Air cooling for skylake X, good idea?

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majic12

Limp Gawd
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Mar 6, 2014
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I was searching for some themps on the 7960x and the few results ive found are way different between,using AIO coolers or in open test benches.So im not sure what to beleve.

Will using something like a nh-u15s (one or maybe 2 fans) keep a 7960x cool for sometimes even at 24/7?
All stock.No overclocks.

I know that the rest depends on the case and room themps but for example in a ambient of 25ºC with the nh-15s maybe i coud expect something like 70ºC tops on the cpu?
Or is it all a bad idea?

Cheers guys.
 
If no OC, then 165W is not impossible for a good air cooler. I'd bet (if it fit) even a 10 year old Scythe Ninja could do it with decent fans. Only concern would be power density, so ensure it has beefy heatpipes and good thermal conductivity to spread that heat. it will get hot under continuous all core load of course but stick some big ass fans (e.g. multiple 180mm+) in a case with good airflow and you'll be fine. Basically you want as much surface area and thermal conductivity from base as you can possibly buy with an air cooler.

For perspective, I ran a 2600k OC'd using ~150W video processing and it would get to ~80 degrees on a passive cooler (mentioned above). Close to throttling though. With a fan it would be less perhaps 65-70 degrees.

So my main concern is power density - as long as it is managed well with a good design, you should be okay.

edit: D15 - U14 models will handle 165W TDP and even some OC
Check out the chart here
http://noctua.at/en/tdp-guide
 
Last edited:
You'll be fine with a high quality air cooler and a good case setup. I've been using a Dark Rock Pro 3 for years and I can't say enough good things about it. It's rated at 250w TDP and I'll be using it for my Skylake-X build. Simplicity and silence.

The only caveat with this cooler is that you have to be careful with the RAM you choose due limited clearance under the cooler. If you're using RAM with large heatsinks or any kind of "gamer" bling RAM with LEDs it won't work out.

AIOs gain you very little over high-end air if you're not overclocking in my experience.
 
Deke said:
You'll be fine with a high quality air cooler and a good case setup. I've been using a Dark Rock Pro 3 for years and I can't say enough good things about it. It's rated at 250w TDP and I'll be using it for my Skylake-X build. Simplicity and silence.

The only caveat with this cooler is that you have to be careful with the RAM you choose due limited clearance under the cooler. If you're using RAM with large heatsinks or any kind of "gamer" bling RAM with LEDs it won't work out.

AIOs gain you very little over high-end air if you're not overclocking in my experience.
Click to expand...

Is there anything bigger than Nh15 or dark rock pro 3? E.g. height wise or width, e.g. 140mm+?
Scythe made some monstrosity a while back but I can't remember that it reviewed so well or used bigger than 120mm.
 
custom90gt said:
Why skimp out on the cooling after spending that much on a CPU?
Click to expand...
Most servers/workstations don't use watercooling for a reason, reliability.

I'd much rather lose 5-10% max balls out OC capability for a solution that I won't have to give a fuck about maintaining, mould, leaks, etc and will still work e.g. if a fan fails or similar.
 
if running it stock... probably doable..

Just picked up a 7820x yesterday. i have a very large custom loop so i have no issues cooling it. stock it ran very cool, ambient at idle, 50-60C tops under load. now that i have overclocked it its consuming tons more power and hits 70c on load and 81c if i run XTU benchmark (AVX load) until i get my delidder tool i'm not going to push it further or run any avx stress tests on it, i could see it getting really hot no problem over time with AVX use.
 
N4CR said:
Most servers/workstations don't use watercooling for a reason, reliability.

I'd much rather lose 5-10% max balls out OC capability for a solution that I won't have to give a fuck about maintaining, mould, leaks, etc and will still work e.g. if a fan fails or similar.
Click to expand...

Is the OP using it as a server? I know about the reliability, but if the OP had thoughts of OCing then he/she is going to lose out on more than 5-10%. You're kidding yourself if you think a decent air cooler will be anywhere near a good loop, especially with something as power hungry as a 7960x...
 
At stock clocks is way too easy for an i9.
This reviewer is probably the only one who used a D15s with a 7980XE:
https://www.eteknix.com/intel-core-i9-7980xe-extreme-edition-review/6/
18-768x576.jpg


Cooler than the 7900x with 8 more cores.
 
Thank you guys for the many answers.To tell the truth im still a litle between the 1950x and the 7960x.(main reason is single thread speed as in my workflow i do need first good multithread performance and secong comes single so yeah,still thinking it).As someone stated,yes this will be my new workstation for the next no less than 4 years.Modeling,rendering and game dev(single thread perfomance does help me in the unreal engine 3).

I saw a review on youtube about air cooling the 7900x ,and someone stated that with a nh-d15 55-60ºC was the max he got.I find the review on the link above a litle strange and doesnt give me much conidence in the person who wrote it.
Exampe:

In the Testing and Methodology page under x399 he say
  • CPU Cooler – CM Master Liquid 120mm (will be retested with Noctua D15S with dual fans in coming weeks)

Ive spoken with noctuan a few times and they told me that they wont be making a Tr4 model of the nh-15 for threadripper as the heatpipes block 2 ram slots.

