ever occur within a HTPC, but if you consider HTPC cases tend to be enclosed and starved of airflow then it is possible that this noise could be reproduced so including a fan speed reducer cable is something SilverStone could have included to be really generous to the consumer – especially considering HTPC systems need to be silent at all times.

As a HTPC cooler the SilverStone NT06 Pr0 is verging on being perfect. It has excellent looks, top notch build quality, tower heatsink-equivalent performance, an innovative form factor, a flexible and simple mounting system and a competitive price. Consequently, the SilverStone NT06 joins the ranks of some of the most highly regarded products here at eTeknix as we award it the Editor’s Choice award.