Looking for CPU cooler and case fans

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litegrace

litegrace

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Hi guys, I recently put together my new computer and the only problem I'm having is with the CPU getting too hot. It's an i7 4790k currently with a stock cooler. I'm using a Thermaltake MS-I case with decent airfllow, but I only have one exhaust fan (all it came with). My case can fit 4 120mm fans, but my PSU is blocking the mounting holes for the bottom one, so I can only fit 3 now. I figured since my airflow is decent and 3 would mean poor pressure due to uneven exhaust and intake, that I would just buy 2 fans to replace the one stock fan.

Is this a good idea? I figured an exhaust in the rear and intake in the front should be fine, especially given the amount of vents in my case. If need be, I'll still have my stock fan for a top exhaust in case my case gets too hot still. I don't plan on overclocking, so I don't need anything too crazy like watercooling. So I wanted your opinions on a new cooler and fans. Right now I'm looking at the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo and 2 Noctua NF-S12A PWM's. Would this be good?

Also, if the Noctua fans are good, I have a choice. Right now, the S12A's are out of stock on Amazon (where I'll be buying my fans and cooler) so I won't be able to get them for almost two weeks. However, I could get the F12's and have them by tomorrow. What's the difference? I know the F12's are meant more for heatsinks, but would they perform just as well as the S12's as case fans? Or should I just wait?
 
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A_Goat
Have you monitored your temps yet? If your temps are fine there is no reason to buy more fans.
As you wont be overclocking, the 212 evo would be the highest grade cooler I'd recommend. It will be much quieter than the stock cooler, and will give you much better temps.

You could also look into the tx3 to save some cash, but it will be slightly louder and hotter than an evo. Although, still a massive improvement from the stock cooler.


If your case/mobo temps are fine, and you would simply like more fans, I would not recommend the noctuas.
The noctuas are expensive for a reason, the only way I can see a reason for buying them would be their lack of noise.
A cheaper option would be corsair AF or even sickleflows.
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smorizio

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the evo is a great cooler...if your going to overclock or stress the cpu with some hard gasmes then go up to the noct 140mm air coolers. on the case fans before you buy them look to see ho many fan headers are on you mb and see if there 3 pr 4 pin units. if your going to use three fans have front fan pull air in then place two fans on top to pull hot air out.
 
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A_Goat

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Have you monitored your temps yet? If your temps are fine there is no reason to buy more fans.
As you wont be overclocking, the 212 evo would be the highest grade cooler I'd recommend. It will be much quieter than the stock cooler, and will give you much better temps.

You could also look into the tx3 to save some cash, but it will be slightly louder and hotter than an evo. Although, still a massive improvement from the stock cooler.


If your case/mobo temps are fine, and you would simply like more fans, I would not recommend the noctuas.
The noctuas are expensive for a reason, the only way I can see a reason for buying them would be their lack of noise.
A cheaper option would be corsair AF or even sickleflows.
 
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litegrace

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If I remember correctly, my motherboard has like 5 or 6 fan headers, and they are 4 pin. My case only fits 120mm fans, currently I only have one stock exhaust fan on the rear (top of the back) but was planning to replace that with a better exhaust fan and then add an intake fan in the front (bottom of the front). Also, how hot should my 4790k be getting idle? It's been averaging 38-40 C idle, which seems a bit high to me, even with a stock cooler.
 
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A_Goat

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That's pretty high for an idle temp, like you said even for a stock cooler.
80C Hot (100% Load)
75C Warm
70C Warm (Heavy Load)
60C Norm
50C Norm (Medium Load)
40C Norm
30C Cool (Idle)
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-1800828/intel-temperature-guide.html

But if the under load temps are fine, I wouldn't worry about it.
 
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litegrace

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The case temp is very cool, but I've had the side panel off monitoring my CPU temp (motherboard as an LCD display with the temp displayed). The reason for this, is that my CPU was hitting 62 C at some points just while watching YouTube, which was worrying me. Over all, my GPU and PSU are super cool, even when touching them, and the airflow seems good, but I just wanted to make sure the CPU is getting lots of cool air and I'm sure my GPU will heat up some on more demanding games for long hours.

I just heard Noctuas were among the best and I don't mind spending more if they are good and will last years. I would rather the case be too cool than not cool enough :p But again, I'm just a bit worried that my CPU is hitting those temps, even idle its sitting at 38-40 C.
 
