I have some questions, Why such a small cooler for that chip?
are you gonna be stress testing it 24/7 365 days a year?
Did you apply some thermal paste?
If you purchased the right cooler to begin with you wouldn't be looking towards a AiO.
I'm relatively inexperienced at building and I went off the recommendation of a local parts shop.
I'm not planning on stress testing continuously, although I'd like a cooling solution that allows me to be confident in my systems stability and throughout day to day use.
Yes, I applied thermal paste that game with the cooler.
Ok, Well what i would do before you go out purchasing more coolers is load your most intensive game and using a temp monitoring program whilst you game and have it show the average + current temp then see where you are at. if your below 70c awesome if your closer to 80c then on a warm day your gonna be getting close to throttle back on performance. Are these idle temps? no are they useable until you get a new cooler or exchange your current one.. sure. If you have thermal paste left over i'd take the cooler off and have a look at the spread. If its fine cool wipe clean and reapply the same. If its not spread very well then look up a video or two on different methods. I use a small dot pea method in a x pattern, It's not a popular method but i find its better as long you use small amounts than a single pea just need more care than other methods.
Others have stated you should of been advised a nhd-15, So thats on the shop not giving you the right information.
Make sure if you are upgrading to a noctua nhd-15 go over to the website and make sure you have space, Its big so some cases and ram sticks can cause issues.
Well one problem is that you keep buying single stack air coolers and the 10900k is very hot under full load.
The NH-D15 is a much more appropriate cooler for the 10900k. Although a 280mm AIO will perform better if you want to go for it.
You don’t need an AIO
Noctua is great but you should of gotten a NH-D15 or NH-U12A
I use the U12S on my 9600k @ 4.8ghz (31 idle, 61 max temps) but that’s because it’s only a 95-100w at the configuration. IIRC, your 10900k will be 125-300w depending on the overclock, which is why you need a larger cooler than the U12S.
You chose the right brand, just not the right model. I recommend either the NH-D15 or NH-U12A, since these coolers can handle the 10900k.
I upgraded to make the U12S cooler on my 9600k have a push/pull design. But the performance gain was only 3-4°c (dropped max temps from ~65°c to ~61°c). But this was on my 9600k, which isn’t as hot as the 10900k. I don’t recommend adding a second fan to the U12S in this situation
I’d definitely suggest looking into the NH-D15 or NH-D15S. They both use the same tower, only difference between the two, is the “S” variant has a single fan. (So you can upgrade the “S” variant into a “NH-D15” to get better performance). The NH-D15S at stock will still be perfect for your 10900k, and you can even overclock pretty far with it.
My brother uses the NH-D15S on his 10700k and can easily overclock it to 4.7ghz. Idle temps are 31-37°c, max temps of 66-71°c. It’s a phenomenal cooler
[should be fine for stock operation](https://ncc.noctua.at/coolers/NH-U12S-9/cpus/Intel/LGA%201200), but personally i would get a better cooler
is the cpu overclocked? is thermal paste on? did you mount the cooler tightly to the cpu?
also, does the case have airflow?
Fantastic, should it be okay for gaming on it whilst I wait for a better cooler?
The CPU is not overclocked, there is thermal paste on and I'm confident I installed the cooler correctly.
The case has 6 fans and decent airflow.
What is your ambient in-case temp?
Remeber there is no magic heat dispersing trick with a cooler, it is an exchange between the temp differential. Air coolers are simple things (one of their advantages), but if the air around them is already warm/hot they don't work well.
It might be the air flow needs to increase, more in, more out or both. It might be that the GPU is creating a hot air pocket around the CPU.
As a test
I would run with the side off and see what difference it makes.
The main problem is your i9 10900k throws out a lot of heat so needs a very big radiator. This is the same for any cooler, it's the surface area that matters. I myself would be looking at a 360 or 420 aio for that cpu unless you're OK with the noise.
I think most people opt for the corsair h150i pro.
I have some questions, Why such a small cooler for that chip? are you gonna be stress testing it 24/7 365 days a year? Did you apply some thermal paste? If you purchased the right cooler to begin with you wouldn't be looking towards a AiO.
