AMD Ryzen 9 7950X Cooling Requirements & Thermal Throttling

[W1zzard]

High temperature seem to be an issue on the new Ryzen 7000 processors. We're pairing a Ryzen 9 7950X with a $10 stock cooler, a Noctua air-cooler and a 420 mm AIO to get a feel for what the differences are like in terms of °C, MHz and performance in both applications and games.

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[clopezi]

Looks like a good job done here, but I'm not convinced that electromigration it's a thing from the past, and
continuous high temperature over the years... doesn't seems right.

Probably not a problem for many tech enthusiasts, but if you want to buy a CPU for 5-7 years... I've doubts.

However, a fantastic article!

 

[ODOGG26]

Great writeup. Dispelled all the nonsense and misinformation that's out there about the 95°C being an issue. To me that's a testament to process advancement and good chip designing.

 

[blu3dragon]

Very interesting, good data and well written. Conspiracy theorists are not going to like it though. Thank you

 

[Frick]

So a high end air cooler locked at low RPMs can maintain ~5Ghz across 16 cores. Honestly that sounds pretty amazing from a noise perspective. I wish GPUs worked like that.

 

[lilwirebrushdude]

So a high end air cooler locked at low RPMs can maintain ~5Ghz across 16 cores. Honestly that sounds pretty amazing from a noise perspective. I wish GPUs worked like that.

Imagine what you could do noise/temperature wise with a U-12A

 

[Space Lynx]

performance aside, deep down I still want a Arctic 420mm AIO, man those temps are nice in gaming.

 

[Tom Yum]

Awesome testing, thank you. As you said, the main issue is psychological, people for years have associated 95C with badness, and many people incorrectly equate temperature with heat flow (95C temps will heat up my house/room/case, etc).

Sadly one review is unlikely to dispel that, but it is a start.

 

[Mr McC]

Thanks for this article.

 

[W1zzard]

but if you want to buy a CPU for 5-7 years... I've doubts.

Given statistics, if there's any lifetime issues, I think we will see a significant number of failures in the first two years, and there will be uproar, AMD will have to RMA these CPUs, there might even be a class-action lawsuit. AMD legal knows that, and I sure they looked into it before making big claims.. of course you never know, could even be such issues with CPUs running 65°C

This is 7 years ago: https://www.techpowerup.com/cpu-specs/?released=2015&sort=name

 

[HTC]

I liked it even before reading ... but i'm disappointed there are no efficiency numbers, which is what i most wanted to see.

 

[Tropick]

Awesome testing, thank you. As you said, the main issue is psychological, people for years have associated 95C with badness, and many people incorrectly equate temperature with heat flow (95C temps will heat up my house/room/case, etc).

Sadly one review is unlikely to dispel that, but it is a start.

One of the biggest reasons I initially had a pretty bad reaction to this is that it felt like it was invalidating years of spending sleepless nights rigging up the most ridiculous cooling mods just to shave 2 or 3c off core temps But it makes sense that comfortable silicon temps =/= comfortable human temps and if you design a part to run at a certain temperature, well there you go.

Hopefully the fact that AMD is offering the same length warranty even though these chips run relatively hot should help convince people that it's fine. It might take a few releases to get people accustomed since, as you said, people have associated high CPU temps with silicon degradation for years now, but I think as peoples CPUs continue to run normally everyone should begin to warm up (pun intended) to the concept.

 

[NoneRain]

Great post! 90+ here we go o/

 

[Blaazen]

And there are bigger coolers than U14S, liquid metals, undervolting, ...

 

[dj-electric]

Just to add to this - there's no reason whatsoever not to powertune your Ryzen CPU. It is incredibly easy and fast. Do power optimize it.

 

[bug]

7950X seems to be AMD's 12900k. Pushed out of its comfort zone, just to be able to take the imaginary crown...
Not a bad CPU, but not one I'd consider buying. I'd go for something "tamer" that will get really close to this without the cooling headaches.

Edit: Now that power draw figures have been added, that makes the similarity to 12900k even more obvious: you can shave off >100W TDP while barely affecting performance.

 

[Garrus]

I run my 12th gen with the stock cheap Intel cooler. No issues at all after setting fan curves. 10th gen barely worked with the stock cooler but 12th gen is fine. People just have got wrapped up in excessive cooling because of years of bad Intel CPUs doing massive throttling. Noctua U12S Redux or a cheap Deepcool and you have more than you need for the 7950X. Computer stores make a lot of money selling useless AIO to people. I have to fix people's computers a lot and usually the first thing I do is throw out their water cooler and put a cheap Noctua in, instead.

