H150i CPU Cooler not working?

Sys. Specs. defined but here is a quick snapshot: i9-9900k, Gigabyte GeForce RTX2080 Aorus, MOBO Gibabyte Z390 Aorus Pro WiFi, 32GB G.Skill RAM, H150i CPU cooler FW v 1.0.4 (note-Corsair suprt. recommended not upgrading the FW above v 1.0.4)

Conditions:

Ambient T: 79F

CPU Pkg. Idle T: 37C, utilization 1% to 2%

H150i liquid T at idle 30.8C

My issue/concern: When I perform some task that drives the CPU utilization up to 14% to 15% I see a significant temp. rise in the CPU pkg (55C to 60C), although the H150i liquid coolent temp. remains around 31C to 32C (see attached temp data recording).

Is this the expected temp. rise for such a small CPU utilization?

Redcued data GORT1 H150i iCUE temps 21oct19.pdf

What is your fan configuration and case fan set up?

Did you use the stock pre-applied thermal compound? Is your cooler mounted properly? If you can wiggle the cooler, it's probably too loose.

By the numbers in your read-out, are you running fans in a push-pull configuration on your radiator? 5600+ RPM is far higher than the mag-lev fans included with the kit are capable of.

The case is a Phanteks Enthoo Full Tower:

2ea 140mm PWM Inlet Fans in the front

1ea 140mm PWM Inlet Fan in the bottom

1ea 140mm PWM Exhaust fan in the rear

3ea RTX2080 fans

3ea Corsair fans / radiotr exhaust out the top

The case is a Phanteks Enthoo Full Tower:

2ea 140mm PWM Inlet Fans in the front

1ea 140mm PWM Inlet Fan in the bottom

1ea 140mm PWM Exhaust fan in the rear

3ea RTX2080 fans

3ea Corsair fans / radiator exhaust out the top

I used the stock pre-applied thermal compound

The CPU cooler seems to be firmly mounted to the back plate / CPU

Fans are stock that came with the Corsair Radiator. Exhaust air out the top, fans push air inside the case through the radiator. I realize that it is better to draw cool air through the radiator but given my case/fans/setup that was the best solution to have the air drawn out of the case through the radiator. Given that the cooler liquid is staying around 30.9C or so this configuration seems to appropriate.

While related, CPU temp and coolant temperature are measurements of two different things. CPU temp is obvious and directly related to voltage, less the amount of heat physically conducted through the cold plate. CPU temp changes are instantaneous, up or down and swing with voltage and load.

Coolant temperature is the measure of how much heat is in the coolant system. This is the secondary level of cooling and perhaps better visualized as the heat overflow or holding chamber. Heat is immediately conducted off the cpu in phase 1. In phase 2 (the cooler), the heat is waiting to be expelled. If you continue to add more heat than you expel, the coolant temp will rise and transmit some of that heat back to the cpu. Coolant temp is minimum possible cpu temp with zero volts. +1C coolant temp = +1C cpu temp.

No cooler setting (fans or pump) affects the phase 1 conductivity. They only affect the phase 2 release of heat and this is why the fan speed is based on coolant temp. It doesn’t matter if you initiate 10 simultaneous instances of Prime 95, the CPU temp 1 second later is going to be high and the coolant temp unchanged. It takes time for excess heat to build up. Most 9900K/H150i combinations will see a coolant change of +6-8, but it will take 10 min to reach that and likely hold. There is always some variation for voltage and placement.

c-attack, as you can see from the recorded data I ran this for far more than 10 min. yet I did not see the increase in liquid temp. you spoke of i.e. +6C-8C. So I am still in the same position wondering:

1 - Is there a problem with the Corsair CPU cooler?

2 - Is this normal and expected temps.?

3 - If this is not normal or expected typical temps. then what to do?

1) I have no idea what interval that is polling at, so there is no obvious element of time on this end.

2) Your Vcore is all over the place. You hit more than 1.31v in places. If you pile on the voltage, the CPU temp will be high no matter if you have a small 120mm cooler or a 3m panel. There is no clue as to your frequency, but since 1.30v is enough to run all core 5.1 GHz on a 9900K, I am going to assume you are running full auto settings. That is what a Lake processor does on full auto and this is all stage 1 cooling - voltage and BIOS settings.

3) There is nowhere near enough evidence to indicate if there is a cooler issue or not. But since you appear to be sitting on the desktop doing normal tasks, the coolant is not going to go up since it can easily dump all the heat transmitted into the system. This is drastically different than running a 100% load for 10-15 minutes, something you may not want to do until you get the BIOS settled.

O.k. so a few observations...

Your set up sounds good. Push or pull config does not matter for thermals. Either works. Exhaust direction for the radiator works just fine. Your pump is installed correctly and the pump is operating properly.

The cooler's performance doesn't seem to be the issue. It is working quite well. If the liquid temps do not increase, that means the attached fans are exchanging heat as rapidly as the cooler is capable of absorbing it from the CPU.

The CPU temps may be slightly elevated perhaps but nothing out of control. Are you running the CPU with all cores boosting the same speed? Are you overclocking your processor? If so at what settings (voltage, speed, etc)?

C-attack and Latharion's, thanks for the input. This if my 1st computer build so I am climbing the learning curve and it sounds like I need to focus on the BIOS setup and possibly make some changes there. I will research the BIOS setting for Coffee Lake and my MOBO.

Any suggestions on running down info. for Coffee Lake i9-9900k and BIOS setups or should I just google this?

Redcued data GORT1 H150i iCUE temps 21oct19.pdf

C-attack and Latharion's, thanks for the input. This if my 1st computer build so I am climbing the learning curve and it sounds like I need to focus on the BIOS setup and possibly make some changes there. I will research the BIOS setting for Coffee Lake and my MOBO.

 

Any suggestions on running down info. for Coffee Lake i9-9900k and BIOS setups or should I just google this?

No Problem. It sounds like you nailed the hardware perfectly, which is great for a first time build. The BIOS can be kind of tricky especially with the higher-end chipsets like the 9900k. Some google-fu should help you track down some good info. I just delved in to a new system recently after running over 10 years on an i7 950, so I feel your pain on the learning curve. These UEFI systems take some getting used to.

One thing i've learned is that motherboard manufacturers tend to run auto voltage settings a bit too high, so I did some research for my chip (an i7 9800x) and set the vcore and a few other voltages manually to keep the voltage, and thus heat, in check.

I don't think you have a cooler issue at all, so don't lose yourself in the data. When there is a physical cooler problem, you can watch that coolant temp go 35-40-45-50-55-60... right in front of your face like seconds ticking by. That's how you know something is wrong. On the desktop doing normal stuff, a 360mm cooler should be able to sit tight at just over ambient temp all day long, so I think you are fine.

The common misconception about water cooling is the fans need to react to each blip of the CPU throttle like an air tower. Even the air tower doesn't really work that way, but its capacity to hold heat is really low in comparison to a medium or large water system. The other missing element is time. The CPU heating to 90C for 1 second is not actually much heat. The CPU heating to 90C for 10 minutes is. All those little temp blips are just that -- momentary CPU changes, not sustained heat in the cooler.

The real underlying problem here is most 6000-9000 series Intel processors are high strung out of the box. Stuck on the 14nm, they keep squeezing a little more out each time. So no relaxed "default processor". It is racing out of the box. To make sure every CPU boots, you add voltage. When you keep doing this, you start to get steep temp curves. Whether you want to overclock or just run stock clocks, nearly all of the Z390 boards need some BIOS tweaking to tame the voltage pile on. No matter your cooler, you will hit 90C right out of the box running Prime 95 or anything like it. I can't guide you through the GA system since I don't have one, but try and find a Gigabyte specific guide for Z390. There are usually a few VRM, LLC, CPU default behavior things to set, plus the normal Auto vs Adaptive vs Fixed voltage decisions. You should still be able to run adaptive voltage, but with a lower top end than the auto scale.