Best cpu air cooler for 3950x no oc + video work?

note235

Supreme [H]ardness
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May 23, 2005
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I'm looking to upgrade my cpu cooler for my 3950.
I was thinking of the Deepcool AS500 but that doesn't seem to be available. Looking at

Noctua NH-U12S​


I'd prefer to spend around $50 but can go more if needed. My primary workload is video rendering so I will be using all the cores. No OC though.
Upgrading my mobo to a Asus TUF X570 Gaming + I have a MSI Geforce Ventus 3X 3090
 
It'll be hard to find something that can cool a 3950X while transcoding for around $50.

Undervolted and with a Thermalright Le Grand Macho and an absolute ridiculous amount of other airflow I hit around 80C when transcoding video with my 3900X.

https://www.amazon.com/Grand-Macho-RT-fan-TY-147B/dp/B01BCLXO7Q

If you want air you're gonna have to go with some of the best of the best if you want to keep things quiet and temps reasonable. Noctua NH-D15s, Le Grand Macho, Dark Rock Pro 4, etc.

Maybe a Scythe Ninja 5 or Fuma 2 could work at around $60?

Of course - if you don't care about how quiet it is at load, anything should be more than fine. I just try to keep mine cooler than is strictly necessary.
 
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the NHU12S is decent, but not for the CPU you want to cool........Dude, you've been around for as long as I have, use some common sense. $700 processor and want to spend $50 to cool it........ha!
It's a 16 core processor and you need a BEEFY cooler, twin tower-two fan at least.
.
But today, it's your lucky day, the Corsair A500 is a great cooler for the cheap builder: https://www.newegg.com/corsair-a500-ct-9010003-ww/p/N82E16835181193?Description=corsair a500&cm_re=corsair_a500-_-35-181-193-_-Product&quicklink=true
Lucky day lol.. that's only one of the shittiest coolers ever made. Corsair used to want a hundred bucks for that POS. Big shocker there is 60% off now.
 
Honestly if you are trying to save money either the Noctua NH-D15, Dark Rock 4 (https://www.amazon.com/quiet-Dark-Rock-BK022-Cooler/dp/B07BY6F8D9?th=1) or Scythe Fuma 2 are probably your best bets. These will last forever and honestly...if video rendering is part of your work why not also invest in making sure you keep it cool so it doesn't thermal throttle during work loads?
 
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Can you provide a fact on that, or is this one of those "oh! but it runs 3 degrees hotter than the $100 Noctua...oh! Dude, it's not worth it yall, it's not worth it!", kinda deal?
And let me break down what I meant by "lucky day" because obviously, you didn't read the part of "cheap builder". And here's the point "price". Because "note325 does not want to spend more than $50. Got it now?
Sure, you can check out its awesomeness by watching the GN review. The craftsmanship that went into it :D

For 50 bucks?

Best bang for the buck would be a True Spirit 140 Power if you were looking for something that can keep up with a D15.

Its pretty tall though, @ about 170mm.
 
Bought the Fuma 2 late yesterday! Thanks everyone. Yeah, I was debating on Noctua or Fuma. But I appreciate everyone's response!
 
Mentioned multiple times already. NH-D15.

Edit: oof... Missed by a minute!
 
So you can't clearly state what makes it bad (according to you)? And your "proof" is gn......which makes no sense of the methods used, considering the cooler was still almost on par with others.
If I'm gonna watch reviews done, I'd go to Linus primarily and others next but never gn.
What's next for that guy? Test the durability of products by blowtorching them, you'd probably not recommend those that "melted" for sure, because gn said there were not "good".
Never heard of anyone buying Thermalright products.

.

Fuma 2.....better not have a batch with the bad plate.
Nope, mostly because I could not care less about any Corsair product. I've had a couple, and I'm good. I have no proof of my claim. This is one of the rare times I used a YouTube video as reference. It was fairly detailed. I'm sure there are others. But hey, buy what you want.. whatever floats your boat! ;)

I do feel kind of bad that I triggered you so hard. Its all good, I've been triggered many times too lol.

Just because you've never heard of anyone buying them doesn't mean they aren't good.. Scythe came first, then Thermalright, and then Noctua. But you already knew that I'm sure.

As for GN, He's a good kid. He does a good job, no need to be so hard on him.
 
Nearly every reviewer pans the Corsair A500 relatively speaking. Not sure where you think it's so great.

Corsair makes good products. Doesn't mean that they don't sometimes miss.



https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/corsair-a500
https://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages/corsair-a500-air-cooler-review,1.html
https://bit-tech.net/reviews/tech/cooling/corsair-a500-review/1/
https://www.techpowerup.com/review/corsair-a500-dual-fan-cpu-cooler/

https://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/9...erformance-dual-fan-cpu-air-cooler/index.html

Tweaktown's review has this weird thing where it's rated 90/100 but if you read their in-depth it basically highlights every issue other reviewers had.

As high as our hopes were, while the A500 turned in decent thermal results, we expected something designed like this to be a chart-topping solution. Even with all the noise in the world, Corsair was still outshined by $50 solutions, as well as the similarly sized and priced D-15! Even in the case of something like the NiC-C5 with similar noise, Thermaltake does better with less tower to cool! We feel Corsair was on the right path, but something about this design does not add up to us. All of that surface area, all of the airflow and pressure one would ever need, a ton of noise involved with anything more than stock settings, we are left shaking our head on this one!
 
