Looking for a small, but very good, cpu air cooler.

[ant7]

I need a cpu cooler to replace this terrible stock cooler. However, I only have about 6 inches from the side panel to the cpu, and to make things even worse my ram is very close to the cpu.

Also, I was looking at the hyper 212 EVO and while it technically would fit, at least I think, it would be almost touching the tempered glass side panel.

If anyone has any suggestions let me know. Thanks in advance.

 

[Darkbreeze]

What is your case model?

If you have six inches, that's 152.4mm, which is definitely not enough for the 212 coolers which are 160mm. Most cases specify exactly how much clearance there is from the motherboard tray to the side panel, and what size coolers will fit.

The only tower cooler I'm aware of that is shorter than 152mm and has excellent performance is the Cryorig H7 at 145mm. Excellent cooler and not terribly more expensive than the 212EVO or X, and much better quality.

 

[ant7]

My case is an hp omen 880 150t and I’m running an i7 8700.

I don’t think this case has very good air flow either with only 1 case fan in the front and 1 in the back. What I’m thinking is that I get the cryorig h7, dual Corsair Air Series SP120 High Performance Edition fans, and Thermal Grizzly Aeronaut Thermal Grease Paste.

Although, my motherboard only supports 2 fans.

Here is a picture of the computer with a fan at the bottom right and the top left.

 

[Darkbreeze]

No offense, but I'd get a different case. Those HP "gaming" cases are basically sh**. If that's not an option, then I'm not sure you can upgrade the fan situation because I'm not seeing that there are additional fan locations on that case, so unless there IS room and you are willing to do some rather involved modifications, or unless there ARE additional fan locations that do not have fans installed currently, a different case with better internal arrangement and additional fan locations might be a much better ide.

Forget the Grizzly grease, it's not particularly exceptional. The Thermal grizzly Kryonaut and Conductnaut are a different story but unnecessary in this case and rather more difficult to apply correctly. I would stick with Arctic Silver 5, Noctua NT-H1, Arctic MX-4, Cryorig Cryopaste, Prolimatech PK-2 (Not PK-3, which is a nano-diamond compound and not as easy to get installed correctly), or any of the bundled compounds that come with most of the major coolers like Noctua, Cryorig, Phanteks, Scythe, Deepcool, Cooler Master or other coolers.

The thermal paste that comes with the Cryorig H7 is very good, and I would just probably use that. Otherwise, the Noctua NT-H1 or Arctic Silver 5 are my usual go to thermal compounds with MX-4 as a usual version for less demanding, lower mounting pressure option.

As a test, I would run your system with the side panel off. If your temps drop significantly with it off, then I'd definitely consider a different case or some way to add case fans. If it doesn't, then it is likely the CPU cooler is not mounted properly or is simply not up to the task.

 

[madmatt30]

^ I think the omen boards have non standard mounting screw holes which can pose problems.

The gammaxx 300 will knock 15c off temps compared to a stock intel cooler - with a locked 7700 ive seen it max at 62c running intel burn test as opposed to temps close to 80c with the stock cooler.

Even with an 8700 I would not expect anything in excess of the mid 70's.

However looking at that picture that is not a stock intel cooler , they're not stock intel pushpins & im not sure the distance between the mounting holes is even a standard intel measurement.

 

[Darkbreeze]

Kind of looks like the whole cooler got "twisted" sideways too. Might be the reason it's not cooling properly, or at least, as good as THAT cooler could be anyhow, which is likely not all the good even if it was mounted perfectly.

I'd also consider, if you do not wish to replace the case, looking at the Cryorig C1 and C7. They are both low profile coolers with near tower cooler performance. The Gammaxx coolers, 300 and 400, are very good for inexpensive coolers. Seems they are fairly loud though compared to a lot of other aftermarket coolers, but probably NOT compared to what's in there now and they are certainly better by far than the small Cooler Master units.