be quiet! Light Loop 360 CPU Cooler Review
AMD Ryzen 7/9 Cooling – Offset VS Non-Offset
Ryzen Testing – Why have an offset CPU mount?
The chiplet-based nature of mainstream Ryzen CPUs places its “hotspot” outside of the processor’s center. Below, we can see a delidded Ryzen 7000 CPU, which features two CPU Compute Dies (CCDs) at the top and a larger IO Die (IOD) below it. It is the CCDs that produce the most heat, making it the area that requires the most cooling.
To deliver optimised cooling performance, be quiet has added an “offset mount” option to their new Light Loop liquid coolers. This allows users to mount their CPU coolers with the center of their cold plates 8mm higher than normal. This places it above the CCDs of AMD’s latest Ryzen CPUs, enabling optimal cooling performance.
Note that users may not always want to use this offset. After all, future Ryzen AM5 CPUs may not benefit from this offset. Beyond that, some existing Ryzen AM5 CPUs, like the Ryzen 7 8700G, are monolithic, and do not require an offset to be optimally cooled.
Offset Testing – The Impact
For this review we added in some Ryzen 9000 testing to see the impact of be quiet’s offset mount. Below, we can see that it lowered our CPU thermals by 3.5 degrees. That’s a huge drop in CPU thermals given how little effort was put into achieving it. Just mount the cooler with the offset, and users can benefit from a big drop in thermals. Remember, this kind difference is often what differentiates the best available CPU coolers from their peers. All in all, it is a great add-on for Ryzen users.
Testing the be quiet Light Loop with AMD’s latest CPUs
To extend our Ryzen testing, we tested this CPU cooler with AMD’s Ryzen 7 9700X, Ryzen 9 9900X, and Ryzen 9 9950X. We also compared it to the thermals we achieved with the Silent Loop 2 360mm cooler that we used in our initial CPU reviews. However, we will note that the Silent Loop 2 360 was using 3000 RPM Silent Wings PRO fans, giving this cooler an edge that it wouldn’t have at stock.
Even with much slower fans, the Light Loop 360 managed to deliver similar or better thermals than its older counterparts with 3000 RPM PRO series fans. For AMD’s Ryzen 7 9700X, this new AIO is overkill, providing us with exceptionally low thermals. Even the larger 16-core model is tamed by be quiet’s new Light Loop cooler.
