Ask GN 41: Why Do CPUs Have an IHS? & RAM Overclocking

By Steve Burke Published January 25, 2017 at 12:12 pm

Hardware

Our latest episode of Ask GN talks CPU IHS inclusion, delidding, RAM overclocking, some other tech questions, and a new trial GN shirt. We also talk about and demonstrate the audio quality differences between a Sennheiser MD46 and Sennheiser G3 lav kit, as some readers/viewers had inquired about our audio gear during CES.

The IHS discussion is an interesting one, and we’ll soon be demonstrating the cooling differences between delidded and lidded CPUs. Until then, though, we’re talking strength and the reasoning for an IHS to begin with.

Video below, timestamps to follow:

Timestamps & Questions

01:31 John Adamson: "What was the mic that Steve used during ces?"

05:11 nome ficticio: "#AskGN Hey Steve! love the work, never leave us please. So how does RAM f requency affect CPU overclocking? i read that having a more direct multiplier, say 10x for 2666, instead of 2800 for instance, could result in an easier time getting those last few MHz out of the CPU due to more stability. is that so with XMP? how so? why? you know the drill!"

08:41 LanStrikeGaming: "Steve I am having issues with the fans on the XFX Rx 480 8GB GTR 1338mhz. In Wattman, I set the fans to turn on at 300mhz acoustic level and set the thermal limits at 55c max 40c target. The fans are not turning on to cool the card when idle. My pc repeatedly is displaying a heat warning at 55c, I try to adjust the settings in Wattman and the fans just are not responding, no matter what Wattman settings I use to have them to provide constant airflow."

10:16 NeoVoodooTech: "Question for next week. Steve what do you think about using a small fan or heatsinks to cool routers and modems? I've recently been experimenting and found some positive results for cooling your network hardware including lower ping and latency and slightly faster sustained downloads and transfers."

12:39 Charlie Lee: "Question: Why do we need IHS? Isn't putting a heat sink directly onto CPU more efficient?"

16:17 Mikel Bledsoe: "Question for Steve: Say i have my wireless usb dongle plugged into the usb 3 header on top of my computer, but the speeds arent consistant ive moved everything away from it have it top and center yet the speeds are still fluctuating alot would it be better to plug it in the back of the pc directly into the MoBo?"

17:51 Daniel Dudas: "Hi Steve! Love your hair. My question is: Could you tell how much power can the motherboard VRM supply to the cpu by the number of phases? Example: X amount of watts/phase(3 phase vrm is barely enough for a 95W tdp cpu, but 5 is good for even a modest overclock)? Keep up the good work! And don't forget to rest.?"

Host: Steve Burke
Video: Andrew Coleman

Steve Burke

Steve started GamersNexus back when it was just a cool name, and now it's grown into an expansive website with an overwhelming amount of features. He recalls his first difficult decision with GN's direction: "I didn't know whether or not I wanted 'Gamers' to have a possessive apostrophe -- I mean, grammatically it should, but I didn't like it in the name. It was ugly. I also had people who were typing apostrophes into the address bar - sigh. It made sense to just leave it as 'Gamers.'"

First world problems, Steve. First world problems.