Ryzen Wraith Cooler Clicking/Grinding?

The Wraith CPU Cooler has actually suited me decently well, keeping my temps much lower than the stock AM3 cooler ever did, but I’ve encountered a weird issue. It seems that when the CPU gets to around 50 C or so, it starts making an odd clicking/grinding noise. It’s worth noting that this isn’t constant, instead the noise just happens every few minutes or so for random lengths of time.

I’m not positive that it’s the CPU cooler (since opening the side panel to try and find the source cause the noise to just stop), but it seems to be coming from there. There’s no obstructions going into any of my fans at all, so I’m unsure of the cause.

Has anyone else encountered this issue at all? Granted, I’ve seen people complain about noise, but the actual fan noise is perfectly fine, it’s just this grinding sound that makes any significant noise.

Can you post a picture of your internals? It sounds like there’s a cable coming in contact with your fan.

Not with the wraith, but with a different cooler. It turned out to be poor cable management and when system load got high enough, and the fan was pulling enough air, it caused a cable to be sucked towards the fan.

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Sure, here.

The only cable even capable of reaching it would be the CPU power cable, but I literally cannot physically move it even close to the fan blades. Even so, I gently pressed a loose cable against the fan and the sound wasn’t the same as what I experienced before.

okay, if it’s not what you’re hearing, you might have a bad bearing then. If you’re within warranty, you could look into getting the cooler (or preferably just the fan) RMA’d.

Imgur is down for me right now, so it’ll be a minute before I can check things out.

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Okay, thanks for the help. If that’s the case, I’ll probably just pick up a new cooler then.

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Yeah, it’s likely a bad fan. The fan is reportedly a delta ball-bearing one, model QFR0912H, if you prefer to replace it. But I agree, I would either RMA it or get a new and better HSF.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Delta-QFR0912H-12V-0-32A-9025-9CM-4lines-PWM-temperature-control-cooling-fan/32794028468.html

If you go for a new one, at the $30 level I’d go with an arctic freezer 33.

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Do you have any recommendations for a cooler with about the same profile as the Wraith? I have an mATX build and don’t want to get something to big with how little space I have for it.

Well, depends on how much clearance you have (in millimeters) and how much you want to pay. You could go for the NH-L9a-AM4 or Cryorig C7, or if you have a bit more space the NH-L9x65. If you aren’t heavily overclocking the C7 or L9a would work great, cannot beat Noctua quality but it’s an extra ten bucks at Amazon.

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