Corsair’s Latest Magnetic Fans Should Keep You Cool & Quiet

Everything is better with lasers, and the same with magnets. While we don’t have any magnetic lasers for you today, Corsair has now launched its new Magnetic Levitation (ML) range of PC fans. These new fans swap out the standard sleeve and ball-based bearings with sleek new magnetic bearings – oh, and some cool colors to boot.

The new ML fans will come in a number of different configurations across two different sizes – 120mm and 140mm. The standard models will be sold as twin packs for $35 for the pair (120mm), but will exclude any fancy lighting or rubber mounts. The ML PRO and PRO LED series will be sold individually, and come with rubber mounts for additional noise suppression. The PRO LEDs come in a range of three colors, Red, Blue and White – no RGB option at this time, but maybe a Link compatible version will be available in the future.

All of Corsair’s ML series fans come fitted with 4-pin motherboard mounted PWM connectors for fan speed control – but they should work fine in non-PWM enabled mounts. Each fan has an RPM range of a rather quiet 400 RPM, to a more verbose 2400 RPM, with noise levels reported to be 16-37 dBA. Full details covered in the tables below:

Magnetic bearings are not some gimmick for once, there are real benefits to them. While in the press release and marketing material the focus is on lower noise, the main benefit will likely come from the lack of wear and tear from dust and pet dander. Sure, bearing choice affects noise; for example, sleeve bearings are very quiet at low RPMs – but give them a few months in a dust riddled PC, and they’ll be rattling up a storm.

No MTBF numbers have been given at this time to gauge failure rates, but it’s likely to be a quite high number of hours. Some long term testing is surely to be on route as samples roll out. Pricing for these fans are quite high, but if you fancy using your own rubber mounts and forgo the lighting, the twin-packs of the standard fans bring the prices more in-line with other premium fans (effectively $17.49 per single fan for the 120mm twin pack).