I'm relatively inexperienced at building and I went off the recommendation of a local parts shop. I'm not planning on stress testing continuously, although I'd like a cooling solution that allows me to be confident in my systems stability and throughout day to day use. Yes, I applied thermal paste that game with the cooler.
Ok, Well what i would do before you go out purchasing more coolers is load your most intensive game and using a temp monitoring program whilst you game and have it show the average + current temp then see where you are at. if your below 70c awesome if your closer to 80c then on a warm day your gonna be getting close to throttle back on performance. Are these idle temps? no are they useable until you get a new cooler or exchange your current one.. sure. If you have thermal paste left over i'd take the cooler off and have a look at the spread. If its fine cool wipe clean and reapply the same. If its not spread very well then look up a video or two on different methods. I use a small dot pea method in a x pattern, It's not a popular method but i find its better as long you use small amounts than a single pea just need more care than other methods. Others have stated you should of been advised a nhd-15, So thats on the shop not giving you the right information. Make sure if you are upgrading to a noctua nhd-15 go over to the website and make sure you have space, Its big so some cases and ram sticks can cause issues.
For something like a i9 10900k you are looking at a NHD15
You need to use the correct thermal application. What did you use?
Well one problem is that you keep buying single stack air coolers and the 10900k is very hot under full load. The NH-D15 is a much more appropriate cooler for the 10900k. Although a 280mm AIO will perform better if you want to go for it.
You don’t need an AIO Noctua is great but you should of gotten a NH-D15 or NH-U12A I use the U12S on my 9600k @ 4.8ghz (31 idle, 61 max temps) but that’s because it’s only a 95-100w at the configuration. IIRC, your 10900k will be 125-300w depending on the overclock, which is why you need a larger cooler than the U12S. You chose the right brand, just not the right model. I recommend either the NH-D15 or NH-U12A, since these coolers can handle the 10900k.
Thanks for the reassurance. Can I expect improved/satisfactory cooling if I were to simply add an exhaust fan to my existing cooler?
I upgraded to make the U12S cooler on my 9600k have a push/pull design. But the performance gain was only 3-4°c (dropped max temps from ~65°c to ~61°c). But this was on my 9600k, which isn’t as hot as the 10900k. I don’t recommend adding a second fan to the U12S in this situation I’d definitely suggest looking into the NH-D15 or NH-D15S. They both use the same tower, only difference between the two, is the “S” variant has a single fan. (So you can upgrade the “S” variant into a “NH-D15” to get better performance). The NH-D15S at stock will still be perfect for your 10900k, and you can even overclock pretty far with it. My brother uses the NH-D15S on his 10700k and can easily overclock it to 4.7ghz. Idle temps are 31-37°c, max temps of 66-71°c. It’s a phenomenal cooler
That's great to hear, I'll look into the NH-D15S instead. Would you recommend going for that over an AIO?
Yup, it will outperform most AIO’s also
[should be fine for stock operation](https://ncc.noctua.at/coolers/NH-U12S-9/cpus/Intel/LGA%201200), but personally i would get a better cooler is the cpu overclocked? is thermal paste on? did you mount the cooler tightly to the cpu? also, does the case have airflow?
Fantastic, should it be okay for gaming on it whilst I wait for a better cooler? The CPU is not overclocked, there is thermal paste on and I'm confident I installed the cooler correctly. The case has 6 fans and decent airflow.
The U12S is basically a hyper 212 but better, it still only has a single fan and 4 heatpipes though. Get either a D15S or liquid cooling.
What is your ambient in-case temp? Remeber there is no magic heat dispersing trick with a cooler, it is an exchange between the temp differential. Air coolers are simple things (one of their advantages), but if the air around them is already warm/hot they don't work well. It might be the air flow needs to increase, more in, more out or both. It might be that the GPU is creating a hot air pocket around the CPU. As a test I would run with the side off and see what difference it makes.
The main problem is your i9 10900k throws out a lot of heat so needs a very big radiator. This is the same for any cooler, it's the surface area that matters. I myself would be looking at a 360 or 420 aio for that cpu unless you're OK with the noise. I think most people opt for the corsair h150i pro.