Silent cooling for i5-4690K in SilentiumPC Gladius M40

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Taureor

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Hello everyone! (first post ever) This forum always seemed like the best way to find an answer for tech problems, so here I am finally creating an account.

Now with the introductions out of the way:
I'd like to overclock my i5 4690K (3,5 stock). I've had it for two years now and I know I could get 4,5 from it, but I never really felt like I needed it. Now the CPU starts to limit me a bit in games like Europa Universalis IV (at least I think it's the CPU). The stock fan does a decent job keeping it cool, but it's too noisy and I think it's time to upgrade. I've looked through the forum a bit, but the answers I found were relatively vague on the noise issue An important thing to note is that noise is a big problem here since I'm a youtuber and any extra noise gets recorded on my videos.

I'm using:
box: SilentiumPC Gladius M40
board: MSI z97 Gaming 5
CPU: i5 4690K
GPU: MSI GTX970 Gaming (I'm not sure if it's relevant, but its size might be?)
PSU: Corsair RM 750W 80PLUS Gold

Edit: Memory is Kingston HyperX XPM Beast CL9 2x8GB

I think I'd like to spend up to the equivalent of 50$. I can go over if it's worth it, but that feels like overpaying to me, especially after I started outfiting my family with off-lease computers on the cheap. Liquid cooling seems a bit expensive, if the same could be achieved with air cooling and the reported noise is higher, but that's just the impression I got from reading up on it so far and I can accept that I might be wrong. Also I do have room for 2 120mm fans on the top of the box.

Grandis 2? Macho? Nocturna? Dark Rock? Something else?
Can you help me choose?

Edit2: according to the manufacturer, the box supports cpu cooling up to 157mm, which eliminates a few of the choices, even though most of them are supposedly 160mm high, I guess 3mm can't be squeezed in, huh? :)

In that case, going of the "best coolers" article here on tomshardware, I'm left with:
Scythe Fuma SCFM-1000 Big Air
SCYTHE MUGEN 5 REV.B
DEEPCOOL GAMMAXX 400 Edit: apparently it's bad
ARCTIC FREEZER I32
NOCTUA NH-U9DX I4 Edit: not compatible

And going with recommendations from other places also:
Thermalright Macho 120 Rev.A
Any other Noctua that fits
Noctua NH-C14S - is it so great to warrant the high price?


Anything to add?

 
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Ok, so I bought the MUGEN 5 rev.B

Currently I'm trying to iron out the overclock, at the time of writing this post the system is running Prime95 with the high-heat test (first from the pop-up list, I think it was small FFT or something like that).
I'm currentyl at 4,4GHz and 1,25V - not sure if it's an ok setup or not. It seems to finally be stable, since I'm rewriting this post for the fourth time and this time it hasn't BSOD'd yet. I started from 1,22V and went up until it stopped bluescreening.
The CPU package temperature hovers around 95 degrees Celcius right now. When I ran it without overclock, it stayed at around 60 with this test, which was about 25 degrees lower than with the stock cooler.
All things considered, I'm happy...
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lodders

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suggest you test how good your CPU is by overclocking with the stock cooler.
If you can get to 4.2 on 1.1V like me, then your CPU will probably go to 4.5 or more.
however, every 100Mhz speed increase requires about 0.05V more Vcore, and 1.3V is the limit.
So if you need a lot of Vcore to get over 4Ghz, you have a CPU which is unlikely to overclock well, and you should save your money

NB, don't try to do a big overclock with the stock cooler, because it will overheat!
 
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Taureor

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I tried a quick overclock on auto settings a while ago (only modified the Ghz, left the voltages to sort themselves out) and it seemed to handle 4,5Ghz. At prime95 it ran at around 100 degrees celcius for around 30 seconds until I got scared and turned it off. Anyway it seems overclockable. Even if I don't manage to go very high with it, I want to get a good cooler because noise is a serious issue even now under heavy load. It runs at around 40 C when browsing and such and at around 80 C under heavy usage like Paradox games or rendering.
 
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Bakhus Mps

Bakhus Mps

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Voltages on AUTO or set by MB OC profile are set alot more higher than needed in 9/10 cases. You get more power consumption, hotter CPU, faster degradation. So once you find a speed you are happy at, make sure you fiddle a bit with voltages and lower them as much as possible while keeping everything stable.

Regarding the cooling problem, take a look at Noctua NH-C14S, Noctua NH-L12. Cant go wrong with either.
 
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Taureor

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Thanks for the OC tips. As for cooling, NH-L12 doesn't support the 1150 socket (according to the page of the store I used, which might be wrong) and the producer says it's not suitable for OC and NH-C14S is very expensive (2x the price of Macho 120, at least in my country), is it really worth such an expense?

Edit: mixed up the two models before and updated the info on socket
 
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Taureor

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Sorry, socket mistake, first I mixed up the models and also the store seems to have incorrect information, I edited my previous reply. As for expensive - I can spend the money if there is no other solution, but perhaps there is? What do you think about the picks I mentioned in the first post?
 
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Bakhus Mps

Bakhus Mps

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Scythe Fuma SCFM-1000 Big Air - dont know this one
SCYTHE MUGEN 5 REV.B - its decent but will get loud on high OC
DEEPCOOL GAMMAXX 400 - its a cheap joke, not meant for any OC whatsoever
ARCTIC FREEZER I32 - its decent but thats it, will get loud medium OC
NOCTUA NH-U9DX I4 - dont think its 115X compatible
 
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Taureor

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Thanks, it narrows it down a bit. What about Thermalright Macho 120 Rev.A - do you know that one? I've read good things.
 
