Pros: Fantastic, top notch build quality on both the cooler and the fans. Installation is so easy a 5 year old could do it. Comes packaged with a tube of the best thermal compound out there (Noctua NT-H1) Noctua's support is AWESOME... I had an issue (see below) and they were emailing back and forth with me within 24 hours to help me fix it. This thing is as close to silent with the low noise adapter as any fan can be. Does a slightly better job than the stock AMD cooler, but does it silently.

Cons: Price is perhaps a tiny bit high considering the class of cooling performance it's in - it's very much at the entry level of after market CPU-cooling performance, yet most entry level CPU heatsinks are just 1/2 or 1/3rd the price. Not worth docking an egg since you do get a top quality fan that sells for $20+ on its own, and Noctua offers fantastic support over the life of its products, plus all the pros listed above, etc...

Overall Review: I am using this in a mini-ITX rig to cool an AMD A8-5600k APU running at stock settings. The reason to buy this cooler is to get a low profile cooler that is so close to silent it's unbelievable. Do not purchase this cooler if your goal is to cool an overclocked CPU. Other coolers will do that better. Purchase this cooler if you want a silent CPU cooler. I am using an ASRock FM2A85X-ITX board, which does not support a backplate thanks to some baffling design decisions from ASRock. I emailed Noctua about this (as a backplate is normally required for installation) and they were very helpful and explained that I could mount the cooler without the backplate if I wanted to use it with that board. So I did - mounted the cooler without a backplate and had no issues! Wouldn't dare try that with my D14, but it's fine with this L12 :)

Pros: Nicely designed, quiet, comes with thermal paste along with all the mounting hardware you could ever possibly need. Very low profile in single fan mode.

Cons: Stay away if you have a 120W TDP Processor!!!! If you check the manufacturers website they tell you that you can only use this with a 120W TDP AMD processor if you have good case flow! And the single fan operation mode won't work at all! I found this out the hard way when trying to run single fan mode with an 8320. Works great 99% of the time, but when you stress test it the system will crash due to overheating. I managed to mount the 120mm fan to the bottom, since I have a small case and it seems to help the temps, but I still can't stay stable when running Boinc or any stress test.

Overall Review: I've been looking for a quality low profile cooler and thought this would fit the bill. It definitely beats the stock cooler without question, however for anyone with an FX8xxx series processor I can't recommend this cooler. I'm either going to have to leave the side of my case off or get a water cooling setup. Still kicking myself for not going to Noctua's homepage, but I'd like to see this 120W TDP info on the product data page to warn consumers.

Pros: I bought this to replace the Noctua NH-L9x65 that was currently in my Silverstone RVZ01 case. While the NH-L9x65 did a decent job this one is so much better. My i7-6700K idles at 24ºC and I haven't seen it go past 66ºC during extended gaming sessions.

Cons: The NH-L12 is too tall to fit in my case with the installed 120mm fan on top so I replaced it a Prolimatech slim fan. This is not really a con; just thought I'd share for anyone else wanting to use this in an RVZ01 case.

Overall Review: Noctua's colors are the color of bacon. Mmmmm bacon.

Pros: This one is excellent. You can run with one fan, top or bottom, or both fans. Ask yourself why Intel and AMD configure their HSF to blow downward onto the motherboard. They know the motherboard needs airflow. This HSF will not only keep your CPU nice and cool. It also cools your memory and the motherboard. I read about overclock bottlenecks and I see a lot of people looking only at the CPU temps. I think the motherboard temps are often overlooked. See those heat sinks on the motherboard? They need airflow too!

Cons: Less heat pipes and less area for the fins compared to the NH-C14, NH-C14s. Bring back the NH-C14. That one was the best one!!!

Overall Review: I've built dozens and dozens of gaming PCs during the past 20 years. I've tried every CPU cooling solution you can imagine - except that mineral oil fish tank thing and the liquid nitrogen thing - way too messy. My main rig is liquid cooled with a custom loop at the moment but I'm not sure i would do that again (because it was crazy expensive and it makes it harder to swap components, plus I had to add fans to keep the motherboard cool anyway). Air cooling, a case with good airflow, a HSF that blows downward, and large diameter fans are the best bang for you buck.

Pros: Extremely quiet unit, with an incredibly easy install. Very effective when compared to the stock fan. AMD-8350 chip stock fan kept processor at a steady 60ºC (about 40ºC over ambient) under normal operation with no OC, and would run upwards of 65dB in noise which is ridiculous, could hear it through 2 doors. After install I couldn't push temp past 45ºC no matter what load I put on the cpu, and could not hear the cpu fan over the case fans. Install- The low profile makes this a great choice for lots of mid-tower cases, also the fans on the heat sink itself can easily be adjusted one way or the other. I have a gigabyte 990fx mobo which can be a little tricky for placing an after market fan, if you are occupying all ram slots.

Cons: no cons at this time.

Overall Review: after a couple days of getting baseline temperature and noise readings, I will begin overclocking and find out what this thing can really do. But under the heaviest load I have given it, the temperature varied about 3ºc, and there was no audible difference.

Pros: Build quality. Quiet. Accessories. Works great.

Cons: none

Overall Review: I am using this on an Asrock FM2A85X-ITX. Officially it is not supported, however I was able to mount it using the intel no-back plate bolts and the AMD spacers and crossbars. Heatpipes touch the VR heatsink but does not cause any non-cosmetic issues. I have this mounted in a Silverstone SG05 case on an a8-5600k processor. I am using the 120mm fan to replace the stock Silverstone intake fan. This has dropped my CPU temps under load by 10-15 degrees from the stock HS/Fan.

Pros: Everything I've said in the original posts

Cons: Running Prime95 at stock yields 60c. That's a little high IMO, but there are many factors to consider like my case and it's size (even though that's what this cooler is intended to be installed in)

Overall Review: That is all.

Pros: You can't get any more silent of cooling than this without going to a water cooler, at this size. @66mm high it fit into the VERY tight space I had between the new PSU and the CPU. - Amazingly silent - Cooling efficiency is VERY impressive even with only using the smaller lower fan only AND with using the low noise filter cable too). HIGHLY Recommended if need to quiet down your PC. I was blown away at the performance of this thing. It looks like a Car radiator laying on its side atop a V6 engine and its works extremely well!!! I had a hard time finding a good cooler at 66mm high and this fit the bill PERFECTLY!!!!!

Cons: Not really any bit CON's here. If I had to list something though it would be that it is not designed for overclocked systems (and says so in the box though), but I'd guess with both fans installed (and assuming it was installed correctly onto the CPU with the included thermal grease), it would probably do okay on a minimal to medium speed overclock too - in this regard its not really a CON though)

Overall Review: Bought this for my daughters PC, which was annoyingly very loud using the stock AMD cooler on her AMD AM2+ 6000+ Black Edition CPU. System currently uses an ASUS GeForce 9600 GT graphics card & previously had an ANTEC 380W (EarthWatts) PSU. WinXP-32bit Pro, WD7200 HDD, DVD, FDD & Add-in 5 channel Audio Board. Upgraded the PSU to a 450W ThermalTak fixed the occasional slowdowns in Diablo III and Skyrim and reduced sound level from fans about 20-30%, but after installing the Noctua NH-L12 (with only the lower fan & the line noise filter cable), its virtually silent. Even with my ear up next to the case!!