Tigrou

With 9700K (95W TDP) I often get 30-36C in idle. And gaming would rarely exceed 65C. With 5700X (65W TDP) I more in the 40-45C in idle. In gaming im more 65-75C even with all fans at 100%

Is it possible that some air coolers are underperforming on Zen 3 / 4 because of chiplets configuration ? Will AIOs (that does not use heat pipes) suffer from the same thing ? Correct. I will edit.

I have a Macho with a 5700X and the performance is disappointing, while it was working great on a 9700K. It's easy to find posts with similar experience on reddit or amazon. One theory is that Zen 3/4 chiplets concentrate all the heat in one place. This is especially true when a CCD is disabled on 8-core chips (e.g. 5800X and 7800X). Here is an image I made that compare them: On the left, the Grand Macho RT. This is a 14 7 heatpipes cooler that compete with Noctua NH-D15 and Dark Rock Pro 4. On the right, the CCDs under the IHS for Alder Lake and Zen 4. I have tried to set them with the right orientation. On Zen 4, all heat is concentrated in the red square. One obvious thing is that heat is centered on Alder Lake and that might help. The red rectangle is the P-Cores / E-Cores : I don't know what to think about it. In the end, the IHS has to distribute the heat (that's its job) but I think this heat distribution is not perfect and that if heat pipes go directly under a heat source, it helps. Also : some modern coolers (ex: Noctua NH-D15 or Deepcool AK620) are different from the Macho. The heat pipes are in the other direction (horizontally instead of vertically).

I have read that DDR5 modules incorporate on-board voltage regulators in order to reach higher speeds. So, I expected motherboards to no include VRMs for RAM, unlike previous generation (eg: DDR4 and below). Eg: 8+2 indicates 8 phases for CPU and 2 phases for RAM. This does not seems to be the case. For example : So unless it's used for something else it seems VRM are still used for RAM (eg: 2x8+2) Or maybe voltage regulators on DDR5 are optional, so motherboard manufacturer include RAM VRMs, just in case ? Furthermore, the high end motherboards seems to use 3 types of VRMs : 2x10+2+2. What is it like that ? (it's probably not DDR5 specific)

OK I got it. It's actually possible to screw it. I got fooled thinking the screw was too small and not able to reach the internal thread on the other side but it's not the case. I just needed to try a little bit more. I watched this video to found out this guy also has nylon tubes. The interesting part start at 5:00 You can notify that he won't fully screw it (there is still a large gap at the end). It's probably better that way. I cannot imagine the amount of force/pressure that must be on the CPU and motherboard if you fully screw it. I think it might end in a catastrophic failure (and I don't wanna try). I remember the HR 02 Macho Rev A had a considerably smaller gap and could be fully screwed

thanks, I will take into consideration your suggestions. Here is a picture of the nylon tubes. Next to it is back plate support. You can clearly see it's wide enough to fully go inside of it : I'm wondering why thermaltake changed those spacers from metal to nylon ? to save a few bucks ? Even with metal spacers, I think it's a poor design because (unless I miss something) the anchoring mount will be "floating around" (move up and down) until the heat sink is finally installed (the 2 final screws are in place). On Thermalright product page you can clearly see the nylon tubes. However, in the manual (from the same page) they talk about "screw pillars". Here is the installation guide I received : There is a AM5 sticker on the box. I guess it means "compatible with AM4 and AM5" not "compatible with AM5 only". The irony is that I ordered a Grand Macho RT with that AM4 platform, then (while waiting for delivery) realized it might not be 100% compatible (because of convex contact with IHS) and thus ordered the ARO to make sure it will perfectly fit. I still have the Grand Macho RT box, not opened and waiting to be returned. Also: I can't believe I'm the only person who bought that ARO cooler and had problems with it. Either I'm doing something wrong, or unit is defective, or it's not compatible with the motherboard. This is not a design issue.

Here is what I got (as specified in the instruction guide and as found in the box) : am4 Nylon Tube x 5 6#32L17 screws x 5 M3L7.5 screws x 3 anchoring mount x 1 (and other obvious stuff like fan, fan clips, anti-vibration pads, ...) The instructions guide I got is slightly different than the one on Thermalright page. I will post it here later. I think you are on the right track. From that review : It looks like the metal spacers are elevated and higher than the motherboard. The nylon tubes I have are wide enough to completelyeat the smaller metal tubes of the back plate. Because of that, they touch the motherboard.

I cannot reach the other side to "at least" start screwing it up. That's not possible. The screws are way too short. After going through the hole in the cooler plate, there is about 4mm left. Not enough to reach the other side.

Except I will never be able to screw it. You are supposed to use 2x M3L7 screws which are way too short for that job. I have mounted another HR-02 Macho Rev A on Intel platform and plates were quite close each other before screwing them together.

I am installing a Thermalright ARO on a AM4 platform. According to manual, the 2 plastic brackets on the motherboard (installed by default) should removed. Then, 4 nylon tubes (that comes with cooler) should be installed. I also put the anchoring mount on the top of it : Anyway, there a 5 millimeter gap on each side that prevent me to start screwing the 2 x M3L7 screws. The CPU is making good contact with cooler, it cannot go lower than that. The height on each side is 8 mm : This seems to be correct and about the same as in this review (see the picture with a ruler) : https://tiny-reviews.com/reviews/2130-overview-on-thermalright-aro-m14g-processor-cooler There must be something wrong but I cannot figure what.

Because the socket has move to LGA and is now thinner ?

I have notified that new Zen4 CPU have some holes/vents around the IHS. This can be seen on those pictures (source : videocardz and reddit) : IHS and CPU board are usually completely sealed (eg: Intel LGA 1700, Zen 3, ...) Other than being purely aesthetic, is there any engineering reason for that ? (eg: thermals)

It is impressive how the number of cores in CPU has increased in recent years (thanks to AMD). Six years ago (2017), Intel's highest-end processor (Core I7) was the 7700K which is 4C/8T. It has been like that for years. Today, 4C/8T is the entry level (Core I3) and highest-end (13900K) has 24 Cores.

I have been wondering if it's possible for a CPU to die because of poor and non uniform contact between cooler and IHS (eg: due to dry thermal paste not being replaced over the time) I know modern CPUs automatically throttle when reaching temperature limits, but what happen if only some specific areas are too hot and not being cooled down properly ? Has CPU enough thermal sensors to detect only some parts being too hot ?

Agree. I had that CPU from 2012 until 2019 and was able to run AAA games without worry. I only had to update GPU 2 times (as expected). Also to be expected is Intel to release their L4 eDRAM cache. It might be just as good as AMD 3d cache.