Air Coolers are making a comeback, and be quiet! is leading the charge with its new Pure Rock Pro 3. Part of the Pure Rock Pro series, the Pro 3 is the little brother to the excellent Pure Rock Pro 5 that I reviewed last year. Featuring a more compact design, Pure Wings 3 120mm PWM fans, and nickel plate coating, the Pure Rock Pro 3 offers a relatively compact and quiet cooling solution for those not wanting to fuss with liquid cooling.
Measuring 139 x 124 x 155mm (L x W x H), the Pure Rock Pro 3 offers a relatively compact form factor for an Air cooler. The design follows that of the Pure Rock Pro 5 with two detachable fans and two primary heatsinks (comprised of aluminum fins), each with three nickel-plated copper heat pipes for more efficient heat dissipation. The base plate is comprised of the same copper with nickel plating as the heat pipes, ensuring consistent heat dissipation throughout.
Other than size, there are two distinct differences between the Pure Rock Pro 5 and Pure Rock Pro 3. The first is the inclusion of Pure Wings 3 120mm PWM fans. This is a departure from the Pure Rock Pro 5’s Silent Wings 4 fans. This does result in a slightly higher cooling threshold on the Pure Rock 5 with a Thermal Design Power (TDP) of 270. However, the Pure Rock Pro 3 is no slouch, easily managing a TDP of 250, which makes it rated to handle the latest AMD Ryzen 9 and Intel Core i9 CPUs. For context, the TDP rating on the Ryzen 5 9600+ used for testing is 65 with an extended TDP of 105.
The Pure Wings 3 fans for the Pure Rock Pro 3 have been especially optimized for the cooler and, as a result, create a more consistent funnel shape air movement through the system, allowing air to move quickly and efficiently through the heatsink. More impressive still is how quiet the system operates, measuring only 34.8dB when the fans are fully engaged at their 2000 rpm capacity. During testing, for example, the Pure Rock Pro 3 ran impressively quiet in everyday operations. Even when pushing it with more resource-heavy work, such as gaming or rendering, it was still incredibly quiet while maintaining consistent cooling.
“…the Pure Rock Pro 3 offers a relatively compact and quiet cooling solution for those not wanting to fuss with liquid cooling.”
Another design difference between the Pure Rock Pro 5 and Pure Rock Pro 3 is the lack of a top plate on the latter. The Pro 5 has an interesting top plate that relies on a tension mounting system to attach it to the base cooler. This required applying pressure to the whole heatsink and twisting it slightly to accommodate the plate, and it always felt a bit odd to install. Thankfully, this has been removed from the Pro 3’s design, and while it lacks a bit of the branding, the overall build and design are much more straightforward.
Unpacking the design further, the Pure Rock Pro 3 is also built with a high clearance point, allowing it to accommodate taller RAM, which is great for those of us who like RGB on our RAM. RAM is further accommodated thanks to the offset design of the Pro 3, which moves it away from the DIMM slots more than other air coolers. The Pure Wings 3 fan on the front can also be adjusted slightly if need be, though in the test build used for this review, there was plenty of room to accommodate the RAM without the need for additional fan adjustments.
Installing the cooler is incredibly easy. Specced to accommodate AMD AM5/AM4 and Intel 1851/ 1700/ 1200/ 1150/ 1151 1155 CPUs, the Pure Rock Pro 3 has no issues accommodating any modern CPU. For the test build, I installed the Pro 3 onto the latest Ryzen 5 9600+ and was impressed with the process. It took about five minutes to install and required a single philips head screw driver with an extension driver.
“The Pure Rock Pro 3 is an excellent air cooler that offers plenty of cooling for even the most demanding of CPUs.”
The process required removing the stock mounting brackets and replacing them with the AM5/AM4 brackets, which are clearly marked to indicate which direction they should face. Once installed, the cooler simply mounts to the two single posts (one on each bracket). For those with AM5 CPUs, be quiet! has also included an offset mounting option to bring the cooler in line with the hottest parts of these CPUs. Once slotted two two tensions screws secure the cooler. After this, it’s a simple matter of slotting the second fan into place (the front fan comes pre-mounted) and using the tension brackets to lock it down.
Cable management is fairly straightforward as well, thanks to the ability to link the two fan cables together and feed them to the primary CPU port on the motherboard. Once this is done, the Pure Rock Pro 3 is ready. It’s that simple.
As has already been alluded to, the Pure Rock Pro 3 performs exceptionally well in testing. It managed consistent cooling in stress testing and did an exceptional job at handling pulse width modulation (PWM) like a champ. For those unfamiliar with PWM, essentially, it regulates the amount of power the fan receives, allowing for quick and dynamic fan speed adjustments. This translates to a system that can consistently maintain cooling without consistently needing to run the same amount of power to the fan, thus creating a much more efficient and overall quieter cooling solution. It’s a smart design and one that be quiet! has consistently leveraged across the host of products I’ve tested.
The Pure Rock Pro 3 is an excellent air cooler that offers plenty of cooling for even the most demanding of CPUs. Leveraging be quiet!’s years of engineering expertise, the company has created a series of air coolers that can perform both efficiently and quietly. If you are looking for an alternative to liquid cooling but still want a cooler that can handle high-performing CPUs, the Pure Rock Pro 3 is a superb and cost-effective solution to consider at only $64.99.
- Pure Rock Pro 3 features 6 black high-performance copper heat pipes with nickel-plated base. As a result, this high-end cooler always keeps your CPU at peak performance, even in overclocked systems and demanding workstations.
- Pure Wings 3 120mm PWM and Pure Rock Pro 3 are a perfect match. The fan features optimized fan blades for highest performance. The angles are adjusted to achieve even more air pressure, adding up to the extraordinary performance. A specially designed, funnel shaped air outlet is more than just the icing on the cake: it maximizes the airflow over the fins.
