Utter noob with cooling - fans being volatile

Lovejoy!

Lovejoy!

Lovejoy!

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Hello all,

I'm very much a noob when it comes to paying attention to cooling and fan settings etc.

I've just built a new PC with a Ryzen 3700x, 2070 SUPER, MSI mortar max etc inside a Fractal define mini c case. I've just replaced the stock fans with 3 corsair 120mm RGB fans, and i'm using the stock cooler on the CPU.

The CPU is actually idling at about 55-60c which seems wild really. I've reapplied thermal paste and it actually seemed to make no difference at all.

The other issue I have is the fans are just being volatile; just spinning up and down at random times, even at the click of a link in Chrome, or at the first sign of any drive usage etc. What am I doing wrong?
I can use a custom curve in the MSI command center software but dropping the RPM on the system pumps the temps up on the CPU to mid-to-high 60s, even touching 70c.

I also downloaded SpeedFan as i'd used that before for a much earlier build I did, and strangely none of the fans are being picked up at all. All it sees is my hard drives.

Just a little disappointed as the noise and temps are putting me off actually using the thing currently :D

Any help will be very much appreciated :)
 
i understand you, thanks. i'll give that a go later.

i'm definitely concerned by the high temps though. was (maybe stupidly) expecting lower temps, certainly at idle.
 
i've picked up those (ever so slightly expensive) corsair ll 120mm rgb fans because a big directive of mine for this build was dabbling with lighting the case up. so i now have three of those around the case.

i will take out the rest of the back slot covers too, and take a look at that link. cheers!

should i be concerned about the high idle cpu temps?
 
so!

i've removed pci backplates, done custom curves on fans etc and i'm still probably getting a little too high temps for my liking.

the CPU is idling at 45c currently. i have it clocked at 3800mhz and it's not boosting above this. i'd noticed by default it was boosting all over the place which is why my fans were having such a wild time. with my custom curve and this flatline clock, at idle my fans are fine. i have the fans spinning up quite significantly when the temps hit 70c and then 85-90c.

however, i still worried about temps. all it will take is some light usage (chrome, maybe some youtube action etc) and the temps really will get up. i've seen it hit 70c not doing much, and i dread to think what i hit when i'm getting into games. i will do a bit of a benchmark later to add evidence.

is the wraith cooler not good enough for the job? am i asking too much to get the temps lower? also was looking at doing some overclocking on this chip but DEFINITELY don't feel like i should in this situation. terrified i'm going to burn it out and just suffer from throttling.
 
yes i have! i was expecting to see changes but i didn't. certainly with the fans spinning up under low or no load. :(
 
an0nym0us said:
Try resetting BIOS to default settings and then in Windows switch between Windows Balanced / Ryzen Balanced power plans to see if either helps.
https://community.amd.com/community...te-5-let-s-talk-clocks-voltages-and-destiny-2
https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/cbls9g/the_final_word_on_idle_voltages_for_3rd_gen_ryzen/
Click to expand...

have done this now. not really seeing any differences on the ryzen balanced/windows balanced power plans unfortunately. my cpu does seem to have a idle voltage of around 1.25v which when not under load seems like a lot? also explains the high heat?

not sure on next steps. don't know whether i've just been unlucky in the lottery, or whether i need to further cool the system with an AIO or good air cooler? yeah, bit deflated with it really :D
 
i'll give that a go later. guess there's no better test than a fresh install on default bios!

as an aside, with regard to temps, is it worth me investing in better cooling?
 
i wouldn't say so. the fans are a little loud really and i do worry the temps get a little high. in the 80s, feasibly 90s at times.
 
that's a fair point, i'll try that too. is the risk there though that you'll get the CPU running too hot and throttling without the fans being able to counteract it quick enough?

my overriding problem is that i just expect these things to work without much effort which is just naive :D
 
i have a bit of a rgb light thing going on at the moment. is there something rgb friendly that i can install. was looking at an AIO really (don't mind spending the money) but not sure what's considered the best.
 
an0nym0us said:
If everything is at stock BIOS settings (i.e. no manual overclocks on anything and all voltages also set to auto), then Vcore is supposed to idle at <1.0V:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/cbls9g/the_final_word_on_idle_voltages_for_3rd_gen_ryzen/

What monitoring software are you using? Make sure you don't have more than one monitoring software open at the same time as they can conflict with each other (e.g. HWiNFO, Ryzen Master, CPU-Z, Corsair iCUE, etc).

Are there any processes hogging resources in the background, preventing the system from truly idling? Maybe you might want to try a clean Windows installation and also installing latest Windows updates. Remember to backup all important data first though.
Click to expand...

so, restored bios settings to defaults, did a clean install of windows and only installed chipset drivers directly from AMD and the CPU-Z. was getting 0.2/3/4v at idle, which is nice.

i've also changed the case fans to react to the system temp rather than CPU, so we'll see how that goes. they're ramping up a bit but i've not set the curve at all so...

but yes, i think upgrading from the stock cooler might be the next step. any further recommendations would be lovely. :)

thanks guys.
 
yeah, definitely good to see!

are we saying no to AIO? i really don't mind spending a bit more money. i'd much rather spend a bit more and know i'm getting better performance.
 
yeah, in BIOS it'll sit at 1.4v

i'll take a look. does manually setting voltages mess about with the boost clock?
 
:D appreciate that.

it's just the first build that i'm trying to care about the aesthetic with. i'm sure an air cooler will do a great job but there's something of having a big chunky thing protruding from the motherboard that keeps making me look towards AIO.

is there a compromise, or am i screwed?

i have honeslty just ordered the h100i to try it out, but i could always cancel...

sigh, i hate these things :D
 
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