Advice regarding Wraith Stealth CPU cooler upgrade needed.

[lttlejoe]

Hi guys maybe you can point me in the right direction or suggest a better alternative as I'll explain.
I've just recently completed a new custom build using the Ryzen 5 2600X and Gigabyte B450 Aorus M, plus 16Gb 3000 MHz RAM and GTX 1060 3Gb as the base.
Everything is working fine just as expected so no issues there except I don't particularly like the effectiveness of the stock Wraith Spire cooler which comes with the CPU.

I don't bother with overclocking so the CPU cooler isn't being pushed beyond its capabilities but the CPU cooler fan seems awfully busy when the CPU gets a bit of work to do, which didn't happen with my old system ( Phenom 11 945 BE) even though it was quite hot running chip.
I did replace the original stock cooler on the Phenom with an 'Arctic Freezer 7Pro' as the original stock cooler itself was awful good and got quite loud with the CPU under pressure but the fan pitch barely showed any change once I'd fitted the Arctic cooler and I'm wondering if a different cooler might also be a better option than the stock Wraith Spire supplied with the 2600X?

I don't think I want to go down the water-cooled option just yet as the temperatures aren't excessive ( according to 'Core Temp' software) as at idle it can be as low as 32 degC but can shoot up to over 70 when I'm moving lots of photo image files around USB drives.
I had a quick game of World of Tanks just a few minutes ago and the CPU never got hotter than about 52 deg C and again, around only 60 degC for CS:GO so it's certainly not too bad under normal gaming loads and well under the limits for the CPU.

I also checked carefully how I installed the Wraith cooler, being extra careful not to damage the pre-applied thermal paste as I put the cooler into place and tightened the cooler evenly so that isn't an issue and it can't be due to overheating of the case as I've had both sides off as I've been swapping drives etc around and there are three cooling fans working besides the CPU fan.
I do prefer a cooler which has a fan that exhausts the air over the cooling fins in parallel to the CPU and mobo surface rather than at right angles so that I can pull the air passing over the CPU cooler fins and out of the case through the case roof via the top fans which is how I had my last set up configured.

Maybe I just got so used to my old system being so quiet and effective that perhaps I'm expecting too much from the new set up but I confess that it does irritate me somewhat when the house is quiet and I hear the sound of the CPU fan constantly rising and falling in pitch as the load changes often for what seems very little reason.

Ideas please!

 

[doyll]

Akasa Raptor does not have very good airflow. Basic rule of thumb is for a system with CPU cooler using 120mm fan and GPU with 2x 80/90mm fans we need at least 2x 120mm case intakes .. Raptor only supports 1x front intake. All other vents are near back of case so will not work well to flow air in one end and out other end of case. Reasoning is simple; case airflow needs to supply components with a little more airflow than they use so they are not forced to re-use their own heated air .. because every degree warmer the air into cooler is translates into same degree higher temp component will be. You might find below link about how airflow works and how to optimize case airflow of interest. Read it to get a basic understand of case airflow and then ask questions.
https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/t...-i-put-my-temp-sensor.18564223/#post-26159770

 

[lttlejoe]

Akasa Raptor does not have very good airflow. Basic rule of thumb is for a system with CPU cooler using 120mm fan and GPU with 2x 80/90mm fans we need at least 2x 120mm case intakes .. Raptor only supports 1x front intake. All other vents are near back of case so will not work well to flow air in one end and out other end of case. Reasoning is simple; case airflow needs to supply components with a little more airflow than they use so they are not forced to re-use their own heated air .. because every degree warmer the air into cooler is translates into same degree higher temp component will be. You might find below link about how airflow works and how to optimize case airflow of interest. Read it to get a basic understand of case airflow and then ask questions.
https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/t...-i-put-my-temp-sensor.18564223/#post-26159770

Thanks for your reply. I get your point but actually I do understand air flow in cases though I failed to mention in my post that I'm not actually using the Raptor case right at this moment, I'm using an Antec gaming case with 3 of the possible 6 x 120mm fans running which I recently purchased specifically for building up a spare computer out of the old mobo, CPU etc.
I never had an issue with the Raptor case as it's big, it also has one front, two top, one side and one rear fan all of which are 120mm (some can be increased to 140mm) and are controlled by fan controller which I installed so even the old Phenom never got hot once I'd installed a decent CPU cooler even if I was on the computer most of the day with only three fans running and set at their lowest rotating speed.
When I first assembled this new mobo etc I thoroughly tested the new Be Quiet PSU out for 4 days non stop in this new Antec case with the old mobo etc before I risked hooking the new components etc up to the new PSU and again the old CPU never got hot so it's unlikely to have anything to do with the case.

Personally I just don't think the Stealth cooler is quite up to it or perhaps the thermal paste is not doing the job? I really can't make out why but it can't be the room temp as I've just checked and it's only registering 16 degC on my large thermometer and I need to think about putting on a sweater as it's rather cool in here.

 

[doyll]

I have never liked flat coolers. Tower coolers do a much better job of keeping their heated exhaust moving back and out of case instead of mixing with cool intake air and warming air into cooler. But without knowing exactly what case, motheboard & RAM it's very hard to know what coolers will fit and what won't. Best cooler performance to cost I know of is Thermalright TRUE Spirit 140 Power, but sadly OcUK does not sell them and won't allow use to post price or where they can be purchased. TS140P stands 171mm tall, 55mm deep so 54mm center CPU to front of fan, and is 155mm wide so 77.5 center CPU toward PCIe sockets. Obviously it doesn't fit all motherboards or in all cases. It will clear PCIe sockets on our motherboard, but if your RAM is too tall it might be problematic fitting fan on front but will fit with fan on back pulling air through cooler which gives same temps as when mounted on front of cooler.

 

[lttlejoe]

I have never liked flat coolers. Tower coolers do a much better job of keeping their heated exhaust moving back and out of case instead of mixing with cool intake air and warming air into cooler. But without knowing exactly what case, motheboard & RAM it's very hard to know what coolers will fit and what won't. Best cooler performance to cost I know of is Thermalright TRUE Spirit 140 Power, but sadly OcUK does not sell them and won't allow use to post price or where they can be purchased. TS140P stands 171mm tall, 55mm deep so 54mm center CPU to front of fan, and is 155mm wide so 77.5 center CPU toward PCIe sockets. Obviously it doesn't fit all motherboards or in all cases. It will clear PCIe sockets on our motherboard, but if your RAM is too tall it might be problematic fitting fan on front but will fit with fan on back pulling air through cooler which gives same temps as when mounted on front of cooler.

Actually I don't think we're far apart here...the TS 140P looks very similar in design to the Arctic Freezer I fitted to the old system and really is the type of cooler that I was thinking of when I made my post.
I was able to mount the Arctic Freezer onto the CPU so that the fan was directing the air which passed through/over the CPU cooler fins directly toward the case roof vent fans. The front fan of the Raptor case pushed the air in, as did the case side fan and the top two fans and rear fan extracted the air pretty much perfectly. Even when the room temp got as high as 30 Deg C in summer there was never a heat issue and Phenoms were apparently notorious for running quite hot at the best of times.

One of the reasons I chose the Raptor case back in 2011 was that it had 4 available front access 5.25 inch bays plus a 3.5 inch front bay for a card reader all of which were filled with 2 optical drives, 6 channel fan controller etc and it was very difficult to find another case with such features.
The Antec is probably the nearest to the Raptor but has only two available 5.25" and one 3.5" front bays but it has high/low fan adjustment which has the roof exhaust fans so I'll manage and it looks slightly more modern than the Raptor, not that it matters as for me a computer is something more about fuction rather than looks.

I'll check out the dimensions of the TS 140P cooler and see if it will fit as it could be what I'm looking for. I think the Antec case is over 200mm wide and will accept a GPU up to 15 inches long so it should fit but it could depend upon the Team Group Vulcan RAM stick height as to whether it will have sufficient clearance.

 

[doyll]

Case cannot be extracting more air than is entering from intakes. That is simple physics. We can't have more leaving then entering. We need to work airflow the same way flowing water works. That why the science of air is named 'Fluid Dynamics'.

So if you only have one intake vent with only 1 intake fan the maximum amount of air your case can be flowing is that one vent of air .. and a very little more from other holes in case that exhaust fans may be pulling in. But the amount of pressure differential case fans make is miniscule .. like hte difference between pressure on your feet when your toes are touching surface of ocean and pressure on them when standing on a dock about 10 feet above surface of same ocean.

