[SOLVED] Whats the best air CPU cooler for i7-7700K ?

Solution
A twin tower cooler like the NH-D15 which you mentioned will be about the best there is.
There are other such units.
One potential issue is compatibility.
Your 34mm ram is not going to cause any issues in that respect.

Nor will you have a problem with height; even the tallest are 165mm.

But, some motherboards will position the cpu socket too close to the first pcie slot.
A cooler can impact a graphics card backplate.

Noctua has some extensive charts on
compatibility and suitability for their coolers.
For suitability with a i7-7700K:
https://ncc.noctua.at/cpus/model/Intel-Core-i7-7700K-288

For motherboard compatibility, enter your motherboard:
https://ncc.noctua.at/motherboards
The NH-D15s is a high...

Eximo

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be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4

Phanteks TC14PE is basically the equivalent of the older Noctua NH-D14

Scythe Ninja 5 has some followers

Eisbear IceGiant ThermoSiphon (not even sure if that is available anywhere) (Also it is HUGE)
 
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Deleted member 2838871

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I may OC down the road...Whats a good Air Cooler ? I know Noctua NH-D15 is one...any others ?

Let us know how that works out... my previous build was a 7700k and that chip gets super warm... warm to the point where delidding was common and that's what I did which lowered temps by about 15C. I cooled mine with a 280mm AIO though...

I don't recall all the details as to why the high temps but remember reading something about craptastic Intel stuff which I removed and replaced...
 

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Still running my 7700k, delidded but I did not use liquid metal, just some high end paste. I had one core running about 10C above the rest, brought that down to a delta of only 3C. Been under a custom loop since day 1. Not the best chip, but it has been running steadily at 5Ghz core with a 4.5Ghz cache. Still gets into the low 80s sometimes.

Plan to BIOS hack a 9700k into it sometime this year, just to see if I can. If it fails, probably just go buy a 5600X or wait it out for DDR5 if I can get the 7700k back in there.
 
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Still running my 7700k, delidded but I did not use liquid metal, just some high end paste. I had one core running about 10C above the rest, brought that down to a delta of only 3C. Been under a custom loop since day 1. Not the best chip, but it has been running steadily at 5Ghz core with a 4.5Ghz cache. Still gets into the low 80s sometimes.

Plan to BIOS hack a 9700k into it sometime this year, just to see if I can. If it fails, probably just go buy a 5600X or wait it out for DDR5 if I can get the 7700k back in there.

Yeah I had similar results with mine... ran it at 5.0 and temps were upper 70's... but I used liquid metal after using that Rockit Cool delid tool to make the process idiot proof. I never had any complaints about it after that... and used it nearly 4 years. I only recently upgraded because I wanted more cores...
 
A twin tower cooler like the NH-D15 which you mentioned will be about the best there is.
There are other such units.
One potential issue is compatibility.
Your 34mm ram is not going to cause any issues in that respect.

Nor will you have a problem with height; even the tallest are 165mm.

But, some motherboards will position the cpu socket too close to the first pcie slot.
A cooler can impact a graphics card backplate.

Noctua has some extensive charts on
compatibility and suitability for their coolers.
For suitability with a i7-7700K:
https://ncc.noctua.at/cpus/model/Intel-Core-i7-7700K-288

For motherboard compatibility, enter your motherboard:
https://ncc.noctua.at/motherboards
The NH-D15s is a high compatibility version which is a touch offset from the socket, and that would be a safe choice.
 
Solution
My 7700K has had it's NH-D15 perched atop it since initial assembly four years ago, and I love it!

63C at stock 4.2 GHz all core, 74C at 4.7 GHz all core turbo under Prime95/small FFTs/no AVX...(this is in balanced power mode, MCE enabled, higher clocks entered in Intel's XTU...; my own sample would hit 85C too quickly at 4.8 GHz, so I stayed at more moderate 4.7 GHz)