7950X seems to be AMD's 12900k. Pushed out of its comfort zone, just to be able to take the imaginary crown...
Not a bad CPU, but not one I'd consider buying. I'd go for something "tamer" that will get really close to this without the cooling headaches.

There is no cooling headache. Previously when you hit a high temperature the CPU would have to massively throttle in order to keep cool. I remember the first Macbook Air for example dropping from 1.6Ghz to 200Mhz. Now that is not the case with Ryzen7000. Any cheap cooler and you can keep 3Ghz on 16 cores!!! No headache at all. Set low fan curves and ignore the temperature. I think the IHS has something to do with the reported temperature not really being an issue (IHS is hot but CPU internal temps are not bad).

Also this is not like the 12900K. Ryzen gets almost all of its performance at 125W. Not similar at all. We need a 125W versus 125W and 65W versus 65W test.

 

[svan71]

The problem is their attempt to keep cooler compatability with previos gen.

7950X seems to be AMD's 12900k. Pushed out of its comfort zone, just to be able to take the imaginary crown...
Not a bad CPU, but not one I'd consider buying. I'd go for something "tamer" that will get really close to this without the cooling headaches.

 

[Hervon]

Wow! The 7950x is even more sexy now. Great job AMD at pushing the limit. Great write up W1zzard!

 

[xulos]

Awesome testing, thank you. As you said, the main issue is psychological, people for years have associated 95C with badness, and many people incorrectly equate temperature with heat flow (95C temps will heat up my house/room/case, etc).

Sadly one review is unlikely to dispel that, but it is a start.

I hope this is sarcasm…

 

[docnorth]

Oh sh#t, this reminds me of the tragic (at least initial) experience with the 3700x, with PBO enabled it made even the bequiet dark rock 4 noisy and the stock cooler work like a helicopter. Only liquid-cooling could keep temps below 80 Celsius and our nerves calm. On the positive side this CPU forced an average user like me to learn more about undervolting, although we are not allowed to tweak settings on this particular PC at the office.

Now about ryzen 7000, they seem stable from day one and that’s a huge improvement over 3700x. As a personal opinion it would be difficult for me to accept 95 C all day, but if the voltages are ok, who knows... Or until I can convince myself that 95 is the new 65 , AMD will improve the design and lower the operating temperatures.

 

[dj-electric]

As a personal opinion it would be difficult for me to accept 95 C all day

Do you people render all day? otherwise this stuff does not hit even close to 95c for any significant period

 

[Wolfkin]

I've been looking for exactly this type of test so big thanks.
Good air cooler runing at low enough fan speed to not be annoying and you only lose a few %, I can live with that easily.

 

[Wirko]

Awesome testing, thank you. As you said, the main issue is psychological, people for years have associated 95C with badness, and many people incorrectly equate temperature with heat flow (95C temps will heat up my house/room/case, etc).

Temperature is still related to heat flow. A CPU that's trying to reach 95°C in almost all circumstances, including a 1T load, will consume much more than a CPU that stays at, say, 50°C in single threaded tests.

On the other hand, yes, I agree. Reaching 95°C means reaching it in the hottest core; if there's just one hot core or two, power consumption and heat flow is going to be much lower than when all cores are that hot.

I've been looking for exactly this type of test so big thanks.
Good air cooler runing at low enough fan speed to not be annoying and you only lose a few %, I can live with that easily.

It will be hard to set up a temperature-regulated fan if the temperature tends to be near the maximum even with a 1T load (frequency dropping by 7% when Wraith is at 20% is an indication of that).

 

[Iain Saturn]

7950X seems to be AMD's 12900k. Pushed out of its comfort zone, just to be able to take the imaginary crown...

Not a bad CPU, but not one I'd consider buying. I'd go for something "tamer" that will get really close to this without the cooling headaches.

Wrong. And and this article proves it.

TechPowerup:

“Our testing in this article shows that the performance losses are minimal, even when pairing the Ryzen 9 7950X flagship with an entry-level cooler that's running at slow fan speed settings. You can simply get started with whatever AM4 heatsink you have lying around and you'll be safe and almost get maximum performance. AMD was wise to make their new Socket AM5 compatible with AM4 coolers, so you have plenty of choice, also on the used market.

The biggest problem is probably psychological. For years we have been trained that "95°C is bad". This is no longer true. 95°C is the new 65°C.”

TechPowerup is basically describing you.

And with the ability to run these at reduced watts - it’s minimal performance drop is astounding.

Temperature drops are fantastic. Nobody who owns these worries about temperature or cooling. Nobody.

Watch that video for proof. Very clear and easy to understand.