First time building a PC, did I apply paste right?

[stratuh]

Hi there. I decided this Boxing Day to build my first PC. I've always used laptops but wanted to try my hand at building a desktop. I bought most of the build brand new but a friend gave me an older case and PSU from 2013. Here's my specs:

Ryzen 5 2600
Noctua NH-L9x65 heatsink
Gigabyte X470 Aorus Ultimate Gaming
2x8gb Corsair DDR4-3000
Gigabyte RTX 2070
Seasonic X850 PSU
Silverstone FT02 case
Samsung 970 EVO 250gb NVME drive

Using the supplied Noctua thermal paste, I'm getting a 36c idle temperature and using Aida64 for 10 minutes gives me 53c temperature under load. I'm happy with the load temperature but the idle temperature seems high with an ambient temperature of 23c or so. The friend who gave me the case and PSU had it with an i5-3570k system, and he was getting a 25c idle, 40c load temperature although I don't know what cooler he had.

 

I originally did the "uncooked rice" method for thermal paste application and I was getting 44c idle, 58c load, and using the stock AMD cooler (with whatever paste is preapplied) I was getting 40c idle, 68c load. My most recent temps of 36c idle, 53c load is using the "frozen pea" method. I've attached a photo of my newest application (since I've redone it a dozen or so times thinking I did it wrong).

 

Am I doing something wrong? I have XMP enabled overclocking my RAM to 3000mhz but I turned off whatever adaptive overclock for CPU Gigabyte has. I'm stuck at the 3400mhz ceiling for CPU. It just seems very hot and I don't know why.

 

[Godlygamer23]

You're good.

[PopsicleHustler]

[Swarlos]

Those are good temperatures.  Idle temperature doesn't mean much of anything as long as your load temperatures are good and low, and 53c under load is quite low.  If you want to bring idle temperature down you can set the fan curve on your CPU to run faster at lower temperatures.  I think your CPU fan is just running really slow at idle because it doesn't need to go any higher.

[stratuh]

12 minutes ago, gorgonzola5000 said:

These are good temps, don't freak out:D

 

I know really anything below 90 is still fine, maybe I'm just trying to "minmax" things. I just wanted to make sure I didn't make a mistake.

[stratuh]

Judging by the comments, I guess I'm good. Thanks guys!

 

Just for curiosity sake and maybe someone reads this in the future, I did some tests with different applications and heatsink orientations:

 

• AMD Cooler with AMD paste
  • 40c idle, 68c load
• NH-L9x65 with Noctua paste
  • heat fins perpendicular to air flow
    • "uncooked rice" application
      • 46c idle, 59c load
    • "frozen pea" application
      • 37c idle, 53c load
  • heat fins parallel to air flow
    • "uncooked rice" application
      • 44c idle, 58c load
    • "frozen pea" application
      • 36c idle, 53c load

 

All using Aida64 stress test after 10 minutes or so.

[boey]

10 minutes ago, stratuh said:

Judging by the comments, I guess I'm good. Thanks guys!

 

Just for curiosity sake and maybe someone reads this in the future, I did some tests with different applications and heatsink orientations:

 

• AMD Cooler with AMD paste
  • 40c idle, 68c load
• NH-L9x65 with Noctua paste
  • heat fins perpendicular to air flow
  • "uncooked rice" application
  • 46c idle, 59c load
• NH-L9x65 with Noctua paste
  • heat fins parallel to air flow
  • "uncooked rice" application
  • 44c idle, 58c load
• NH-L9x65 with Noctua paste
  • heat fins perpendicular to air flow
  • "frozen pea" application
  • 37c idle, 53c load
• NH-L9x65 with Noctua paste
  • heat fins parallel to air flow
  • "frozen pea" application
  • 36c idle, 53c load

 

All using Aida64 stress test after 10 minutes or so.

Think the uncooked rice method applies more to Intel CPUs since they are smaller.

[stratuh]

19 minutes ago, Swarlos said:

Those are good temperatures.  Idle temperature doesn't mean much of anything as long as your load temperatures are good and low, and 53c under load is quite low.  If you want to bring idle temperature down you can set the fan curve on your CPU to run faster at lower temperatures.  I think your CPU fan is just running really slow at idle because it doesn't need to go any higher.

Thanks for this! In BIOS, I can adjust fan speeds (the only ones are exhaust and CPU fan, intake are powered by molex) and I've adjusted them to get a better temp range of 34c idle to 51c load.

 

Old:

• 15% at 25c
• 25% at 35c
• 40% at 45c
• 60% at 55c
• 100% at 65c

New:

• 30% at 25c
• 40% at 35c
• 55% at 45c
• 75% at 55c
• 100% at 65c

Noctua fans are supremely quiet, so I don't really notice a difference at all.

[stratuh]

3 minutes ago, _d0nut said:

Think the uncooked rice method applies more to Intel CPUs since they are smaller.

Makes sense, this is what my friend told me to do and he's an Intel guy.

[Godlygamer23]

4 minutes ago, _d0nut said:

Think the uncooked rice method applies more to Intel CPUs since they are smaller.

The method doesn't really matter most of the time because the thermal paste will spread out pretty evenly once mounting pressure is applied.