motasimWhy don't they cool the chipset anymore? Doesn't the Z170 need any cooling? EK used to cool the Z97 chipset in the previous iteration of this water block intended for the Asus MAXIMUS VII Impact.

motasimAs you can see here :



and here :





They have managed to do so, under the sound card in the past, but now it seems that they don't feel that there is a need to cool the chipset.

AssimilatorUnrelated: Intel manufactures its chipsets on what it considers "old" process technology.... Z170 is 22nm, which is better than AMD's CPUs. I find this both amusing and saddening.

AssimilatorIf you look at Z170 vs Z97 you will see the former has TDP rated at 6W while the latter has a TDP of only 4.1W. So theoretically, there's more of a need to cool Z170 than Z97.

I say theoretically because Intel chipsets haven't needed anything but passive cooling (and maybe not even that) since the memory controller and integrated graphics were moved onto the CPU. My work PC is a Dell Haswell with no chipset heatsink whatsoever:



The only time you'll need a large heatsink, or maybe active cooling, is when you've got a board with numerous extra controllers located near the chipset (e.g. Asrock Z77 Extreme 11). In all other cases, it's just bling, and EK has finally figured out that they can cut costs by not bothering to cool something that doesn't need cooling.

Unrelated: Intel manufactures its chipsets on what it considers "old" process technology.... Z170 is 22nm, which is better than AMD's CPUs. I find this both amusing and saddening.

TheGuruStudThey must lose a lot of money making these things.

AssimilatorIf you look at Z170 vs Z97 you will see the former has TDP rated at 6W while the latter has a TDP of only 4.1W. So theoretically, there's more of a need to cool Z170 than Z97.

I say theoretically because Intel chipsets haven't needed anything but passive cooling (and maybe not even that) since the memory controller and integrated graphics were moved onto the CPU.