Is my heatsink (Noctual D15) at thermal capacity or do I have poor IHS thermal compound?

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ubiquityman

ubiquityman

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1. Anyone have experience where the IHS was creating a significant barrier to heat transfer such that temps were hitting 100'C?

2. How about experiences with the Noctua D15 not being able to dissipate 200W?

I have a 7280X that runs great at 4.7GHz (all cores) at stock voltages. The problem is cooling.

I had a Nepton 280L water cooler which appeared to keep everything around 70'C under full load, but this lasted for a few days and then the Nepton appears to have stopped pumping water.

So, I replaced that with a simpler solution, the Noctua D15. This is supposed to be a >200W HSF solution, but it's not doing a good job cooling. Temps are hitting 100'C when all 8 cores are loaded to 4.7GHz. I'm testing with the Intel Performance Tuning app which displays a TDP, but there's a bug in that it doesn't display the correct value. My guess is that the CPU is at about 200W, which should be well within the capacity of the HSF.

Considering that the Nepton did keep the CPU cool, I'm guessing that something didn't all of a sudden change, but I am wondering whether there is a possibility that the thermal interface between the silicon and the IHS has deteriorated.

The other alternative is that the Notctua D15 just doesn't do that good a job.

Any thoughts or suggestions?


 
Solution
geofelt
Your case and cooler are excellent.
You should have no issue.
Here is noctua TDP cooling guidelines.
http://noctua.at/en/tdp-guide
NH-D15 is as good as it gets.

On the case fan setup. I would concentrate on getting airflow IN from the front.
You can have 3 140mm intakes which should be more than enough.
Whatever comes in the front will exit SOMEWHERE.
I Think your front intakes can be filtered. Good, that will keep your case cleaner.
Use a single 120/140mm in the rear, mainly to direct the airflow.
If you have too much exhaust or other fans, they will draw in unfiltered air from adjacent openings.

The purpose of thermal paste is to fill in microscopic air pockets in the mating surfaces. By itself, it is an insulator.
Too much is...
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jaslion

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The D15 should be good enough according to what I've found. So I'm guessing there is some uneven pressure/bad mounting or you got air trapped between the heatsink and cpu (lifting the heatsink up when the thermal paste was already applied). I would recommend you reseat the cooler since it's better than a corasier h110I which is what your previous water cooler pretty much was.
 
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ubiquityman

ubiquityman

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@jaslion, re-seating the D15 was the first thing I tried last night. Originally, I followed the Noctua installation instructions for the application of the thermal paste, which was a 4-5mm blob in the middle of the CPU. This was not the best in my opinion. 5 small blobs would have been better in my opinion. Regardless, when I re-seated, I ensured that the thermal compound was evenly applied and I did move the HSF around in a small circular motion upon re-seating to ensure I got as much air out as possible.
 
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ubiquityman

ubiquityman

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@JamesMason, good question.
I have a Cooler Master 5t (the red one with the tempered glass side panels).
I'm generally conscious of airflow and cooling.

The Notua D15 has 2 140mm fans. They HSF is oriented so it blows towards the rear.
After the HSF, I have a 140mm chassis fan that blow out the case.
This essentially is 3x140mm fans all blowing in the same direction.

In the front of the case, I have a 140mm fan blowing into the case.

At the top of the case, I have a 140mm fan combined with a custom baffle that blows air into the case across the VRM (to cool the VRM).

Finally on the bottom of the case, the power supply blows air out of the case.

What may be a bit atypical is that I configure all the chassis fans to change their speed based on the CPU temperature rather than motherboard temperature. This way when the CPU heats up, all the fans (CPU+chassis) go 100%.
 
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James Mason

James Mason

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That's sucking the hot air rising from out of the back of the case right back into it again.
Specifically which 5t? there's a few of them, but they all seem to have a solid front panel that I feel isn't doing you any favors.
 
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geofelt

geofelt

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Your case and cooler are excellent.
You should have no issue.
Here is noctua TDP cooling guidelines.
http://noctua.at/en/tdp-guide
NH-D15 is as good as it gets.

On the case fan setup. I would concentrate on getting airflow IN from the front.
You can have 3 140mm intakes which should be more than enough.
Whatever comes in the front will exit SOMEWHERE.
I Think your front intakes can be filtered. Good, that will keep your case cleaner.
Use a single 120/140mm in the rear, mainly to direct the airflow.
If you have too much exhaust or other fans, they will draw in unfiltered air from adjacent openings.

The purpose of thermal paste is to fill in microscopic air pockets in the mating surfaces. By itself, it is an insulator.
Too much is bad.
It is hard to use too little.
I think a small rice sized drop in the center will spread out under heat and pressure.
Smooshing it around first is likely counter productive.

At idle, I would look for a temperature around 10-15c. over ambient.
If you can't get this, there is something wrong.


 
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ubiquityman

ubiquityman

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@geofelt & @JasonMason,

The case I'm using is this one:
https://www.amazon.com/MasterCase-Computer-FreeForm-Tempered-Magnetic/dp/B01N0LE4BM/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1505441181&sr=8-1&keywords=coolermaster+5t
Although it looks like the font is blocked, it's not. That whole front chamber is an air cavity with foam backing which does a great job of silencing fan/air noise.

To control how air flows through the case, I've blocked all openings that don't have a fan (unless of course I intentionally want air to flow in that area).
For example, on the top of the case there is space for 2x 140mm fans. I'm using one. The other spot is blocked off with a solid piece of black cardboard.
The front there is enough space 3 fans, but I have only 1 fan. The rest of the space is blocked off with 1/2" thick black foam and Bluray drives.
The back has perforated holes, which again are all blocked off except where the fan is.
The bottom has a filtered intake for the power supply, that is NOT blocked off.

The reason I do this is main to ensure that air flow through the case and not around in circles where the fans are.

I believe there's enough turbulence coming out the back that any air that is getting sucked in from the top should be minimal.

Also, if the temp inside the case rises, the MB temp will rise (which I'm not seeing). I have tested this by removing the side cover (which should lower the temps if the inside was getting warm under load). It doesn't appear that the inside of the case is heating up significantly.

As for the thermal paste, I understand, the less the better, and the Noctual paste is strangely runny compared to the Arctic silver and Intel's TIM.

When I get a chance, I'll try changing the TIM, but the way that the temperatures are changing (I have them plotted using the Intel Utility), it feels like there's little thermal mass in the CPU system.
 
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ubiquityman

ubiquityman

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I emailed Noctua yesterday and they claim that the heaksink has ample capacity and the problem with CoreX is the TIM under the IHS.
I'm planning on printing out a deliding too, then I'll try it again.
 
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J

jaslion

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Fair enough since there are certain intel chips that run hotter due to bad application of the thermal compound in them.
 
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