AMD 7900 non x

[mitch247]

Good to hear. Just need the am5 debacle over & it's pull the trigger time.

 

[KaiserDJG]

AMD's current statement is that it relates to EXPO settings and memory overclocking, whereby the motherboards are supplying extremely high SoC voltages (1.4v and above) to a part of the CPU. I've seen Buildzoid's recent thoughts on this on his youtube channel and his opinion is that your 10-20w of SoC is not enough power to cause the chip to physically bubble. He doesn't think you can generate those kinds of temps (200 degrees+) without involving the vcore rail, which could well be delivering 200+ watts under peak loads.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DP-PqRduunw for the full thing. I do think it's interesting to see how this plays out, and indeed I am glad I haven't get got a 7800X3D on my desk. Only time will tell.



It is utterly normal for VRMs to be 60-80 degrees. This is their happy range, and they aren't really unhappy until you pass 100 (although 90 is usually the sign of a poorly designed board). Temps will depend on load, and a smaller CPU can't draw as much from them.

Techspot did a good write up on the X670 range VRM thermals: https://www.techspot.com/bestof/amd-x670-motherboards/ where the absolute premium boards hit 56 degrees on the VRMs - and the very worst hit 76. The good news is that zero boards are worrying, but indeed the ones that push 76 are sending that heat somewhere, i.e. into the case. I think they did their testing with a 7950X, and a 7700 would probably take at least 10 degrees off. I'd be surprised if anything on the planet runs below 40.

That said... if you build in an "airflow" case that reviews well and does its job, what you tend to get are 140-160mm fans spinning very slowly to the point where they are practically inaudible. General consensus these days seems to be that you are better with good airflow and slow fans than trying to wall the case off with sound dampening materials.

Obviously smaller cases are harder to vent because they may not have space for big fans, and the ITX boards all seem to have VRM fans on them which are probably small and whiny. If I was building a quiet HTPC myself, I'd probably settle on a micro ATX board and a case such as the Pop Air Mini: https://www.fractal-design.com/products/cases/pop/pop-mini-air/rgb-white-tg-clear/

(Indeed I was very tempted to do my next build this way, but I think I've talked myself into going regular ATX and waiting for the Fractal North to become available.)

Also bear in mind that what gets reported as "motherboard temperature" may not be (and probably isn't) VRM temperature. You're likely reading ambient case temperature. My z370 + 8700k are 5 years old and can probably generate as much heat as a modern build (peak 220 watts on the cpu, pushing 90 degrees under Prime95), but the actual case temperature read by the thermal probe is more like 40 degrees under normal gaming with a 3060 gpu. And this is a case with really bad ventilation

careful with your gpu in the north , its got a max size of 300 which most of the non reference cards exceed

 

[eddiew]

careful with your gpu in the north , its got a max size of 300 which most of the non reference cards exceed

Good to know, thank you!