Installation

As with the Noctua NH-D14 I reviewed a little while ago, I'm going to perform a dummy install on the MSI P45 Platinum. This motherboard features a rather elaborate cooling setup that often interferes with installation of oversized heatsinks, so if we can get the NH-C12P SE14 to install on here, it should install fine on many boards. Noctua do have a compatibility list on their website, so if you're not sure about your board, go check it out before you purchase.

The first part in an Intel installation is to get the back-plate set up. Basically, if (like me) you're using a Socket 775 motherboard, you'll want to make sure you have the rubber insert ... inserted. 1366 and 1156 setups can remove it. Then you put the hex headed bolts in the correctly marked holes (there is a guide engraved on to the back of the plate itself). The plate then goes on the back of the motherboard and through the mounting holes.

Next you place the black plastic spacers over the bolts. At this point you should offer up the heatsink and decide how you are going to orientate it on the board. In our case, we could mount it in all 4 directions perfectly fine on both the MSI board and the Asus Blitz Formula we tested with. The orientation of the cooler dictates the next part of the mounting installation.

The curved mounting bars attach to the bolts and are screwed on with the supplied thumbscrews. Tighten thumbscrews till they stop, and they do suddenly stop due to the way the mounting bars are designed, which is great because it removes any guesswork on your part.

The next part, according to the instructions is to mount the heatsink, but honestly, I found getting the fan on a little difficult with the heatsink attached to the motherboard. I found that I could mount the fan first and still install the heatsink fine. Each of the four corners on top of the heatsink should have the supplied rubber dampeners stuck to it. Then the fan sits on top, and the two clips leverage over the four corners of the 140mm fan.

You can then put the complete heatsink on the CPU and pass a screwdriver through the fan blades to tighten up the spring-loaded screws. Like the thumbscrews that attached the curved bars to the mounting bolts, the spring-loaded screws can be tightened to the maximum; there is no guesswork involved, just simply tighten until done.

Total installation time the first time was about 55 minutes, but that was purely because I tried to follow the instructions to the letter. If I was to start to finish doing it my way (fan on first) then the entire thing could be done in 15 minutes or so, not including the time to remove the motherboard if your case doesn't have a motherboard tray that allows access to the rear of the socket.

The lower height of the NH-C12P SE14 meant there was no installation issues in my Cosmos S case, even with the side panel fan in place, although the heatsink fan and side panel fan were quite close. In the end I removed the side panel fan anyway so as not to interfere with the results from other heatsinks during testing that required the removal of the side panel fan.