His stock temperature for the 1950x is insane,which means he didnt apply thermal paste as he shoud.So another red flag for professionalism.
Power consuption on the i9 7900x stock and overclocked is the same??



But on the other hand i might be mistaking.

So case will be a silverstone ft05 or a nzxt s340 as ive found the two to have good airflow.



---------------------------------------------

Or maybe i shoud believe more in air cooling a stock 1950x as its soldered and call it a day?
 
power consumption on any overclocked skylake-x cpu goes through the roof and temps along with them. in stock operation they run pretty cool and power efficient.

word is the 7900x and 7980xe are best bin chips that is why you may see situations where they run cooler / clock better than the disabled core lower models (7800x 7820x are same die as a 7900x, 7920x 7940x 7960x are disabled core versions of the 7980xe) but overall exact quality of any specific chip is going to vary as that is the silicon lottery.
 
majic12 said:
So case will be a silverstone ft05 or a nzxt s340 as ive found the two to have good airflow.
Click to expand...

Actually those two cases are in completely different leagues when it comes to cooling performance. The S340 is average to below average in terms of airflow while FT05 is a top of the line airflow case. The difference could be up to 10ºC between the two cases using the same system as shown in reviews that contain test data for both cases:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/9431/the-nzxt-s340-case-review/4
https://www.bit-tech.net/reviews/tech/cases/nzxt-s340-review/3/
 
realworld said:
At stock clocks is way too easy for an i9.
This reviewer is probably the only one who used a D15s with a 7980XE:
https://www.eteknix.com/intel-core-i9-7980xe-extreme-edition-review/6/
18-768x576.jpg


Cooler than the 7900x with 8 more cores.
Click to expand...


That 1950X temp is not right, no way would it still be running at 90 degrees. Likely forgot to subtract the offset which if I remember right is even higher then 20 degrees on Threadripper. All X chips even on Ryzen are offset by 20 degrees, just a fyi.
 
N4CR said:
Most servers/workstations don't use watercooling for a reason, reliability.

I'd much rather lose 5-10% max balls out OC capability for a solution that I won't have to give a fuck about maintaining, mould, leaks, etc and will still work e.g. if a fan fails or similar.
Click to expand...

When speaking of rackmounted servers in a datacenter, most are aircooled, yes, but it does not resemble most users home-setup.
We have a ambient temperature of ~21C on the cold side, 24/7 365...as in always, so all servers have 21C air intake, most home setups are different....and NONE of our ~5K servers are overclocked.
Stability, stability, stability....important factor ;)
 
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custom90gt said:
Why skimp out on the cooling after spending that much on a CPU?
Click to expand...

Exactly, if you are going to drop 1.5K on a CPU and try run it under a HS/F cooler when even the 8700K struggles with one that is asking for thermal throttle issues. If you buy an enthusiast end part, the least you can do is put it under real liquid cooling and not these AIO devices.
 
majic12 said:
Thank you guys for the many answers.To tell the truth im still a litle between the 1950x and the 7960x.(main reason is single thread speed as in my workflow i do need first good multithread performance and secong comes single so yeah,still thinking it).As someone stated,yes this will be my new workstation for the next no less than 4 years.Modeling,rendering and game dev(single thread perfomance does help me in the unreal engine 3).

I saw a review on youtube about air cooling the 7900x ,and someone stated that with a nh-d15 55-60ºC was the max he got.I find the review on the link above a litle strange and doesnt give me much conidence in the person who wrote it.
Exampe:

In the Testing and Methodology page under x399 he say
  • CPU Cooler – CM Master Liquid 120mm (will be retested with Noctua D15S with dual fans in coming weeks)

Ive spoken with noctuan a few times and they told me that they wont be making a Tr4 model of the nh-15 for threadripper as the heatpipes block 2 ram slots.

His stock temperature for the 1950x is insane,which means he didnt apply thermal paste as he shoud.So another red flag for professionalism.
Power consuption on the i9 7900x stock and overclocked is the same??



But on the other hand i might be mistaking.

So case will be a silverstone ft05 or a nzxt s340 as ive found the two to have good airflow.



---------------------------------------------

Or maybe i shoud believe more in air cooling a stock 1950x as its soldered and call it a day?
Click to expand...

Try find reviews of Threadripper in regards to the applications you use, you may find that it is a very viable alternative.
 
A
Gideon said:
That 1950X temp is not right, no way would it still be running at 90 degrees. Likely forgot to subtract the offset which if I remember right is even higher then 20 degrees on Threadripper. All X chips even on Ryzen are offset by 20 degrees, just a fyi.
Click to expand...
It's because they used a Cooler Master CLC that isn't even compatible with Threadripper's gigantic size.
 
Just found this to show how we do things, this is the first datacenter we had buildt (it's no longer alone):


Different from home user setups...as again: Stability, stability & stability...(did I mention stability?)
 
Yeah fantastic, except for the part where this is not a data centre.

It will however pull 450-500w in a cinebench run or blender render. I would not even remotely consider anything but custom loop to keep that chugger cool
 
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