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A_Goat

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Refer to the list I posted for a temp guide, you should only worry if your CPU is rising past 75C. Adding fans wont benefit your stock cooler all that much. The only way you're going to see noticeable gains with the CPU temp is to upgrade the CPU cooler.
If you do want to dump money onto the noctuas, wait for the air flow editions... the Static pressure versions are not designed for air flow, there is a difference.
 
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litegrace

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Okay, I was just looking at case fans for extra air flow, but I'm mostly looking for a CPU cooler. I contacted Intel and they told me to run a stress test using the Intel Diagnostics Tool. It passed all of the tests, but toward the end it hit 90 C which seems excessive, especially with the side of the case open with good air flow. I'm just worried about damaging my CPU by having it run hot for hours while I game or do video editing.
 
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A_Goat

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No game you have will stress your CPU like the Intel burn test, you will be fine for gaming.
If you plan on overclocking or doing things that will stress 100% of your CPU like burn tests/benchmarks/rendering then an aftermarket cooler is a must.

Upgrading now will give you much better temps though, and it will be much quieter. Lower temps are always good.
Hyper 212 evo is always a good place to start.
 
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litegrace

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That's what they said, but I also do video editing. I just tested rendering a video using Sony Vegas 11 and my CPU hit 91 C by the time the video was 12% rendered (about 30 seconds) and was slowly rising. I stopped the rendering for fear of my CPU overheating, because I think it would have at that rate. I'm going to call them back, because that's not normal for a CPU to be almost overheating after 30 seconds of video editing. There's no way I'll even be able to use the computer at that rate.
 
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A_Goat

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Yea, that's not right.
Did you purchase the computer with this chip installed? Or did you do it yourself?
It could simply need to be re-seated and could benefit from some new thermal paste.
 
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litegrace

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I installed it myself. Intel told me to take the stock cooler off and it ended up being all bubbled and not spread evenly. There were spots in the middle and lower left that had no thermal paste at all and then on the top right there was a clump of extra. I'm going to go to Best Buy and buy a cheaper thermal paste there to re-seat the stock fan and test it again (to make sure the CPU is running properly, otherwise I can call back and they said they would replace it). I'll likely order a better cooler online (with some Arctic Silver 5) so the stock cooler and thermal paste will just be to test the CPU until they arrive and won't be a permanent solution.
 
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A_Goat

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Alrighty, definitely sounds like something didn't go right during the installation. :p
There is a whole lot of information and opinions on the best way to apply thermal paste... so make you spend some time researching that. I've had the most luck with "the line method".

Those intel stock coolers with the springs/clips are a pain, there are a bunch of guides on those too!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qczGR4KMnY
 
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litegrace

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The guy from Intel said it had been a problem for some of their processors (shipping with bad thermal paste), so I'm assuming that was the case as I was very careful with placing the cooler straight down and clipping the pins in diagonally from each other to apply even pressure. After re-applying thermal paste (just Antec brand, nothing too fancy) doing the pea method, I'm getting a slightly cooler temp (around 2 C) but nothing huge. I haven't seen it hit more than 74 C from playing a couple games, but I'll still get a better cooler just in case.

I also noticed that my GPU (G1 Gaming gtx 970) was hot on the top where the metal was, but the fans weren't blowing very hot and in GPU-Z it said it was only in the 40 C range while playing a game. Is this pretty standard? I'm just a bit paranoid when it comes to heat, I don't want to slap on the side cover of my case then melt my components if I'm not constantly monitoring them. I'm noticing the area between the CPU and GPU gets pretty hot, so I definitely think better fans are in order for the case (especially seeing as I have the side panel off right now). Do you think the Hyper 212 Evo is a solid upgrade from stock? I don't want anything too expensive and don't plan on overclocking anytime soon (and if I do I'll go for water cooling).
 
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A_Goat

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Even the $20 tx3 or T4 will be a massive upgrade from the stock cooler, but the evo would be even better.
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/cooler-master-cpu-cooler-rr212e20pkr2

Your card is safe for up to 80C, after 80c it will start to throttle (still safe)
What game were you playing, and at what resolution/graphical settings?
Your g1 should exceed 50C when playing AAA Titles with a default fan curve
 
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litegrace

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Idk what to do, my CPU is just a mess. I replaced the thermal paste and followed strict instructions online, but I'm still having temperature issues. The CPU is idling around 40-46 C (with the case open and sitting on top of an empty desk), but it spikes to 74 C when playing a non-demanding game like League of Legends, so I'm afraid to play anything more. Upon stress testing with Intel Diagnostic Tool, I get temps of 91 C and I tried testing with Prime95 Small FFT and it hit 100 C almost immediately, and I had to quickly end the task before risking any damage to my CPU. It can't be normal for a non-overclocked CPU to be hitting these temps, even with a stock cooler. I'm just worried at this point that my CPU won't even be able to make it through any amount of time gaming/video editing without overheating. I'm honestly starting to regret building a PC in the first place, I never imagined I would have this many issues right from the start.
 
