Cooler Master MasterAir MA624 Stealth CPU Air Cooler

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With some next-gen PC stuff coming out, now is probably a good time for PC builders to upgrade their systems in some capacity. Components like the CPU, GPU and memory are obvious, but other essentials such as coolers, power supply, and even a proper case are equally important and typically stay with your machine much longer.

This time I’m looking at Cooler Master and their MasterAir MA624 Stealth CPU Air Cooler, which as its name suggests is a large, beefy, yet understated air-cooling flagship meant to keep your desktop components running smooth and breezy. If you couldn’t tell, this thing is a monster for any system.

The MA624 Stealth is without a doubt a behemoth with dimensions rivaling a graphics card and dwarfs standard-size motherboards at 144.9 x 153.2 x 160 mm / 5.7 x 6 x 6.3 inches. Dual tower fin heatsinks, six heat pipes sporting a nickel-plated base, and an angular shaped aluminum cover top makes everything look more menacing in its jet-black motif. Basically the ‘stealth’ element has more to do with it not having flamboyant RGB lighting of any kind, making it look semi-discrete if that’s the styling you want with your machine.

What really portrays its gigantic mass is its dual SickleFlow fans that effectively quadruple its real estate coverage, and guarantees optimal airflow at a whisper quiet 27dBA and 2.25mmH20 air pressure. Speaking of the fans, the second SickleFlow fan is detachable with plastic notches and can provides enough clearance room for standard height (70mm) RAM compatibility. This is also a bigger 140mm type to properly draw in cool air.

As I said, the MA624 is a beast of enormous proportions and will probably be the second largest piece of kit in your build, so much in fact that it could affect the type of PC case that can accommodate its mass. In my case (figuratively and literally) it just barely fit inside the CMP 520 chassis that was also provided by Cooler Master. Fortunately, this unit makes up for many shortcomings if you’re going for a minimalist approach or if you didn’t budget for additional case fans, this is potentially the next best option short of expensive liquid cooling.

I say ‘potentially’ because there was one problem with the MA624 and it’s big one for AMD users: the out-of-the-box mounting is not compatible with the latest AM5 platform, at least not directly. This is problematic because I had to delay this review until I found a solution for my build (ASRock X670E Pro RS/AMD Ryzen 7700X/Cooler Master XG850 PLUS PLATINUM/GIGABYTE RTX 3070 GAMING OC/Samsung 890 PRO NVMe SSD/Cooler Master CMP 520 Case), which happened to come from Noctua and their NM-AM5/4-MP78 mounting kit.

It’s somewhat disappointing that both Cooler Master and AMD failed to release OEM brackets in preparation of the Zen4 architecture, which felt like an oversight since this detail was announced months before retail release. In fact, Noctua is the only brand that was prepared for the generational switch and I had to perform some very light modification between the MA624 and the mounting kit to get everything seated properly.

Otherwise, the included mounting brackets and accessories remain compatible for existing and extensive Intel (LGA1700/LGA1200/LGA2066/LGA2011-v3/LGA2011/LGA1151/LGA1150/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) and AMD (AM4/AM3/AM2/FM2+/FM2/FM1) sockets with little to no alteration.

Cooler Master’s MasterAir MA624 Stealth CPU Air Cooler is a beautiful monster that makes no qualms about being large and in charge. It overshadows your motherboard but does a fantastic job of keeping most PC builds nice and chilly. However, mounting compatibility with AM5 is an issue, and almost impractical without the Noctua NM-AM5/4-MP78 kit saving the day. As of this writing, Cooler Master has announced AM5 support but rollout for their own brackets is still unknown. That said, the MA624 is an awesome air cooler, but the AM5 issue needs to be addressed ASAP.