I3 12100 Power

[carl]

Hi All,

Looking at the official Intel specification page for i3 12100 I just needed some clarifications on terms of reference.

https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/134584/intel-core-i3-12100-processor-12m-cache-up-to-4-30-ghz.html

Processor Base Power - 60W - is this the cpu thermal power output I can work by to select a suitable cpu cooler?

Maximum Turbo Power - 89W - this is the cpu peak power requirement to check against when considering a power supply?

I want to pair the i3 with an inexpensive H610M mini ITX board and maybe use a noctua low profile cooler such as NHL-9 with a 92mm slim fan. Other parts will be 1 TB m.2 NVME drive and 2 x 8GB DDR4 3200MHz ram modules. Graphics will use the iGPU UHD 730. What is the total power requirement? It's going in a low profile case. https://www.inter-tech.de/productdetails-155/IP-60_EN.html

Thanks.

[Rumpelcrutchskin]

Nah, 60-89W is the power draw. Noctua NHL-9 would be fine for i3.
250-300W PSU is plenty for mini-PC without graphics card.

[carl]

Ok thanks. The PSU in the case I'm interested in supplies only 120W though. Can I lower the power much by disabling two of the cores via the BIOS?

[Rumpelcrutchskin]

Originally posted by carl:

Ok thanks. The PSU in the case I'm interested in supplies only 120W though. Can I lower the power much by disabling two of the cores via the BIOS?

That`s cutting it way too close, probably need another case or case with separate PSU.

[r.linder]

You're gonna need a better power supply, max you should be drawing for a PSU like that for the whole system is ideally 60W which you're not going to get down to, and any 120W unit is going to be junk that's just going to fail if you run too close to the limit

[GOD RAYS ON ULTRA™]

Not enough power. 120 watt will be just enough for the processor.

If you don't need the drive bay then maybe something like this is better:

in Win B1 Mesh Mini-ITX Chassis with 200Watts 80+Gold PSU with Mesh Top Cover, Black https://a.co/d/aIGewHW

This has a 200 watt PSU and is enough for my 5300g and 32g ram with a b550itx mobo and nvme SSD.

[BurakZG]

I think, you might be fine with 120W default PSU. Maybe you need to disable "boost" in UEFI, but maybe motherboard will be throttling itself.
I doubt a bit your idea of mounting noctua cooler. As far as I can see, your case is made to use it's backplate as radiator (you need to buy something separately).
This will not be a gaming PC for sure 😃
It might be fine for light office work or some light server.

[Agent]

If the wife or whoever complains about the bills get a smart meter plug for your PC to show how little it actually pulls from the wall. I'm on a 7800x3D and 4070 plus use FPS caps when I am gaming which is rarely now.

The culprit btw is normally the big huge fridge :P

[Tonepoet]

If I may intervene for a moment here, then I'd vaguely advise against this course of action. First using anything but the Laminar RM1 stock cooler that comes with the 12100 makes relatively little sense, unless maybe it must run as quiet as possible or you need a fan that's even shorter than 47 millimeters. Otherwise you're likely spending $55 on a noctua cooler for a 12100, so you would have been able to afford a 12400 with almost the same T.D.P. and gain what is a more powerful and power efficient processor in the first place. They have practically the same power draw 12100 has a 60 watt T.D.P. whereas the 12400 has a 65 watt T.D.P. The Laminar RM1 is considered somewhat better than previous intel stock coolers (not a high bar to clear, admittedly), and it's only 47 milimeters tall, which is only just barely taller than a back panel I.O. shield cutout.

Second, Vega integrated graphics massively outperforms Intel U.H.D. 750, which is higher tier than 730. A.M.D. stock coolers are also generally better regarded than intel stock coolers. Granted, they're even taller at 55 milimeters, but that's still relatively low profile.

Granted, the reason I mention it is 'cause the noctua cooler goes down to 37mm and if you only have that much in the way of clearance, well, then you only have that much in the way of clearance. However, for refernece, the ID COoling IS 55 is actually 57 mmilimeters tall. and still advertised as low profile[www.amazon.com].

I really can't help but think you'd get overall better results with a ryzen 5600gt, especially since unlike most Intel chips, most Ryzen chips are unlocked by default. In order to undervolt an Intel chip you'd have to have a K sku, just the same as if you'd want to overclock.

Also, do consider the Inwin b1 mesh[www.amazon.com] and pure[www.amazon.com] cases, or maybe the pure. 80 extra watts might not seem like much, but it's a 75% increase in power coming from 120 watts, and they're gold rated so they're probably more efficient than whatever you're looking at.

You might also want to look into cases that'll accept flex atx power supplies, like the K29 steel[www.amazon.com] or a k39 steel[www.amazon.com].