Best air cooler for 6700k - £50 budget

LewisRaz

LewisRaz

LewisRaz

Soldato
Joined
23 May 2016
Posts
3,874
Location
North Essex
Using my 6700k at stock settings. Stripped out my custom loop and only had a h55 to spare which is struggling to keep the cpu under 80* while mining.

I would like a nice big "fit and forget" air cooler. I really like the dark rock pro 3 but it is almost as much as half decent aio and im not so sure I would be comfortable with that weight hanging off the mobo.

Anyone got any decent suggestions or have knowledge of the dark rock pro3? Is there nothing to worry about with its weight?
 
Weight is not an issue. Sure, we hear people say it is, but I have never seen anyone post credible images or data of motherboard being damaged by a big cooler unless it was seriously abused. A German sight did a video abusing on by boxing it up running and repeatedly banging, dropping and finally throwing it into ceiling and landing on floor and it was still running and showing on their monitor .. but there was damage. :p
Sorry, I can't remember what review site did it so can't find the video.
 
I've got a Cryorig R1 Ultimate on the rig in sig. Works great, keeps temps in check, and was OK to install. Had Noctua coolers in the past and apart from the colours being subjective can recommend them as a brand. The quality of the coolers is extremely high and the mounting system is easy to use.
 
LewisRaz said:
not so sure I would be comfortable with that weight hanging off the mobo.

Anyone got any decent suggestions or have knowledge of the dark rock pro3? Is there nothing to worry about with its weight?
Click to expand...

Have you ever tried to snap a PCB with your bare hands? It's almost impossible.

As long as the cooler is fitted properly, and the motherboard secure on the standoffs, you'd have to put a hellova a lot more than a kilogram of force on it to even think about doing any damage, as the cooler is bolted directly to the board.
 
oldbanana said:
Problem with cryorig`s most coolers is ram clearance is only 30-35mm
Click to expand...
Cryorig R1 and H5 Universal support any height RAM in front of fan because front of fan is less than 50mm in front of CPU centerline.

LewisRaz,
Dark Rock Pro 3 is a good cooler with mid-level cooling ability.
What motherboard, RAM and case do you have? These determine what coolers will fit.
 
LewisRaz asked for a cooler in £50 budget range .. besides downflow coolers run CPU hotter because they do a very poor job of keeping their own warm air from being re-used .. and the warmer the air going into cooler the hotter the CPU will be .. at an almost perfect 1:1 ratio.
 
doyll said:
LewisRaz asked for a cooler in £50 budget range .. besides downflow coolers run CPU hotter because they do a very poor job of keeping their own warm air from being re-used .. and the warmer the air going into cooler the hotter the CPU will be .. at an almost perfect 1:1 ratio.
Click to expand...

ah crumbs me missing the budget mark sorry . Saw OP was looking at Dark Rock Pro which is the Same price or a few pence more

Dont have issues of hot CPUs with Top down coolers personally, have above and i7 8700k going into a 7 litre case with the unit above 4.9Ghz- then again im am forced into using one .
Just looking at lazerd3d page and see i7 units running smaller top downs just fine, specially at stock!

fact is that H55 is struggling at stock any lead to few other issues thats causing hot air .

@LewisRaz , what case do you have ? might be solvable with some airflow
 
Reason top down coolers often don't work as well as towers is top down airflow turns out when it reaches motherboard, then up when it reaches GPU, RAM, etc coming up along side of cooler and fan where fan often pulls this heated air back into cooler. The shorter the downflow cooler, the higher the chances of this occuring. Obviously also depends on how close GPU is, how tall RAM is etc.
 
orbitalwalsh said:
ah crumbs me missing the budget mark sorry . Saw OP was looking at Dark Rock Pro which is the Same price or a few pence more

Dont have issues of hot CPUs with Top down coolers personally, have above and i7 8700k going into a 7 litre case with the unit above 4.9Ghz- then again im am forced into using one .
Just looking at lazerd3d page and see i7 units running smaller top downs just fine, specially at stock!

fact is that H55 is struggling at stock any lead to few other issues thats causing hot air .

@LewisRaz , what case do you have ? might be solvable with some airflow
Click to expand...

Its a fairly heavily modded nzxt h440. It did house my full loop with 240+360 rads. I have now turned it into a "mining rig" that is on 24/7 with a 1080/1060 on air and the 6700k.

Got temps down to low 70s. Using all fans at 100% (including case fans). I have all 3 intake fans on but only a 140mm and the H55s 120mm as exhaust as the exhaust fans are all at the top and I want air to reach the GPUs at the bottom instead of being sucked straight up.

Seems the best I will get for this set up with this usage.

My plan is to turn this pc into a dedicated mining rig and re-use this case for a ryzen gaming system so if I do get the dark rock pro 3 I can re use it on that!
 
doyll said:
LewisRaz asked for a cooler in £50 budget range .. besides downflow coolers run CPU hotter because they do a very poor job of keeping their own warm air from being re-used .. and the warmer the air going into cooler the hotter the CPU will be .. at an almost perfect 1:1 ratio.
Click to expand...

Do you have any evidence of that? I had a darkrock TF for a year on a 4.6GHz 6700k with high volts and on a silent fan profile kept it below 70c....
 
AiiR said:
Do you have any evidence of that? I had a darkrock TF for a year on a 4.6GHz 6700k with high volts and on a silent fan profile kept it below 70c....
Click to expand...
Yes, I do, the link below shows the difference on open bench using AXP-100 cooler.
https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/posts/23545411/

But as you called on my posting what I've found not just on AXP-100, but other downflow cooler as well, do you have any evidence about your Dark Rock TF with fans flowing air up away from motherboard vs down onto motherboard? Because if you have never tried it you shouldn't be calling others out for sayig it usually gives lower temps.
 
PH-TC14PE for £46.99 is an exceptionally low price. My guess is reason is the white model is only one with silver color on fins. Normal price is £70-80.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom