CPU Suddenly Idling Hotter

[AdmiralThrawn]

To give some context, I have noticed that in the past month my CPU (9900K) is now idling at 41c on average instead of 27c (Previous average temp). I have not made any changes besides upgrading my GPU in august, and repasting with Kryonaut Paste.

Could this be related to the paste quality? The thermal contact? My pump settings getting changed? ETC. I am currently out of ideas.

System Specs are in my profile. Previous GPU was a 2080TI, I now have a MSI Gaming Trio 3080 12GB.

Regarding my cooling, I am using a water cooling system for my CPU and air for my GPU at the moment. I have 3 intake fans on the bottom of my case and 6 exhaust fans (3 on top, 3 on side)

Case is the 011D and the fans are Lian li Unifans

I live in north dakota so summer temps are 70-100 degrees and this time of year it is about 30-45 degrees every day outside. I have not changed the ambient temp of the room either.

I would greatly appreciate any help or guidance with this problem.

P.S. My peak temps are still the same, never hotter than 67c under load. GPU runs at about 53 under load.

 

[AusWolf]

How long have you had the CPU cooler? Have the fans on it got louder during peak load? Do you hear any pump noise?

Also, when do you see 41 °C idle temp? Is it after a cold start, or is it after a gaming / work session?

 

[AdmiralThrawn]

How long have you had the CPU cooler? Have the fans on it got louder during peak load? Do you hear any pump noise?

Also, when do you see 41 °C idle temp? Is it after a cold start, or is it after a gaming / work session?

1. I have had my block and liquid cooling setup for 1 year
2. The fans are the same as far as loudness.
3. I do not hear pump noise, but the pump is working fine.
4. the 41c is after cold start
5. I used to see 27c after a cold start in the winter.

 

[dgianstefani]

Doesn't matter, peak temps are what matters, and they haven't changed.

 

[doyll]

How old is your system?
Where is your radiator mounted? How much of radiator is above top of CPU / waterblock?
I ask because it's possible a little air might be collecting in pump thus lowering coolant flowrate and causing temps to be higher. It's also possible new GPU has different airflow than old one thus changing case / radiator airflow / air temp thus changing temps.

 

[AdmiralThrawn]

Doesn't matter, peak temps are what matters, and they haven't changed.

I would Strongly disagree with that. Lower temps are always better for your system, and temp rising like this indicate something out of the norm.

How old is your system?
Where is your radiator mounted? How much of radiator is above top of CPU / waterblock?
I ask because it's possible a little air might be collecting in pump thus lowering coolant flowrate and causing temps to be higher. It's also possible new GPU has different airflow than old one thus changing case / radiator airflow / air temp thus changing temps.

1. My entire pump, rad, tubing, resevoir is above the block. I have not really noticed a flowrate issue but i will look into this. Do you think it could have something to do with the kryonaut paste?

 

[dgianstefani]

I would Strongly disagree with that. Lower temps are always better for your system, and temp rising like this indicate something out of the norm.

Temps rising to a whole 41 °C...
It's probably nothing more than your thermal paste curing.
Lower temp ranges (being above certain temperatures is also a factor for consideration, depending on the part) are better for certain parts of your system, and the part in question here is not sensitive to this temperature.

 

[doyll]

1. My entire pump, rad, tubing, resevoir is above the block. I have not really noticed a flowrate issue but i will look into this. Do you think it could have something to do with the kryonaut paste?

Is radiator above pump?
In 011D motherboard is vertical, so CPU socket, CPU, waterblock & pump are same level.
I'm trying to find out if radiator is above pump.
I assume it's either top or side.
If radiator is in side or front (not sure if your front it vented) with hoses entering it at top than all air will to top of radiator, waterblock and pump (assuming they are all about same level).
If radiator is in side with hose entering bottom air usually collects in top radiator end cap but can also collect in pump and waterblock. This is okay but not as good as top mounted radiator.
if radiator is in top of case all air will rise to top of radiator end caps.
Hopefully that helps you understand why it's best to place radiator in top.

 

[cvaldes]

You should strongly consider software as a possible culprit. It could be something as stupid as a newer version of a web browser that is causing higher idle usage. Regressions do occur in software, whether it be in the operating system, a device driver, an end-user application, whatever.

It'll be up to you to diagnose your system more thoroughly. For Windows systems Task Manager is a good place to start. For Macs, Activity Manager would be a good place to start although some people might just open Terminal and use the 'top' command.

At one point I noticed the RTX 3050 in my daily driver desktop Windows PC was idling around 30W even with everything closed (including web browsers). So I used DDU to uninstall the NVIDIA video driver and reinstalled from scratch. That dropped GPU idle power to 9W.

While that example is for that GPU, the same sort of software snafu could easily happen elsewhere in the system.

Hell, recently there was some guy asking about a PSU cable adapter possibly for a future build. Many comments later in his thread he blurts out that his CPU was idling around 20% (which he clearly didn't recognize as abnormal) and "everything felt laggy." After some prodding, he actually cleaned up a ton of bloatware and got his CPU idle usage to a normal 1-2%.

So yeah, your suddenly higher idling temperatures could be caused by a new load on the CPU that didn't exist before, caused by some poorly written piece of software.

 

[maxfly]

^^^ that's a good point and would be where I would start digging.

Paste change and GPU being the two new known changes. Neither should increase the idle temp alone. Logic says you should see both idle and load temps increase if they were a factor.
I'm assuming your old GPU was part of the loop prior to these changes? If so, again it shouldn't effect only the idle but both idle and load. But removing the GPU should drop temps not increase them. Has to either be a process/processes at idle or maybe a weird ass mount issue. ??? Very strange problem.

 

[cvaldes]

If it were a cooling block mounting issue, that would be reflected in higher peak temperatures which the OP stated was not the case in the last sentence of his inquiry.

Increased ambient temperature would also be reflected by higher peak temperatures as well.

There is something that is causing idle temperatures to be significantly higher. I mentioned someone else's recent situation where a bunch of bloatware was chewing up system performance.

That is the most likely cause of higher idle temperatures.

 

[AdmiralThrawn]

You should strongly consider software as a possible culprit. It could be something as stupid as a newer version of a web browser that is causing higher idle usage. Regressions do occur in software, whether it be in the operating system, a device driver, an end-user application, whatever.

It'll be up to you to diagnose your system more thoroughly. For Windows systems Task Manager is a good place to start. For Macs, Activity Manager would be a good place to start although some people might just open Terminal and use the 'top' command.

At one point I noticed the RTX 3050 in my daily driver desktop Windows PC was idling around 30W even with everything closed (including web browsers). So I used DDU to uninstall the NVIDIA video driver and reinstalled from scratch. That dropped GPU idle power to 9W.

While that example is for that GPU, the same sort of software snafu could easily happen elsewhere in the system.

Hell, recently there was some guy asking about a PSU cable adapter possibly for a future build. Many comments later in his thread he blurts out that his CPU was idling around 20% (which he clearly didn't recognize as abnormal) and "everything felt laggy." After some prodding, he actually cleaned up a ton of bloatware and got his CPU idle usage to a normal 1-2%.

So yeah, your suddenly higher idling temperatures could be caused by a new load on the CPU that didn't exist before, caused by some poorly written piece of software.

Now that you mention it this all started around the time I switched to opera with discord running off the browser, could that affect the system idle? I also have had a similar issue with the gpu. I will sort through my programs and see if this works. Thank you.

Is radiator above pump?
In 011D motherboard is vertical, so CPU socket, CPU, waterblock & pump are same level.
I'm trying to find out if radiator is above pump.
I assume it's either top or side.
If radiator is in side or front (not sure if your front it vented) with hoses entering it at top than all air will to top of radiator, waterblock and pump (assuming they are all about same level).
If radiator is in side with hose entering bottom air usually collects in top radiator end cap but can also collect in pump and waterblock. This is okay but not as good as top mounted radiator.
if radiator is in top of case all air will rise to top of radiator end caps.
Hopefully that helps you understand why it's best to place radiator in top.

Radiator is on top.

^^^ that's a good point and would be where I would start digging.

Paste change and GPU being the two new known changes. Neither should increase the idle temp alone. Logic says you should see both idle and load temps increase if they were a factor.
I'm assuming your old GPU was part of the loop prior to these changes? If so, again it shouldn't effect only the idle but both idle and load. But removing the GPU should drop temps not increase them. Has to either be a process/processes at idle or maybe a weird ass mount issue. ??? Very strange problem.

This is definitely a weird problem, I am guessing it has to be software at this point because my loop is rock solid and my paste is the same, I think a bad driver is the culprit because my gpu is idling the same temp as before and so is my ssd and ram. I will sort through software and post an update.