AMD APU Buyers Beware!

[Gollum]

If you plan on buying a new CPU from the APU series of AMD. You will definitely need an extra cooler as the stock cooler is not capable enough of cooling down the system. I learned this the hard way when I discovered the size of the stock cooler that came with the processor.
Build quality of the cooler is also bad.
See photos below

Comparison between the thickness of the cooler with most common notebook portable Hard drives.
*imageshack.us/a/img822/4600/comparisongm.jpg

Thickness less than 2cm. This is not a graphics card that we need to cool. Heck we have bigger graphics card coolers these days.
*img855.imageshack.us/img855/1771/img20130525110404.jpg

Flimsy clamp
*imageshack.us/a/img577/1562/img20130525105447.jpg

overall bad quality
*imageshack.us/a/img6/5752/img20130525105551.jpg

There is no doubt about the performance of the APU. Its as good as it gets but you need to get an after market cooler to keep it cool.
FM2 socket is the same size as FM1 or AM3, so a major number of after market coolers will be compatible and will provide better cooling.

 

[bikramjitkar]

I bought an Intel Xeon processor a few days back that's equivalent to an i7, and the stock cooler for that is about the same thickness as this!

 

[avinandan012]

what temps are you getting on default clocks?

official specification says it has 65 watt TDP , max temp is 70 C.

So the cooler should be sufficient for 65watts

 

[harshilsharma63]

@OP; post the temperatures you get with the stock HS.

 

[Gollum]

With stock CPU cooler, I was getting 60 degrees Celsius and above at idle and in BIOS
I also reapplied the thermal compound as I thought that it might be an Issue with that or contact issue. No difference.

 

[harshilsharma63]

With stock CPU cooler, I was getting 60 degrees Celsius and above at idle and in BIOS
I also reapplied the thermal compound as I thought that it might be an Issue with that or contact issue. No difference.

Buddy, BIOS is not a reliable source for temperature. Check with some Windows based temp monitoring utility.

 

[Gollum]

Buddy, BIOS is not a reliable source for temperature. Check with some Windows based temp monitoring utility.

Are you kidding about the BIOS?
tried many software too
H/w monitor by cpuid
everest
MSI custom tool for overclocking

And only after I installed cooler master Hyper tx3 on this PC the temperatures dropped 20 degrees!!!
now it runs at 38-40 degrees and at max load 50degrees.

 

[harshilsharma63]

Are you kidding about the BIOS?
tried many software too
H/w monitor by cpuid
everest
MSI custom tool for overclocking

And only after I installed cooler master Hyper tx3 on this PC the temperatures dropped 20 degrees!!!
now it runs at 38-40 degrees and at max load 50degrees.

No I'm not kidding.

 

[TheLetterD]

But if I get an aftermarket cooler wont there be space problems? I have the vengeance ram which has a large heatsink :/

 

[harshilsharma63]

But if I get an aftermarket cooler wont there be space problems? I have the vengeance ram which has a large heatsink :/

There could be, there could be not. It depends on the motherboard.

 

[The Sorcerer]

With the awesome heat and humidity that we get during typical Indian summer, do you think any stock heatsink will play its part? Heck, there are few low cost coolers that don't play it part. I am not sure which part of this post indicated a problem. No1 gives good stock CPU coolers... well.. maybe the old socket 939 days and maybe the coolers that came with 980X processors from Intel, but most people ended up upgrading the CPU coolers. Some server processors sold in retail don't even come with stock heatsinks.

What's the point in having 'strong' clip when the weight of the heatsink is not heavy, and that the retention bracket is attached on the motherboard with a metal backplate (well, atleast the tier 1 brands do that anyways). Intel doesn't even have that, they still use push pins and you can't change fans on it (well, not that I am saying the changing fans on AMD socket cooler would make any sense). They rely on those plastic pins!!!!

I am not saying that Intel sucks, too! . Merely pointing out that these are stocks and stock sucks.

Its not cheating, nor its fraud. Back then, companies found it feasible to give coolers with copper heatpipes and copper base, now they don't. Giving a VFM processor for its price made more sense, especially considering that people are eventually going to replace it with an aftermarket cooler at some point.


FYI, you don't need bigger coolers on GPU, but you do need fans with better bearing and a design which draws heat away from the core as fast as possible, unless you want cards to end up like triple slot Asus GTX 680.

 

[Theodre]

Was planning to buy and setup a PC with AMD APU in the coming months! I think i should be more careful with the cooling system thing. Thanks for the info friend

 

[Gollum]

talking about ambient temperatures. the hardware sould be around 10degrees up and not more than that
at idle.