Air coolers on high load CPU and/or GPU have a near perfect cooling ratio of 1:1. Every degree warmer the air into cooler is translates into same degree hotter the CPU/GPU will be. So if cooler has to re-use it's own exhasut air wth cool air the increased temp of air into cooler is refected in component temp increase. Only way to change that is higher airflow speed / higher fan speed or suppy more air to cooler. The bigger the cooler is the more heat it can remove at lower airflow / fan speed.

TRUE Spirit 140 Power has 6x 8mm heatpipes so has significantly more crossectional volume and heatpipe wick on inside as well as more outside surface area contacting fins .. like 30% more than 6mm heatpipes have. Not many companies use 8mm heatpipes in their coolers, and the ones that do all seem to have better performance. Original Silver Arrow had 8mm heatpipes and Phanteks PH-TC14PE has 8mm heatpipes .. there are a few more but I can't remember which is which.

 

[lttlejoe]

Case cannot be extracting more air than is entering from intakes. That is simple physics. We can't have more leaving then entering. We need to work airflow the same way flowing water works. That why the science of air is named 'Fluid Dynamics'.

So if you only have one intake vent with only 1 intake fan the maximum amount of air your case can be flowing is that one vent of air .. and a very little more from other holes in case that exhaust fans may be pulling in. But the amount of pressure differential case fans make is miniscule .. like hte difference between pressure on your feet when your toes are touching surface of ocean and pressure on them when standing on a dock about 10 feet above surface of same ocean.

Air coolers on high load CPU and/or GPU have a near perfect cooling ratio of 1:1. Every degree warmer the air into cooler is translates into same degree hotter the CPU/GPU will be. So if cooler has to re-use it's own exhasut air wth cool air the increased temp of air into cooler is refected in component temp increase. Only way to change that is higher airflow speed / higher fan speed or suppy more air to cooler. The bigger the cooler is the more heat it can remove at lower airflow / fan speed.

TRUE Spirit 140 Power has 6x 8mm heatpipes so has significantly more crossectional volume and heatpipe wick on inside as well as more outside surface area contacting fins .. like 30% more than 6mm heatpipes have. Not many companies use 8mm heatpipes in their coolers, and the ones that do all seem to have better performance. Original Silver Arrow had 8mm heatpipes and Phanteks PH-TC14PE has 8mm heatpipes .. there are a few more but I can't remember which is which.

The Antec case I have has two fans at the front, two on top, one at the side and one at the rear plus a vent on the case floor for the PSU so there's more than sufficient potential airflow through the case to keep a CPU such as the 2600X cool as long as the cooler is efficient.

The room temp has now warmed up to 22 deg C and after a few rounds of WOT, the hottest it got was 59 C and the Zotac Mini 1060 GPU temp is not reaching 40C according to Nvidia's Firestorm software so I think the problem is that the stock Wraith Spire cooler is working OK but simply not as efficiently as would a better cooler, hence the noticeable cooling fan change in pitch with load which I'm not used to. I also think the problem is that I'm aware of it which makes it appear worse than what it is as I could live with it but I prefer as near to silence as I can manage.

I'll definitely be looking to replace the Wraith cooler with something better. I might as an experiment, try fitting the Arctic Freezer from my old system to the 2600X as I believe it with fit an AM4 socket.

 

[doyll]

Best way to accomplish good case airflow is to have all fans moving air the same direction. Like 2-3x front intake moving air into case, CPU cooler moving air on back and then out of case. GPU coolers dump air everywhere but it is still best if we can keep all air around it moving toward back and out of case. I don't think our Antec case has venting to do this. Yes it has 2x front vents, but only other vent flowing air same direction front intakes for is rear vent. All other vents are toward the back of side, top and bottom. Maybe the top vent as exhaust can work with front to back flow, but the side vents probably won't help as intake or exhaust. And as I said, if your exhaust fans move more air than filtered intakes what little additional air they draw into case will not be filtered.

If your Arctic Freezer will mount on new system it is likey a better cooler than Wraith. Even if not better it will at least not be dumping heated air in all directs and that alone could lower high load CPU temps by 5-8c

 

[lttlejoe]

Best way to accomplish good case airflow is to have all fans moving air the same direction. Like 2-3x front intake moving air into case, CPU cooler moving air on back and then out of case. GPU coolers dump air everywhere but it is still best if we can keep all air around it moving toward back and out of case. I don't think our Antec case has venting to do this. Yes it has 2x front vents, but only other vent flowing air same direction front intakes for is rear vent. All other vents are toward the back of side, top and bottom. Maybe the top vent as exhaust can work with front to back flow, but the side vents probably won't help as intake or exhaust. And as I said, if your exhaust fans move more air than filtered intakes what little additional air they draw into case will not be filtered.