I'll give you a clue and a hint: Read post 1, then post 3 and then go back to post 1 and the hint is "prefer to spend around $50", then go back to post 3 and another hint: "cheap". And you get it $44.99.
As for "issue", the same was said about the be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4, that it was a nightmare to install, blah, blah, blah....I bought two, didn't have a problem installing them, I look at performance and price. Is the A500 that horrible performing? Or is it because some "people" had a big problem installing a screw? Or was it: eeeww! No RGB and the fans are too loud, eeewww!!!!

.
This is as simple as reading and comprehending. But clearly many failed at it. Even in the video the point I was making it's stated, so thanks for even further my proof and point.
Alright. I think the issue you are overlooking here is this... The OP buys an expensive CPU, and expensive GPU and then wants to skimp on the cooling of the system. Considering he is already thousands of dollars in, and he wants to do heavy loads, we can't in good faith recommend a $50 cooler.

It wouldn't work for his setup. That means we make that clear and then make suggestions as to what WILL work. If you just recommend a cheap cooler and move on thinking you did your job and then they are back here in a week saying their processor is overheating, did you really help?

It would be like someone asking what $50 GPU should they buy for Cyberpunk. You would go "lol! You can't play it on that! You need XYZ". This is the same scenario. A cheap $50 cooler will not give him results he will be happy with.
 
I don't have any experience with that cooler, but I'll look into it. Thanks!
For what it is the price it is awesome. Works great on my X5690 and 3770K. I tried it on my AM4 and it worked pretty good too. Only problem is on this board there is some interference with the closest dimm. I use all four so cant have that. A little too on Intel but not as hard as on this one. I went back to my LGMRT as there are no interference issues with memory. I also have my old Ultra 120 Extreme circa 2007 that I can use too now that I have a mount for it.. but no need to with the coolers I already have.
 
I'll give you a clue and a hint: Read post 1, then post 3 and then go back to post 1 and the hint is "prefer to spend around $50", then go back to post 3 and another hint: "cheap". And you get it $44.99.
As for "issue", the same was said about the be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4, that it was a nightmare to install, blah, blah, blah....I bought two, didn't have a problem installing them, I look at performance and price. Is the A500 that horrible performing? Or is it because some "people" had a big problem installing a screw? Or was it: eeeww! No RGB and the fans are too loud, eeewww!!!!

.
This is as simple as reading and comprehending. But clearly many failed at it. Even in the video the point I was making it's stated, so thanks for even further my proof and point.
You mean the part where it couldn't handle an OCed 10980XE? Tells me all I need to know really. Yes he's probably not going to OC his 3950 but given how PBO works he's probably going to limit himself with such a cooler.

And pointing out the Fuma2 issues while ignoring the noise fact is dubious at best if you're also ignoring the thermal and noise issues of the A500.
 
You mean the part where it couldn't handle an OCed 10980XE? Tells me all I need to know really. Yes he's probably not going to OC his 3950 but given how PBO works he's probably going to limit himself with such a cooler.

And pointing out the Fuma2 issues while ignoring the noise fact is dubious at best if you're also ignoring the thermal and noise issues of the A500.

Not being able to cool an overclocked Core i9 10980XE doesn't mean that its incapable of cooling a 3950X. I think people often fail to grasp just how much power a 10980XE can consume and what kind of heat they generate. At 4.7GHz, total system draw with an idle GPU was 617w. With a 3950X, it was 384w. X570 is also inefficient as far as platforms go as the TDP of the chipset is three times what it is for any other modern chipset.
 
Not being able to cool an overclocked Core i9 10980XE doesn't mean that its incapable of cooling a 3950X. I think people often fail to grasp just how much power a 10980XE can consume and what kind of heat they generate. At 4.7GHz, total system draw with an idle GPU was 617w. With a 3950X, it was 384w. X570 is also inefficient as far as platforms go as the TDP of the chipset is three times what it is for any other modern chipset.
Definitely fair. But the fact that the other coolers could avoid thermal for me says that it might not be able to handle a 3950 under PBO no problem is what I was mostly getting at.
 
I don't have any experience with that cooler, but I'll look into it. Thanks!
Its by far the best $50 hsf imo. I swapped mine for a noctua u12s chromax for a black out theme i built around a 8086k rig and was sorely disappointed. The u12s was equally quiet and looked great but it couldnt keep the oced 8086k anywhere near as cool as the 140p did. I sold mine with one of my back up rigs but ill be getting another even if only for my test bench. Thats usually the only place it will fit anyhow being that its so tall. Thats the one big drawback, Its hard to fit in alot of cases without hitting the side window.
 
When I read, I comprehend as well.. they taught me that when I was just a lil squirt. Corsair is junk, you should never recommend one lol.

You need to relax man. Every time you come in here you get all huffy and puffy. Most of us here are not noobs, though some of us are.. and that's ok. Gotta start somewhere.
 
Imagine blindly recommending Corsair for the sake of the brand naming, when it seems half of their stuff is rebranded mid range components with a premium added just so people can stay in "the ecosystem".

It's like picking appliances in a kitchen. You don't go with a singular brand for everything. Each component is judged on it's individual characteristics.
 
Corsair makes good stuff. Corsair makes bad stuff. Both are true. Plenty of their kit I'd buy (and have, and will) - plenty I wouldn't. The A500 isn't on my particular list because there are better air coolers if you need high-end air, for not a lot more scratch, and if you don't need high-end air, then just get a 212 Evo or the like. In short - if you've got a lot of cores, get the bloody Noctua or DRP or similar. If you don't, get the Evo 212 or something cheap.

In this case - that's an expensive, high core CPU - spend the bit extra and get the Noctua. Part of the cost of doing business with fancy CPUs is you need to keep them cool.

IMHO, of course.
 
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