The Noctua NH C14 is a beautiful design, with the same fan colourings that seem to seperate people into two audiences, those who ‘love' or ‘hate' them. I think they are a fantastic colour scheme, almost a retro appearance, but very unique and instantly recognisable as a Noctua product in the marketplace.
As we can see, the base resides under both fans, which are sandwiched by a series of aluminum fins.
To support the weight of the heat exchanger and the fans, Noctua have incorporated a steel support rod between the six heatpipes. This is bolted to the base of the heatsink and forced between the aluminum fins by a layer of clear elastomer. This steel support rod is to give the product added strength and to ensure the shape wont warp over time, or even with rough shipping.
One of the great benefits of this particular Noctua design is the fact that either fan can be removed to suit specific requirements. The joints between the copper heatpipes and nickel plated aluminum fins are soldered.
With the top fan removed, the profile reduces to 105mm which makes it an ideal partner for a performance HTPC system build. The lower fan can also be removed for a ‘high clearance' mode. Dual fan mode is obviously the best for ultimate performance.
Processor support is excellent, the NH C14 can be installed onto an Intel socket 775/1155/1156/1366 board and an AMD socket AM2/AM3 board.