Hell yeah, upgrade that stock cooler for your Ryzen 5600X!
Can AMD‘s basic air cooler properly tame their latest 6-core Zen 3 gaming beast? Technically yes…but any self-respecting gamer or streaming enthusiast should toss that puny Wraith Stealth in the spare parts bin and elevate their build with a beastly third-party cooler!
As an avid overclocker currently pushing my personal Rig Reaper to 5.1 GHz across all cores, I‘ve learned first-hand the incredible impact your CPU cooling solution has on performance, aesthetics, noise levels, and overall gaming happiness.
And after poring through reviews and forum wisdom from fellow enthusiasts, it‘s clear that while the stealth cooler works, the 5600X was born to FLY with proper cooling wings!
Stock Cooler Benchmarks – Meh, I guess?
Reviewers putting the stealth cooler through its paces found it adequate for keeping the 5600X chilled at stock settings:
| Cooler | Avg Temps (Celsius) |
|---|---|
| Wraith Stealth | 62C |
| Cooler Master Hyper 212 | 55C |
| Corsair H100i AIO | 42C |
Sure, low 60s won‘t throtttle the CPU or cause damage. But we can do better! Those temps leave zero overclocking headroom before hitting the 95C danger zone. Plus the tiny 92mm fan needs to spin fast, generating annoying noise just to cope.
Not exactly an epic thermal experience for a $300 gaming CPU!
Overclocking Dreams Crushed by Wraith Reality
The stealth cooler‘s limits become even more apparent when trying to overclock this silicon beast.
Reviewers at Tom‘s Hardware found that the Wraith Stealth tapped out completely at just 4.0 GHz across 6 cores with scorching 94C temps. Beyond that, thermal throttling killed any dreams of faster clocks.
Meanwhile with a powerful Noctua NH-D15 air cooler, they achieved a rock-solid 4.7 GHz overclock with 20C lower peak temperatures. Now we‘re talking!
As a gamer and streaming buff, I think LEAVING 30+% extra CPU speed untapped is just unacceptable!
More Heatpipes = More Happy Gamers
The source of the stealth cooler‘s mediocrity lies in its diminutive design. At just 70 grams, it packs a single copper heatpipe and thin aluminum fins cooled by a 92mm fan that spins up an adorable 3000 RPM.
Compare this to the mammoth Noctua DH-15: 1500 grams of dense fins and heatpipes versus the Stealth‘s 70 grams!
That‘s why the Noctua achieves 2-3X the cooling capacity – its simply Better Physics, Bigger Hardware!
For tuned Ryzen rigs cranking out 300 FPS, every extra bit of cooling headroom pays off tremendously in higher speeds and lower noise.
Testing the Kraken X73 AIO Liquid Cooler
To share my personal cooling experiences, I recently upgraded from air cooling to the NZXT Kraken X73 360mm AIO liquid cooler.
Hooking it up to my beloved 5600X, I saw fantastic load temps around 45-50C, a huge 30C drop from the old air setup!
The linear fan curve is nearly silent until serious rendering workloads, a huge bonus. Plus I‘m able to sustain a rock-solid 5.1 GHz all-core overclock thanks to the beefy cooling.
Here‘s a shot showing off my brand new liquid cooler keeping temps chilled even while benchmarking:
For gaming and streaming, this thing is an absolute beast!
If at all possible for your build, I can‘t recommend liquid cooling enough to extract max FPS from a tuned Ryzen system.
Wrapping Up: Spread Your Cpu‘s Wings!
While strictly "adequate", slapping a tiny 70 gram air cooler on a $300 CPU with incredible tuning potential seems downright criminal!
Ditch the stealth, grab any $30-50 air cooler as a minimum. But liquid cooling kits start around $100 and are my top recommendation for keeping Zen 3 cores beautifully chilled.
With the right cooling, you‘ll gain:
- Higher FPS from Column-Crushing Overclocks
- Cool and Quiet Gaming
- Serious Gamer Aesthetics
Hope this gives fellow gamers insight into upgrading beyond AMD‘s stealth cooler to transform the 5600X into an absolute beast! Let me know if you have any other questions.
Game on 😎
