Noctua NH-L9a 92mm SSO2 CPU Cooler

Pros: nice packaging, comes with everything needed.

Cons: compatibility / see other thoughts

Other Thoughts: Check the website for compatibility before you purchase. A lot of the reviews for this cooler talk about how its low height and strict size dimensions mean it will fit most boards. They do not talk about the rear mounting plate, which goes flush against the board on the backside for mounting. If your board has chips in this area, this cooler will not work for you. Very sad, as it looks like a sweet unit.

Pros: Extremely quiet.
Brought my temperature down significantly.
Got rid of the high winding sound my stock cooler would make.

Cons: None

Other Thoughts: A lot better than I anticipated. It really quieted my computer in general. If I had cheap small fans as case fans I don't think I would of noticed a difference. Luckily replacing my old cooler with this one was the piece to my puzzle for quieting down the machine.

Pros: This is a good cooler. Its very quiet, and quite capable, but it didnt work for my needs. See Other thoughts.

Cons: Rated for maximum 65 watt cpu. I was using this with a 100 watt cpu and it didnt meet my needs.

Other Thoughts: I would like to start off saying that I got this cooler to squeeze into a tiny case, and this is best in class for the ultra thin form.

I used this on the A10-5800k and it worked well over all. For web browsing, watching movies, hulu, nextflix, and listening to music it worked great. For gaming, it was was quickly overwhelmed, but still functional. It kept the CPU at 30-33c at idle, and about 66c at max load during hours long gaming sessions.

Technically 66c is within the heat specs for the a10 chip, but I prefer to keep it more in the 45-50c range at max load.

I have replaced this with a different cooler but this product is ultra quiet and very capable given its form and intended use. I just wouldn't recommend it for a 100w chip if you plan on anything other than basic computing.

Pros: Keeps out of the way of RAM, but full size sticks with large heat spreaders may be right up against one side, restricting airflow a small amount. Bought myself a set of low-profile sticks to help a bit.
Very quiet, normally (see cons)
Surprisingly cool considering how very small this HSF is. One of the smallest I've ever owned. Needed a cooler shorter than 80mm so the extra headroom is a nice bonus

Cons: Every so often when the speed ramps up, I noticed a loud clicking noise as if the fan was bouncing a close wire or something. Checked and nothing was near it, so I pressed on the fan and rotated it a bit. Seems the fan was hitting the heat sink just slightly, but pressing on it made it stop. For now...
Hugs so closely to the motherboard, heat doesn't seem to escape very well...
About half a teaspoon of a red fluid drained out from the fan after the first week of use. I'm assuming it was some kind of oil to keep it smooth and quiet.
It's a good thing I didn't have a video card installed yet, otherwise the underside of it would have been covered in the stuff!

Other Thoughts: Keeps my AMD APU A8-3870k cool enough, even for long gaming periods. Overclocking is a no-go however.
If you'd like an idea of how closely this sits to the RAM, I have it installed lengthwise on a ASROCK A75M-ITX FM1, and the edge sits right against where the RAM slot begins. Again, low-profile RAM or RAM without a heat spreader will fit fine.