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The Noctua NH-U12P SE2 still represents the premium model of the Noctua CPU cooler line-up. The Noctua NH-U12P SE2 CPU was considered a high-end CPU cooler when it was first released almost 3 years ago.
It has since been overtaken by the Noctua NH-D14, however Noctua invested a good amount of R&D into the design of the thermal characteristics and cooling technologies used in the Noctua NH-U12P SE2 CPU cooler.
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The Noctua NH-U12P was initially released with only a single fan, along with Intels 775 socket configuration, aside from the AMD offerings. When Intel released the 1366 and 1156 sockets, Noctua reacted and released the SE version. The higher TDPs of the new Intel sockets introduced more heat and again, Noctua reacted and added a second NF-P12 fan and introduced a push/pull fan configuration. Hence, we have the SE2.
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I love this CPU cooler. It’s not huge, but it keeps the temps low. Not only that but even under full load the fans that come with the heatsink (NF-P12) are quiet. In fact, they can’t be heard over my GPU fans.