If your Arctic Freezer will mount on new system it is likey a better cooler than Wraith. Even if not better it will at least not be dumping heated air in all directs and that alone could lower high load CPU temps by 5-8c

If it will mount, I'll try the Arctic Freezer probably over the weekend as it was really impressive on the Phenom 11. Mind you I live out in the sticks and it's the best part of an hour to anywhere which sells thermal paste so it might have to wait until after monday to get some delivered. The old stock cooler sounded like it should have been mounted on the wing of a Boeing 7 series, it was so bad when ever it got a bit of worek to do.
After I'd installed the AF, I had to listen carefully to tell if it was actually working. Even with the old CPU, Mobo and little GTX 1060, it performed flawlessly on games like WOT etc.

If the AF won't fit I'll source another cooler of comparable design so that when it's mounted on the CPU, the fan will be pushing the air which passes over the fins toward the roof fans which will then assist with extraction. The two front fans and single side fan will push the air in toward the centre of the mobo and the top two, along with the rear fan will extract any built up warm air.

If it still gets too warm after that then it's water cooling.

 

[doyll]

If it's still too warm a case with better airflow costs much less than decent water cooling.

 

[lttlejoe]

If it's still too warm a case with better airflow costs much less than decent water cooling.

I doubt it will be too warm with a decent cooler. There's more than sufficient ventilation with the cases I have but I agree with you about cost.

To be fair, the CPU temp isn't really getting past 70C or just slightly over when it's under absolute full load of shifting, opening and manipulating many thousands of image files at a time that I'm moving around to and from different older and slower USB backup drives, all this is on top of when I'm running other tasks too such as downloads/updates/surfing at the same time, but most of the time it's hovering around the 44-50 C mark with medium loads and light gaming. The image files by the way go back to 2004 and earlier on the drives I'm working on at the moment so you can imagine just how many thousands I have which runs into several Tb and I've finally tasked myself with filing/organising them.
When it's resting, the CPU temp sits at about 31-32 degC and the GPU around a similar figure of 30-32 degC so really it's not running at all badly and I'm sure there will be plenty out there who would be content with those figures, it's just that I was used to a virtually silent machine even when gaming and one would think that the old Phenom would get far more stressed during game play than the Ryzen 2600X!

I've tried running several games today, World of Tanks, Battle Tank Legends, Fortnite, CS:GO etc and I'm barely making 50 to 60 deg C on the most demanding of them. The GPU temp is barely making 40 degC during gaming so it's all very decent with regard to gaming and temps.
I guess if I was on a tight budget I'd be happy with the results so far and be reluctant to spend further but I just hate fan noises, always have and suspect I always will. I kitted the Raptor case out with Akasa Pirhana fans and they are very quiet. The Arctic Freezer fan is also very quite and both my old and new Be Quiet PSUs are superb when it comes to low fan noise.
We shall see what happens.

 

[doyll]

Sounds like your temps are fine. Better cooler and optimized case airflow will likely lower temps some, but biggest difference will probably be system noise level.

I use Open Hardware Monitor graph it easy to see what temp and load of components is for hours or even a day at a time. Nice piece of monitoring software and it's free. https://openhardwaremonitor.org/

Hardest my system ever works is encoding videos. I use handbrake and if I use high priority level I can't do anything else while it's encoding. I use both Handbrake and Prime for cooler testing. both are free software.

Please let us know how it all works out with your Arctic Freezer.

 

[lttlejoe]

Sounds like your temps are fine. Better cooler and optimized case airflow will likely lower temps some, but biggest difference will probably be system noise level.

I use Open Hardware Monitor graph it easy to see what temp and load of components is for hours or even a day at a time. Nice piece of monitoring software and it's free. https://openhardwaremonitor.org/

Hardest my system ever works is encoding videos. I use handbrake and if I use high priority level I can't do anything else while it's encoding. I use both Handbrake and Prime for cooler testing. both are free software.

