i7 7700k stock w/ Noctua NHD15 Temp Question

cadefoster

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I've just upgrade my heat sink to the Noctua NHD15 from a cooler master 212. My initial impressions are pretty good, I was hitting close to 80c in some games and now I rarely see it go above 65c with fairly low fan speeds so I'm very pleased. My only concern is my cpu temps fluctuate constantly while gaming, sometimes by as much a 10c at a time. I had similar fluctuations with the 212 but I was hoping the Noctua would have evened the temps out a bit. I'm pretty sure I got good even pressure with the install, I tightened both screws till they just stopped. I may have added a tad too much thermal paste but I don't think it was huge amount. Any thoughts as too why my temps constantly fluctuate? My idle temp is 25-30 which stays pretty stable with just occasional spikes.

win 10
asus z270 prime
i7 7700k
16g ddr 4
Corsair 750w gold psu
Fractal Design R5 Case
gtx 970
 
Solution
some version of P95 are more stressful than others, and, it depends on if blended or small FFTs are run....; most like the older version (if you can find it) of 26.6, where blended FFTs only hits about 65-71C temps... (all well above any temps encountered in any gaming scenarios)

later versions, with small FFTs is most stressful..

I just ran P95 v28.8/small FFTs, and with 22C ambients, i had ~78C for cores 0,1,2, and core 4 at 80C, so I'd say your temps are fine...

cadefoster

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Thanks for your input. The only reason I question it is I watch a lot of benchmark videos and other 7700s seem to run a a relatively constant temp. Which made me think I might have an issue somewhere since mine can fluctuate so rapidly.
 
temps will only be relatively stable at/under constant heavy load conditions, like Prime 95/blended FFTs, where P95 v26.6 will induce about a 68C load, or, 73C with MCE (all-core max turbo) enabled...

Under less strenuous loads, temps can go from 35C to 68C and back down to 36C nearly instantaneously as clocks ramp up/down, which is normal....
 

cadefoster

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Thanks for all the input. I'm not sure if I have MCE enabled in my bios, im I little embarrassed to say I wasn't aware of that setting. I'll definitely double check to see if it's enabled. I've been testing some more games and the max temps are still looking pretty good. I have seen the CPU hit 70c a couple of times but it's not sustained, 65c or so seems to be the average.
 
If you run a heavy load such as P95 for a few minutes, and see all cores ramp up to 4500 MHz in HWMonitor, then MCE is most definitely enabled....

If you see only a single core hit that clock speed, it is not enabled... (your NH-D15 can easily handle the 6C higher temps of MCE all-core 4.5 GHz operation...)
 

cadefoster

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I finally had time to play around with my pc a bit more and do some testing. I checked the bios and MCE was set to auto which looks like its definitely enabled. I ran prime95 small ftt for a about 10 min and cores 1,2 and three maxed out are 75c but core 4 hit 78c. This is with cpu fans at 1200rpm. Does this sound like its in the ballpark of normal operation? or should I look at reinstalling the NH D15? Those temps just seem a little high to me.
 
some version of P95 are more stressful than others, and, it depends on if blended or small FFTs are run....; most like the older version (if you can find it) of 26.6, where blended FFTs only hits about 65-71C temps... (all well above any temps encountered in any gaming scenarios)

later versions, with small FFTs is most stressful..

I just ran P95 v28.8/small FFTs, and with 22C ambients, i had ~78C for cores 0,1,2, and core 4 at 80C, so I'd say your temps are fine...
 
Solution