CPU Temperature is high

Respectfully, TDP is in fact 91 Watts: Intel Product Specifications - https://ark.intel.com/products/97129/Intel-Core-i7-7700K-Processor-8M-Cache-up-to-4_50-GHz


BringerOfTea was correct in stating "the i7 7700K is very hard to keep cool". To learn why, and what can be done about it, see Section 9 in the Intel Temperature Guide - http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-1800828/intel-temperature-guide.html

Additionally, if your GTX 1080 Ti is a Founders Edition which exhausts its heat out the back of your case, then it's not influencing your Core temperatures. However, if your GTX 1080 Ti is instead one of the many variants which exhausts and recirculates its heat inside your case, then it's definitely influencing your gaming Core temperatures ... IF your H100i is top mounted in a typical configuration where it exhausts heat from your case. However, IF it's instead front mounted, where it's intake air is at ambient room temperature, then Core temperatures are not affected by heat inside your case from any sources.


Sorry, but that's not exactly right. The terms "load" or "full load" you see posted on various Forums are highly misleading, because they're posted by users who typically don't bother to provide a definition, or their Ambient room temperature. Not all loads are created equal, including stress tests. The only correct and proper load for conducting a valid thermal performance test is a steady 100% workload, meaning 100% Thermal Design Power (TDP), which is how Intel develops Thermal Specifications. Further, 100% CPU Utilization just means the processor Cores are busy 100% of the time, which has no direct correlation to a steady 100% TDP workload.


Without knowing what temperature monitoring software you're using, it's still safe to say that "CPU" temperature is another misleading generic term, which should be ignored, since it's often mislabeled in various utilities and mis-assigned to sensors such as the CPU's Integrated Graphics Processor Unit (IGPU). The only processor temperatures you need to be concerned with are your Core temperatures, which are measured directly on the heat sources at the transistor "Junctions" inside each Core, where temperatures are highest.

Here's the operating range for Core temperature:

Core temperatures above 85°C aren't recommended.

Core temperatures increase and decrease with Ambient temperature.

Normal or "Standard" Ambient temperature is 22°C or 72°F. People write into our Forums from all over the world. They run PC's in summer months at room temperatures of 40°C (104°F) without A/C, or winter months in room temperatures of 10°C (50°F) with very little heat. If people don't offer their Ambient temperature and we don't ask, then it's easy to see how troubleshooting temperature problems can quickly reach the wrong conclusions based upon incomplete information and false assumptions. Ambient temperature can be a huge variable that needs to be taken into consideration, and should always be included with system specs.

Q: Since no one has yet asked, what is your Ambient temperature?

Highest Core temperatures occur during stress tests, rendering or transcoding, but are lower during less processor intensive workloads such as applications and gaming. CPU workloads and Core temperatures can vary greatly between games. Idle temperatures below 25°C are generally due to Ambient temperatures below 22°C. Idle temperature means dead idle, which is 1 or 2% CPU Utilization in Windows Task Manager.

If you'd like to learn more and get yourself up to speed on this topic, then read the Guide in the link I provided above, or just click on the link in my signature.

CT