Please let us know how it all works out with your Arctic Freezer.

As you say the temps are actually fine and well within normal parameters...it's just that the cooler to my mind is rather odd, but there again probably so am I!
On lower-mid loading I can hear the fan rising and falling in pitch which is the source of irritation for me but from the figures from the software I'm currently using, it is obviously working as it keeps the CPU cool enough when under heavier load. It just sounds as though it's continually playing catch-up in the low to mid temps which is why I think a decent more efficient tower cooler like the Arctic Freezer 7 Pro would possibly solve the issue just as it did with the old Phenom CPU which had very similar issues.
Personally I don't think the coolers they give with CPUs like the 2600X are quite good enough, they may do the job but not as well as a better cooler and to be honest I half expected it to be like it is so I'm not surprised.

From my limited experience with CPU coolers so far, the dispersion of air is better and easier directed toward an exhaust port with a tower cooler than the wider dispersion throughout the case of my current flat stock cooler, which you also alluded to earlier so I will definitely be looking at getting another cooler of the tower type for the 2600X.
I'm loathe to take the AF cooler off the old Phenom CPU as I want CPU, mobo etc for a second backup computer build and also to run some older special image editing software with an earlier version of Windows which won't run on Win10 so I'll look for either another AF 7 Pro or something similar, but I'll do my research first to see if there better coolers out there first, though if unsure then I'll probably end up taking it off the old CPU to make sure.

That Open Hardware Monitor software link looks interesting so I'll give that a try...thanks for the link as well as the other software you mentioned.
I'll definitely keep you posted with regard to which cooler I end up with though the Arctic Freezer certainly did the job for me with the Phenom and if the 2600X is no more demanding than the Phenom then it should be fine, but I just need to do a bit more research.

 

[doyll]

Cycling fan speed cycling can usually be resolved by adjusting the fans' temperature to speed curve. Usually setting it so fans don't speed up until temp is a little higher fixes it.

Indeed, tower coolers are better than flat coolers are at keeping heated airflow away from cool intake air.

Then maybe getting another economy tower cooler would be the way to go. Which Arctic Freezer do you have? The Arctic Freezer 12,13 or 34?

Please let me know your thoughts after you use OHM. I really like it, but you might not.

 

[lttlejoe]

Cycling fan speed cycling can usually be resolved by adjusting the fans' temperature to speed curve. Usually setting it so fans don't speed up until temp is a little higher fixes it.

Indeed, tower coolers are better than flat coolers are at keeping heated airflow away from cool intake air.

Then maybe getting another economy tower cooler would be the way to go. Which Arctic Freezer do you have? The Arctic Freezer 12,13 or 34?

Please let me know your thoughts after you use OHM. I really like it, but you might not.

The Arctic Freezer I've got is the AF 7 Pro rev 2 which I purchased about 15 months ago when I updated my old system last year. The cooler had fantastic purchaser reviews which is what prompted me to buy it in the first place and it was definitely as good as the other purchasers claimed, in fact it far exceeded my expectations. Whether it is capable of dealing with something like a 2600X remains to be seen but I don't think it would be worse than the Wraith.

I'll look into adjusting the fan's speed curve relative to temp as that sounds one possible solution and it's only a case of adjusting it via the bios so not really an issue.

As for OHM, a cursory glance suggests it's similar to 'Core Temp' which is a piece of software along the same lines so I'm sure I'll get on with it.

 

[doyll]

I suspect AF 7 Pro has similar abilty to stock cooler, but being it's a tower means better airflow control thus lower temps. Not a lot of good £20 coolers. Not many 120mm fan coolers in £20 range. Arctic Freezer 34 is £20.99 with 4x 6mm heatpipes and 200-1800rpm 120 fan. Raijintek Themis is £24.95 with 3x8mm heatpipes and 120mm fan. 3x 8mm heatpipes are a little better than 4x 6mm heatpipes. Most 4x heatpiple 120mm fan coolers start at around £30. Coolers like Alpenfohn Brocken Eco with 4x 6mm heatpipes and 500-1600rpm 120mm fan. 8mm heatpipes transfer more heat than 6mm heatpipes and from my experience 3x 8mm heatpipes cool about the same as 4x 6mm heatpipes. I rarely even test entry level coolers so am not very knowldegeable about them speifically. If you ever do decide to buy a new cooler, drop me a trust note.