Silverstone Cooler: Nitrogen NT03
Installation
Installation of the NT03 was a bit tougher than a lot of coolers that I have had in the past. Certainly the stock AMD cooler was a doddle to put on compared. The instructions provided are pretty good but the actual logistics of putting on the cooler are not as easy. This is certainly a job easier with two people.
First job is to prep the CPU with thermal paste. I used Arctic Silver 5 for both of the test coolers. Instructions for AS5 can be found here
You have to take out your motherboard and mount the included backplate with the longer screws provided.
The fans are then screwed onto the heatsink. As mentioned previously – the fans go on in a push-pull configuration.
As you can see the cooler is certainly a small size. Remember that the fans are individually optional and one or both can be removed for quieter running or even to take up less space.
I was not very happy with the amount of wires that come along with this cooler. Not only do you have one cable for each fan but the extension cable that plugs both fans into one header gives you extra wiring. Some careful planning would be needed to get this tidy in a case with a window.