CORSAIR RS II and RS II ARGB Fans: Everything You Need to Know

Say hello to the CORSAIR RS II fan family. Same optimized airflow, same quiet-running design, same Magnetic Dome bearings that make these fans a crowd favorite - available with two models: the standard RS II, and the RS II ARGB if you want to light things up.

We’ll dive into its specific features and their benefits, but before we do, let’s check their full specs.

You'll notice on the table above, every spec besides RGB LEDs, connection cable, and colorways is identical between the non-RGB and ARGB version of each size. Same airflow, same speed range, same bearing, same warranty. RGB is the only thing that changes.

These two are the foundation of the whole lineup: optimized airflow at lower fan speeds, Magnetic Dome bearings, and CORSAIR AirGuide technology for airflow that actually goes where you want it. No frills, no lighting, just solid, quiet cooling in Black.

They're built to run quiet - moving solid airflow at moderate speeds instead of screaming at full tilt just to keep up. The RS120 II scales from Zero RPM up to 2,100 RPM, while the larger-bladed RS140 II tops out lower at 1,700 RPM but still pushes more total air, thanks to its bigger blades.

Now, for those who likes to add a little bit of flare in their build, the RS120 II ARGB and RS140 II ARGB are the exact same fans described above, but with equipped with 8 individually addressable RGB LEDs per fan. Same airflow, same speed range, same bearing, just with lighting you can fully customize, and now available in Black or White instead of Black only.

We mentioned in the beginning that not only that we want our fans to be focused on performance, but we also wanted them to be easy to install. If you want 360mm of cooling without the screw-driver marathon? That's the whole point of the Unified Frame design implement both on the RS360 II and RS360 ARGB. It takes three RS120 II (or RS120 II ARGB) fans and locks them into one housing, so instead of 12 screws for three separate fans, you're done with just 4.

It's not just faster to install, either. Power and PWM signal both run through the frame itself, so there's less cable clutter behind the fans and less turbulence messing with your airflow. Net result: smoother airflow and less noise across all three fans.

So which size is the right fan for your build? If your case has room for 3x 120mm fans up front or on top, including 360mm AIO support, go with the Unified Frame; it's just the easier build. Only need to fill one fan slot? Grab a single RS120 II or RS140 II. And RGB or non-RGB is purely a style call, the performance is identical either way.

When building a PC, cable management can be challenging at times, as nobody wants a rat's nest of cables behind their case. All RS II fans (non-RGB and ARGB alike) daisy-chain together, so a whole set only needs one cable to the motherboard's 4-pin PWM header for speed control.

This is the one feature that's exclusive to the ARGB lineup. Every RS II ARGB fan packs 8 individually addressable RGB LEDs, so you get real control over color and effects, not just a single static glow. Stack three together on the RS360 II ARGB Unified Frame and you're looking at 24 RGB LEDs working together as one clean lighting strip across the whole 360mm array. Each ARGB fan also comes with a PWM extension cable and an ARGB extension cable, so cable routing isn't a headache.

Here's the thing about a regular fan: air comes off the blades and just... spreads out. CORSAIR AirGuide Technology fixes that, on both the standard and ARGB RS II fans. Angled anti-vortex stator vanes focus the airflow instead of letting it scatter right at the blade, which means better cooling on hot components and better static pressure when you're pushing air through a dense radiator.

Now picture an AirGuide fan, like every fan in the RS II lineup: that airflow stays concentrated and actually makes it deeper into the case or through the radiator before it fades out.

Every RS II fan model, with RGB or not, can operate at nearly silent while running, literally not spinning at all, until your system reaches a threshold where it needs the cooling. Once things heat up past a set point, the fan kicks on at a low RPM and ramps up gradually from there. Basically: silence when you're idle, cooling when you need it.

Both the 120mm and 140mm specs move more air than your typical thicker 30mm fan (which typically has higher static pressure), so they play nice with a wide range of cases and radiators, and they're equally effective as case fans or radiator fans. This holds true whether or not the fan has RGB.