Let's see now whether installing the 1400 mm fan on the top of the heatsink will result in efficient cooling.

We start with the temperature measurements with our system (Intel Core i7-920) running at stock voltage - which is already producing enough heat. As you can see in the comparison chart below, the Noctua NH-C12P SE14 lowered the temperature of the CPU at 45 degrees Celsius, which is a great performance for such a compact heatsink:

The next step is to overclock the CPU to 3.60GHz. The Noctua NH-C12P SE14 gave a surprisingly good performance and the logged CPU temperature was 65 degrees C. Although other heatsinks were even more efficient, they were not comparable with the Noctua NH-C12P SE14 in terms of size. In addition, the Noctua NH-C12P SE14 makes the difference among other heatsinks that have their single fan installed on the top side. Typically and according to our previous tests, this design did not help these coolers reach top performance.

Noctua has been promoting its coolers generally designed for efficient and quiet operation. The NH-C12P SE14 confirms this claim. The heatsink was very quiet and produced just 44dB of noise, measured at a 30cm distance from the unit. That's a great performance for a 140mm fan and positions the NH-C12P SE14 in a high position in our comparison chart:

The Noctua NH-C12P SE14 is a little bit pricey and would cost you around $70: