The Yate Loon cult began with that thread back in the air-cooling section, where they appear to perform extremely well.

It would be interesting if a whole load more fans were evaluated in the same way. It was the original intention, but it didn't happen.

Another thing that we never had was verification of the results by another tester. Or a specific test on PAs, which at least earned their position by being tested by lots of people.

I know one model of Yate Loons (SL?) came out top in that test, but I have some and I never really noticed YLs 'in general' being either quiet or particularly great performers. I'm pretty sure I didn't have that model, as they were only 80mm fans. Nevertheless, iirc, the reason I buried mine in a tub of spare parts was that they were somewhat noisy.

While I'm at it, Pabst, junked a few of those too, they were expensive and they always seemed to die young.

YL's must have got a whole lot better since I junked those fans... So why are they so good? What is it about their design that makes them so quiet and yet so effective? The bearings? The blades? The housing?

I would buy some (new ones) and give them a try, but I haven't seen any for sale here for ages. PCCG have so many fans but no YLs? That said, if they had them, they'd probably want $30 each for them.