Noctua has won the hearts of many, with its signature beige and brown colour scheme signifying quality PC cooling. In a surprising twist, the brand is now using its expertise to keep you chilled during this hot, muggy summer with its new Home series of personal fans.
Instead of your standard tower blower, Noctua has created a modular mount that takes existing 120mm and 140mm PC fans and transforms them into a desktop companion. Making sure you’re not working up a sweat trying to find a place for it, you can stick the NV-FM1 pivoting mount on any level surface, fix it to walls, or stick it on furniture.
Based on the award-winning NF-A12x25 fan, there are up to nine different accessories you can attach. The names don’t exactly roll off the tongue, so I’ll list them below to make it a little easier:
NV-FS1 is the most comprehensive set, including everything you need, from the mount and fan to the new and improved eight-way controller. Generally, these hubs aren’t the prettiest, which is why they’re usually tucked behind the motherboard. Fortunately, this one trades the SATA connection for a 12V barrel and pops on a removable cover to make it neater.
I can’t tell you how well it works without my hands on the kit, but the airflow amplifier seems promising in that it’ll direct the stream right to you. After all, you don’t want it blowing into your desktop or headset microphone; otherwise, your teammates will think you’re stuck in a wind tunnel. Similarly, the gasket and pads will minimise vibrations across your desk so your mates don’t pull you up on some rather eyebrow-raising sounds.
It’s a bit of a left-field product, but speaking as someone who suffers from the heat emanating from my gaming PC, this doesn’t look bad at all. I’m even more inclined to give the benefit of the doubt thanks to years of impressive products worthy of our best CPU cooler list. It’s just a shame there isn’t a beige or entirely brown one to choose from (although I prefer black, mind you).