Performance Testing

Please refer to the dedicated test setup page here as it applies to this review as well and I did not want to go over it separately to save on review space.


Let's remind ourselves that the fan is rated for 800–2000 RPM (+/- 10%). Bitspower sent over six fans in total via two triple packs, and they hit an average of 1819 RPM at 100% PWM duty cycle and went down to an average 294 RPM at 26% PWM duty cycle before remaining constant all the way down to 1%, as seen in the image above. There was not a lot of variation between the six samples, which is nice to see, and the RPM profile is fairly linear in the response range, and also longer than the rated range, which is also nice to see. It could have been more linear compared to some of the more recent fans tested, and yet this is such a small issue that I will not use it as a negative on the next page by just pointing it out here instead.

Context is needed to talk more about the fan's performance and noise, so I have below comparison charts for some fans tested so far at set RPM values (or as near as they can get to those).


I have included fans in charts where the rated RPM is within 50 RPM of the chart cutoff point, and have also removed fans either too old or simply redundant with the introduction of an updated version. In addition, I have removed fans that only appear once or twice in the charts above since they are not good for comparison as more entries get added into the test database. The specific RPM values chosen reflect usage scenarios most popular with watercooling even though some fans (the Noctua NF-A12x25, for instance) go higher. The charts are to be considered for comparison within this result set only and are not to be compared with results from another test elsewhere owing to different testing conditions.

Bitspower was definitely targeting a feature set for value given this fan is part of their Touchaqua brand, and yet the NJORD 120 does fairly well, especially at lower fan speeds where it performs better than most other fans so far. It also means more airflow noise here, and the performance trend continues to worsen as fan speed increases and other fan designs show their scalability. It is in line with most other RGB fans, trading places with several of the CORSAIR RGB fans, with valuable rotor space taken up by LEDs as well.