My Ryzen 9 5900X recently started reaching unusually high temperatures. It climbs to around 88–90°C while playing vanilla Minecraft and sits around 86°C during Final Fantasy XIV. The system uses a two-year-old Corsair H170i AIO, an MSI RTX 3080, and Noctua NT-H2 thermal paste. I have reapplied the paste twice and reseated the CPU block three times, but the temperatures have not improved. What should I check next?
2 Answers
The Ryzen 9 5900X can normally run quite warm and is designed to boost until it reaches its temperature limit, but temperatures in the high 80s during lighter games are worth investigating. Check the pump speed in BIOS or your motherboard software, confirm the radiator fans are spinning properly, and clean dust from the radiator. Also compare the CPU package temperature with individual core readings and check whether background processes are keeping the CPU under load.
Make sure the pump is not the highest point in the loop. If air collects inside the pump housing, cooling performance can drop and the pump may become noisy. Ideally, the radiator should be mounted so that air stays in the radiator rather than inside the CPU block. Since the cooler is about two years old, also listen for unusual pump noise and check whether the coolant temperature or radiator stays unexpectedly cool while the CPU is hot; that can indicate poor circulation or a failing AIO.
The tubes are mounted on the side of the block and run upward toward the radiator, so the pump is not intentionally positioned at the highest point. I will check the pump RPM and listen for air or grinding noises.
The radiator fans are running, and the tubes leave the CPU block on the right side before going upward and toward the radiator. I am not sure whether the pump speed is behaving normally, though.