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A_Goat

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Which version of prime 95? There is a specific version of prime 95 that is designed/bugged to cause excessive heating with the 4th gen Intel CPUs.
You're right, it's not normal... that's why we've been trying to get it figured out. It sounds like either the stock cooler is defective, or your specific CPU simply runs hot as not all CPUs are the same. Is there a microcenter within driving distance of you?
Without a microcenter, you can exchange the CPU and cooler and hope you get a better one...
or you can buy the aftermarket cooler now to see if that solves your problem, if it doesn't... you can return the cooler,

or keep the aftermarket cooler, and return the CPU and stock cooler and install the better cooler on the new CPU once you get it.

From what has been discussed in this thread, your only problem is your CPU overheating.
No reason to regret dumping all the cash when your only problem is covered under warranty, and intel has already offered an exchange
 
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litegrace

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Unfortunately the closest Microcenter is about 4 hours away, so it's not really worth the drive. I'm getting a warranty replacement, but it's going to be 2 weeks before I can get my new CPU which sucks (I'll be out of town when they ship the new one and won't be back until the week after). My only other option is to overnight a CPU and pay the $25 shipping cost along with temporarily paying the cost of the CPU ($350) until they receive mine and refund it. I'm 100% going to buy a new cooler (most likely a Hyper 212 Evo) and a couple of Noctua fans to make sure this isn't an issue, even if I'm not overclocking.

I only tried Prime95 as that is what most people used to test their CPU's, and even people with the same chip were getting 15-20 C cooler temps with a stock cooler. I mean even the Intel stress tests (Diagnostic Tool and XTU) both made the CPU hit 90-91 C within the first minute, which I can't imagine is a good thing. I realize the stock cooler isn't great, but I would assume it should be enough to keep a non-overclocked CPU out of the danger zone.
 
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A_Goat

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Yes, it should be enough... but it is very possible that the cooler/fan could be defective.
It's also possible that your CPU itself is defective.

But like I said there are certain versions of prime95 that overheat 4th gen CPUs (yours).
But that's not exactly relevant, as the other tests that don't overheat the 4th gen CPUs are also overheating your CPU.

What motherboard do you have? And what version of the BIOS is installed?
 
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litegrace

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UPDATE: I just received and installed the new CPU sent through warranty (decided on the overnight instead of waiting 2+ weeks, and initially it is performing much better. I'm getting idle temps of 38-42 C, and I expect that it will go down as the thermal compound sets or does it's thing. Initially with the other CPU I was seeing 50+ C on idle, so this is quite an improvement. Even after replacing the thermal compound and re-seating the CPU for the first one, I was idling at 42 C, but that was after about 8 hours of letting it settle in, and it was still managing to overheat when video editing.

I'll keep you updated after I let it settle for a few hours and get around to testing it a bit more, but initially it seems to be running quite a bit cooler than the first one. I'll still be ordering the Hyper 212 Evo and some Noctua case fans, but I definitely am seeing an improvement here. It's also interesting to note that the stock cooler they sent me is slightly different from the first one (despite both CPU's being the same model and from the same batch), so that tells me that they may have had issues with the other cooler. The CPU temp on idle is slowly going down (38 C is perfectly fine for me, but it's nice to see it drop even more if it does), again I'll keep everyone updated just in case anyone else comes across the same issues and can learn anything from this experience :) Oh, and props to Intel support, they did a great job on helping and being quick and effective, which was really nice.

Sorry, forgot to be more clear on CPU temp. My motherboard gives me a measure of the hottest core, but I've been using Realtemp to get accurate readings for all cores. The hottest core right now is 40 C (with Steam, Skype, and Chrome all running), while the lowest is 33 C, which is great because previously all cores were 36+ C on idle (after thermal re-application), with the hottest core being around 42 C, just wanted to clarify :)
 
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