Question i5-10400F runs cooler than the i5-9400F doing the same work?

AtomikDjakareh_32G

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Aug 25, 2022
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Previously, when my older 9400F was under high usage, the cooling fan would get quite loud... meaning the CPU was doing lots of work and getting very hot...

But the i5-10400F behaves differently... under the same high load, I see the clocks stay high... but the cooler stays quite silent... suggesting the processor isn't doing much work and thus not getting hot enough to raise the cooler's speed. And sometimes it will do the same heavy task faster.

Does this have anything to do with Hyper-Threading?

English isn't my first language. Sorry for any spelling errors.
 
There might be several reasons involved, and it is doubtful that hyperthreading has anything to do with it. In fact, hyperthreading SHOULD generally RAISE temperatures on any core where hyperthreading is enabled since it is having to do more work.

Most likely the reason is probably because the 10400F has a slightly upgraded stock cooler using a copper slug on the contact surface rather than just the standard aluminum contact used on the stock cooler for the 9400F. It's also possible that the thermal interface material (Casually known as thermal paste or a thermal pad) on the newer cooler is fresh and working well while the one on the 9400F might have become dry and hardened over time and wasn't allowing as good of heat transfer as when it was new. This cooler was only supposed to be paired with the higher end CPU models that were non-K SKUs but I know that some of the lower end CPUs like the 10400F also came with them, sporadically. I'm thinking maybe they had a shortage of the cheaper coolers and simply decided to box some of the better coolers up with some production runs. I don't know really I just know I've seen it, as one I built for somebody that wasn't supposed to have the higher end copper slug cooler did.

Different ambient temperature in the room it is in due to the time of the year or changes in your house temperature because of improved A/C cooling could be factors.

Also, they are both the same 65w TDP, but the 10400F is more efficient than the 9400F and can do more work using the same amount of electricity and therefore finishes things faster so that there is less time for heat to accumulate in the long run. Mostly though it's probably primarily due to a better cooler. And if you should desire to do so you could add an aftermarket cooler for around 25-30 US dollar equivalent that would probably make your current cooler end up sounding like a jet engine by comparison. Probably never even see a need to ramp up it's speed to be honest.
 

Zerk2012

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Previously, when my older 9400F was under high usage, the cooling fan would get quite loud... meaning the CPU was doing lots of work and getting very hot...

But the i5-10400F behaves differently... under the same high load, I see the clocks stay high... but the cooler stays quite silent... suggesting the processor isn't doing much work and thus not getting hot enough to raise the cooler's speed. And sometimes it will do the same heavy task faster.

Does this have anything to do with Hyper-Threading?

English isn't my first language. Sorry for any spelling errors.
It's also my understanding that Intel upgrade the coolers a bit with the 10xxx processors.