What fans are best for custom cooling?

“Best” is a subjective matter in almost anything, depending on what you focus on. The “best” graphics card for you, might be the card that simply pushes out the most FPS, while the “best” graphics card for the next person is the card that has the best power to performance ratio and so on.

For PC fans, there is the same situation. If you want the best fans in terms of pure airflow through a radiator, you can get a 6000 RPM fan that will draw 80W. It will, however, come with the downside of sounding like a cargo plane taking off, and will likely suck anything you have not bolted to your table right into it, obliterating it instantly.

So for now, we are just going to focus on what we (long term PC enthusiasts, and therefore very picky about noise) think is the “best” – let’s see if you agree.

Bigger is always better, right? Often times yes. In custom water cooling you want to spec your loop out from how many radiators you can fit into your case, and then go from there. With most mid to high-end cases today such as our, 6500X and even the soon-to-be released 9000D and 3500X, you will have plenty of room to mount thick radiators, and even push pull configurations. This also mean that you will have no issues using a 30mm thick fan instead of a 25mm thick fan.

While 25mm fans have been the workhorse of the PC industry for many years, 30mm fans have been on the rise over the last few years, since components keeps drawing more power, and thus better cooling. We aren’t the biggest fans (pun intended) of using push/pull configurations on radiators as it both dramatically increases the costs, but also has only a slight performance increase (compared to the costs). It also requires much more space for your setup (50mm + your radiator thickness, compared to just 25mm or 30mm).

This is why 30mm fans are a great option here. They fit in most cases, and given the nature of the extra thickness, they can push more air through your radiators at the same noise levels as even the best 25mm fans. It's a win/win, basically, provided you are not trying to build in a super tiny case. (Breaking out a measuring tape to make sure 30mm fans will fit where you want them is the best method for ensuring compatibility.)

With both the RS MAX and the RX MAX you get this benefit. We strongly recommend the RX MAX, as it enables iCUE LINK compatibility, greatly reducing any cable clutter in your system, but the RS MAX will still enable you to have one of, if not the best fans for custom water cooling. The same goes for AIOs, too.

For us, it is not as much about getting the lowest temperatures on the coolant, or the CPU, it's about having a system that will not throttle, and at the same time be as quiet as possible. On most systems, you won't really see a difference in going lower than 30°C coolant temperature.

So what is the advantage then? If you can already now get 30°C coolant temps with your fans why would you want say, the RX MAX? For us the answer is easy – noise. Being able to lower fan speeds from 1400 to maybe 1200 or even 1000 RPM is a massive decrease in noise. So having the “best” fans is not always about being able to go as low as possible in temperatures, but it can enable you to have a far more pleasant experience while using your PC.