Does Anyone Use The Stock Fan?

[TheDutyPaid]

Reading through the post on CPU fans where people are looking for aftermarket coolers or looking at temperatures for others. I wonder if anyone uses the stock in the box CPU heat sink and fan?

I am in the middle of a new build my first in 5 years since I made my Q6600 system. On which I used the fan that came with the Intel chip. (stock fan)

It has had mild over clocking for 5 years and temps are about 32 on idle and 60 on full load.

My view is Intel or AMD would not go to the trouble in making a top of the range product just to get people to use a sub rate fan?

Can any one point me to proper scientific tests of a round up of fans?

[Tonka777]

I think people mainly swap to aftermarket fans and heatsinks to reduce noise levels.

[Jonj1611]

I will change the fan if I am overclocking, if not I generally won't bother unless something looks off with the temps which hasn't happened for me yet.

[Bonebreaker777]

Half of my builds runs with stock cooling.
It's enough if you add a few case FANs and the stock cooler can deal with anything from undervoltage to mild overclock while remain relatively quiet.
Could you specify "proper scientific"? - you don't mean the usage of equations, thermodynamic laws and explanations, right? Cause you will find very few and most of them will be older than you should care.

[TheDutyPaid]

Could you specify "proper scientific"

The results I have found they do not measure the ambient temperature and sometime not even the same fan type on the same chip, like stock on a I7 and aftermarket on a I3

I saw a video where they was testing 120mm case fans, they used a purpose made test machine which was huge.

Maybe I like to ask why to much and want all the facts, they say a big rad water cooler is better then sock. Then so me the facts. :-)

[Kovoet]

Nope I don't. I have replaced my h100i cpu case fans with corsair sp's. Work a treat and they are quiet

[Jonj1611]

Misread post.

[Bonebreaker777]

The results I have found they do not measure the ambient temperature and sometime not even the same fan type on the same chip, like stock on a I7 and aftermarket on a I3

I saw a video where they was testing 120mm case fans, they used a purpose made test machine which was huge.

Maybe I like to ask why to much and want all the facts, they say a big rad water cooler is better then sock. Then so me the facts. :-)

Following your stated criteria I would say Hardware Secrets are pretty "scientific" in they cooling reviews.

Just a extract from they numerous reviews: SilverStone AR02 CPU Cooler Review: How we tested.
They coolers are tested on the same configuration, where it is stated so (but it should be always the same configuration within comparison graphs).

[scaryjim]

The point with stock cooling fans is that they're designed to operate adequately at minimum cost, so they're generally noisy (high speed fan) and allow you CPU to get up to relatively high temperatures - not unsafe temps mind, but most electronics work less efficiently at higher temperatures. The cost of an aftermarket cooler is usually a small percentage of the total cost of the computer, and if it makes your computer quieter and keeps your CPU at a lower temperature it's often worth doing.

That said, there's only a few computers I've built that haven't used the stock cooling, and most of those were built back in the day when it was a lot easier and cheaper to get OEM processors that didn't include a cooler at all! The only computer I've built recently that I'm not using stock on is my HTPC, and that's because the stock fan sounded like a jet trying to take off under load! Not great when you're trying to watch a DVD...

[TheDutyPaid]

stock fan sounded like a jet trying to take off under load! Not great when you're trying to watch a DVD...

I found this very interesting, Table of Results which shows the Intel fan to be one of the lowest noise out put, even beating the Be Quiet range.

[kalniel]

I found this very interesting, Table of Results which shows the Intel fan to be one of the lowest noise out put, even beating the Be Quiet range.

And it cools as badly as the passive cooler

It's hard to define exactly stock fan performance - they vary depending on the CPU - intel have several different models, and different motherboards drive them at different speeds. We use the stock cooler on our 2500k setup and the temps aren't as bad as that test, but it is quiet.

[AETAaAS]

Agreed, a nice case now is the coolers AMD package with their different processors. The A series tend to get a cooler which is similar to this;


While the FX series gets this ones like this. (This is the distinction AFAIK, it may be down the TDP lines but I haven't confirmed this)


The FX cooler ahead of its A series counterpart such that some people buy them second hand to upgrade their original coolers at a low cost.

And to answer the original question, I have almost never used a stock fan. They are built down to a price, compared to heatsink/fan manufacturers who are more free to do as they please. I primarily upgrade to make my PC quieter but the added headroom is a nice bonus.

[deejayburnout]

Only used the stock fan on one build and I never liked the idea of it blowing heat into the case.

At least the aftermarket ones i have seen mostly go with the natural flow of the air through a case

[evisceratrix666]

im using stock cooler with my fx-6200 O.C 4.5ghz and been running nice and well since last year

[Bonebreaker777]

The one on the picture above with the heatpipes?

[scaryjim]

... This is the distinction AFAIK, it may be down the TDP lines but I haven't confirmed this ...

AFAIK it's down to TDP - AMD actually have 3 coolers: a slim profile cooler (about 43mm tall) which is rated to 65W and a taller version of the same cooler which is rated to 100W and look like the top one, and the heatpipe cooler which I think is rated to 140W. I believe the 95W TDP FX CPUs come with the non-heatpipe cooler (although I'll be happy to be corrected).

I found this very interesting, Table of Results which shows the Intel fan to be one of the lowest noise out put, even beating the Be Quiet range.

This was the stock 100W TDP AMD cooler - youcan see the difference between the 65W and 100W coolers, and the Zalman I swapped the stock fan out for, in my review thread: http://forums.hexus.net/reader-revie...le-review.html