My hot take is that this is practically irrelevant for the vast majority of desktop users, even hobbyists. Unless you have an absolute rats’ nest of cables inside the case or you are overclocking the chip close to its thermal limits, your chip should run just fine with a small form factor heatsink/fan, which an older, non-enthusiast case should have no problem fitting. As one data point, I’m cooling my CPU with a Noctua NH-D15 inside my Antec Three Hundred. A somewhat tight fit? Maybe, but certainly no performance issues.
Far from being a tech wizz, I once decided I was going to push to the absolute limits an old 775 board I had around and the only concern I had was with CPU cooling, as I intended to fit the machine with a Core2 Quad.
Because the machine was built inside an SFF, putting in a larger cooler was not feaseable, unless I was to cut a hole into the side panel to accomodate it. However, spending a few more monies on the CPU for a 65W model did the trick and I managed to keep the stock cooler I was already using.
Bad airflow could become an issue with newer CPUs, for example
My hot take is that this is practically irrelevant for the vast majority of desktop users, even hobbyists. Unless you have an absolute rats’ nest of cables inside the case or you are overclocking the chip close to its thermal limits, your chip should run just fine with a small form factor heatsink/fan, which an older, non-enthusiast case should have no problem fitting. As one data point, I’m cooling my CPU with a Noctua NH-D15 inside my Antec Three Hundred. A somewhat tight fit? Maybe, but certainly no performance issues.
The emphasis was on newer, the latest Intel CPUs can run absurdly hot under load.
Far from being a tech wizz, I once decided I was going to push to the absolute limits an old 775 board I had around and the only concern I had was with CPU cooling, as I intended to fit the machine with a Core2 Quad.
Because the machine was built inside an SFF, putting in a larger cooler was not feaseable, unless I was to cut a hole into the side panel to accomodate it. However, spending a few more monies on the CPU for a 65W model did the trick and I managed to keep the stock cooler I was already using.