Test System and Temperature Results

Test System

Test System Processor: Intel Core i7-6700K @ 4.2 GHz & 4.6 GHz OC

(Skylake) Motherboard: MSI Z170A Gaming M7

Intel Z170

Provided by: MSI Memory: 2x 4096 MB G.Skill F4-2133C15D-8GNT

@ 2133 MHz 15-15-15-35

Provided by: G.Skill Video Card: Integrated Intel HD Graphics 530 Hard disk: Crucial MX200 250GB SSD Power Supply: Zalman ZM850-EBT

Provided by: Zalman Case: DimasTech Bench/Test Table Easy V3.0

Provided by: DimasTech Operating System: Windows 7 64-bit Service Pack 1 TIM: Arctic Ceramique 2 MISC: ASUS GTX 560 clearance testing only

G.Skill Trident Z clearance testing only

Testing Procedure

Idle Temperatures

Typical Load Temperatures

Max Load Temperatures

All testing is done at a room temperature of 22°C (72°F) with a 1°C margin of error. The coolers are tested with Turbo, EIST, and C1E enabled, which will allow the CPU to clock down to a low 1.6 GHz while idle, or clock up to proper speeds under stock and overclocked conditions. The retail Intel Core i7-6700K I use for testing at stock is set to its load-optimized defaults with the CPU's maximum voltage being 1.28 V. Overclocked, the processor is running at 4.6 GHz on the CPU with vcore maxing out at 1.40 V. During all these tests, fans are set to run at 100% in the BIOS, with temperatures being recorded by AIDA64.The idle test will consist of the CPU sitting idle at the desktop for 15 minutes. This will allow for a stable temperature reading that will be recorded at the end of those 15 minutes.Wprime's and AIDA64's CPU tests represent typical multi-threaded loads. Both offer consistent results, with one being a benchmarking application and the other a stability test. Both are run for 15 minutes before the peak reading during the test is recorded and taken as the result. This test lets enthusiasts know what temperatures they can expect to see with games and applications. Wprime is set to eight threads while AIDA64 is configured to stress the CPU, FPU, cache, and system memory.AIDA64 offers maximum heat generation when set to stress just the FPU in the stability test, which will really push the CPU. This test represents extreme loads much like LinX, Prime95, and other extreme stress tests many users are familiar with.