So, after many.....many years. I have decided to upgrade my PC. I am leaving NvidIa and going full team red for the first time. I was intel/Nvidia for years and then i switched to AMD processors for the build I am currently using but I think it's time to wave goodbye to team green.
I have been using the stock AMD cooler on my Ryzen 1700 and it performs like crap, sometimes getting up too 95C+. After talking to my friend who has the 7700 who has temps of 85C+ on the stock cooler and switched to the D15(dropping his full load temps by 20C+/-) i decided i wanted to have better cooling. Also, I live in the PNW and don't have air conditioning, which isn't needed really where i live but i don't need my computer heating my room to 80 degrees in the summer and want it to cool as well as it can, especially with that power hungry/hot GPU.
That's a decent reason and all, but the CPU cooler doesn't magically make the CPU generate less heat. It dissipates heat faster away from the CPU. Which of course just means it's getting to your room.
Heat is heat. 100 watts of power will have the same amount of energy to dissipate with the best cooler on the planet and the worst. Your CPU will just have the heat closest to it for less or more time.
Originally i was going to get the 5800x and a GTX 4070. Then, after a lot of vodka and youtube videos i decided that i wanted to try out DDR5 and the newest Ryzen 7000 series CPU's. I had the Ryzen 1700 since release and EVERYONE said to just use the stock cooler, which i have been but it isn't really great at all and i have seen it peaking at 95C many times so i wanted a better cooler. The problem is, the cooler i picked doesn't fit in my old case so I chose the Corsair 4000D purely because of that reason. I also have been an Nvidia fanboy for years but i decided on trying out AMD cards so i picked the 6950XT for $40 less than the 4070 was going to cost me. The MOBO I chose because I have had problems with my current ASUS ROG STRIX B350-F and after looking into it, the new ASUS MOBO's are having the EXACT SAME memory issues i was having in 2017 so i am jumping off the ASUS ship.
What I read, DLSS 3.0 is like magic and running 1440p games, you'd possibly benefit from it if you stick to Nvidia. I don't know how much $40 means to your budget but I would invest in that solely because of that. THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH AMD GPUs, buy it's something I'd consider.
If I was building today, I'd certainly go DDR5 as you are.
I can't comment on stock cooler as I also value quiet operations because it's annoying when I'm gaming next to a jet engine, so even though the cooler might be overkill, I want them quiet. I haven't tested stock cooler but a nice Noctua was in my budget.
Same with my case, Be Quiet! 500DX but again, because I want as silent as possible while gaming.