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Bakhus Mps

Bakhus Mps

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Thermalright Macho 120 Rev.A is a decent cooler with a pretty bad fan.
You could easily exchange it for a better one but you'd probably still find it impossible to fit above your very high radiator ram.
 
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Taureor

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Ah, that might be a problem I guess. From what we've discussed so far, I'm partial to Scythe at the moment. As for Noctua - is Noctua NH-C14S better than Noctua NH-C14 if I could get the old model with two fans?
 
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Bakhus Mps

Bakhus Mps

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They are pretty much the same cooler, s version has only one fan and is a newer model.
You wont be able to use the C14 with the second fan for the same high ram reason so no point in getting it unless you want an extra fan to put somewhere in your case.
EDIT: also second fan makes 1-2C difference, no more.
If you can get the C14 cheaper, get than and remove the bottom fan and put it somewhere on your case :)
 
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Taureor

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The Scythe FUMA looks promising: (mounting picture) http://www.scythe-eu.com/uploads/tx_cfamooflow/Fans_RAM_01.jpg and it reportedly offers great cooling, but as the noise is an issue,
Mugen 5 Rev.B also looks fine: http://www.scythe-eu.com/uploads/tx_cfamooflow/Cooler_With_RAM_3_18.jpg
I've looked around to compare:

According to techpowerup the fan noise at max speed is:
Scythe FUMA: 42dBA
Noctua NH-C14S: 43dBA
Noctua NH-C14: 65dBA ( ! )

And according to reviews here (adjusted for 1m distance):
Scythe FUMA: 32dBA
Scythe Mugen 5 Rev.B: 21dBA ( ! )
no results for Noctua here.
Are these realistic? They seem almost too good.

They both cost the same in my country and offer similar cooling (though FUMA seeems to cool a bit better, though louder), so I would probably go with the supersilent Mugen, but you did say it gets loud on high OC. Is the review score wrong, or did you perhaps have a damaged fan or an older model?

Edit: Links to sources:
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Scythe/Fuma/7.html
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Noctua/NH-C14S/7.html
https://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Noctua/NH-C14/6.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/scythe-fuma-scfm-1000-big-air-cpu-cooler,4986-2.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/scythe-mugen-5-rev.b-cpu-cooler,5083-2.html
 
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Bakhus Mps

Bakhus Mps

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Havent used the Mugen with the stock fan, 1250RPM cant hold a serious OC on that heatsink (4,6Ghz on a 4690k).
Heatsink is okish, but needs a higer rpm fan (used CM JetFlo) with had to spin up high to keep the CPU cool under load.
 
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Taureor

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Aug 3, 2017
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After watching a few more reviews I think I'll go with the Mugen 5 Rev.B and get a stronger fan if it's too weak.
I'll hold off on the final decision for a while, so des anyone want to add a different recommendation?

Thank you for all your help Bakhus Mps.

Also what is a good operation temperature for that i5? Silence is more important than OC for me, so I'll probably limit the OC to what the system can get silently. I've read that they work well even at 100 C, but it sounds like bullshit to me. In other places I've read that you shouldn't go over 80 C. Which is it really? Or maybe I should limit the OC so that it stays even cooler?
Edit: read up a bit more, would keeping lower speed on fans under 70 C and at 70C going to max speed in order to keep it under 80C be a good choice? Also OC so much that it reaches 80C on prime95? Or should I go higher?
 
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Taureor

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Aug 3, 2017
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Ok, so I bought the MUGEN 5 rev.B

Currently I'm trying to iron out the overclock, at the time of writing this post the system is running Prime95 with the high-heat test (first from the pop-up list, I think it was small FFT or something like that).
I'm currentyl at 4,4GHz and 1,25V - not sure if it's an ok setup or not. It seems to finally be stable, since I'm rewriting this post for the fourth time and this time it hasn't BSOD'd yet. I started from 1,22V and went up until it stopped bluescreening.
The CPU package temperature hovers around 95 degrees Celcius right now. When I ran it without overclock, it stayed at around 60 with this test, which was about 25 degrees lower than with the stock cooler.
All things considered, I'm happy with the cooler. It's audible at full fan speed, but around half speed I can't hear it at all and it still performs OK. It was also very easy to fit - it's asymmetric. Maybe I would have gotten better results with Noctua, but it would have been much more expensive and again - this fan is very quiet too.
As for the overclock, I tried 4,5GHz, but it ran very hot at around 1,3 and wasn't fully stable. Is 4,4GHz at 1,25V and 95 degrees C at Prime95 torture test an ok setup? I considered leaving the cashe ratio at stock (3500), but ultimately set it to auto and it went to 3900. Oddly enough, it seemed to improve stability - when at 1,23V it ran a bit longer before bluescreening when it had the higher Ring Ratio. I have no idea if that was random or not.
Anyway if this test doesn't end in the BSOD, should I stick with this setup, or go lower? I think I'll try playing something like DOOM when the test runs in the background just to see if it doesn't crash.

EDIT: BSOD on that one, testing 4,3GHz at 1,18V
 
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