Conclusion
The fourth Ninja was a pleasant surprise (mainly because of its unattractive predecessor). Scythe used improved version of the first two designs, and shortly after created popular Fuma series based on Ninja 4. Fuma rev. A was the best deal for the money, although the current second version is a bit different story. Now there’s the new Ninja 5 that looks very promising. The core remains unchanged, but the cooler is bigger and stronger than before.
Conclusion
There are two very important things: revolutions per minute and the price. The more intense airflow, the less attractive this cooler becomes. The best setting for Ninja 5 would be 600 rpm and less. Scythe knows well why they sell this cooler with low-speed fans. With proper settings it‘s better than SPC Fera 3 v2, and a bit less efficient than Noctua NH-D15, but also accordingly cheaper. It all depends on the deal you can get.
The price range is quite wide, 70 € is too much (Reeven Okeanos and Raijintek Nemesis would be a better choice for the money), but if you get a chance to buy it for less than 60 €, go for it. The efficiency/weight ratio is nothing extraordinary, but we decided to give it award “Go for it!“ for the results in low RPM modes and high-quality fans that are not very common in this price category.
This is not the end of Ninja 5 tests on HWCooling. We are working on a passive mode and in-depth testing with reference fans.
Scythe Ninja 5 |
+ high cooling performance |
+ the performance doesn't significantly decrease even after reducing RPM |
+ excellent performance/noise ratio with less intense airflow |
+ a good deal if you want to use the cooler with RPM lower than 650 |
+ very quiet PWM regulation |
+ extraordinary quality of fans: fluid bearings, extremely low speed operation is possible |
+ comfortable installation |
+ good compatibility, everything from the old Intel LGA 775 to AMD AM4 |
+ solid and rich installation kit (screwdriver included) |
+ low height, ie. great compatibility with majority of cases |
+ 100% compatibility with RAM modules lower than 4 cm |
- modules in the second slot that are higher than 4 cm collide with the heatsink |
- cooling performance with more than 650 rpm is average |
- not very impressive cooling performance/weight ratio |
- it is not possible to put fans on all four sides, although the design would allow it |
- you can turn the heatsink only in one direction when using AMD CPU (vertically) |
If you like magazine HWCooling, please support us.
We cannot keep publishing this kind of detailed content on regular basis without your help because it is very time consuming. We will be grateful for every contribution. Thank you!
- Contents
- Parameters and details
- Test procedures
- Automatic regulation
- Max. RPM
- 45 and 42 dBA
- 39 and 36 dBA
- 33 and 31 dBA
- Conclusion
Hi !
Thank you for the test. I like your methodology of testing.
Can you use the therlmaright le grand macho rt ? Which is probrably the best cpu cooler
The noctua scythe fan graph is interesting I’d like to see temperatures and db comparing the included scythe fan vs a noctua.
i bet if you got better fans this thing would kick ass!
A passive or semi-passive setup for comparison with the Fuma or Zalman Passive Cooler would be great.