Good CPU fan/heat sink?

What would be a good fan/heat sink for a first time overclocker?

socket 478

the stock one... really! generally, first time OC'ers dont OC that high, so you can use the stock one, and when you want to go further, but the temps are to high, then you can switch..

if you MUST have a new HSF...

the ThermalRight Sp-94 is a good HSF... (though its a bit loud.. you can try putting a quiet 92mm Panaflo fan on it..)

the CNPS7000A-Cu *COPPER* Universal Heatsink - Zalman is a good heatsink, and you can add a good fan to it

Thermalright SP-94 is supposedly the king of air cooling right now. You just have to pick up a good 92mm fan, and you'll be all set

raven

well my stock one is a peice... it looks like a peice of silver painted wood with small fan mounted on it...

the zalman is a good and quiet HSF combo, the fan is built into it, so replacing its fan is a tricky thing to do...

the zalman has got one major downside...
its heavy! and maybe for a beginning OC'er it isnt that good of an idea to immediatly put 700+grams on the CPU...

if i were you id stay with the stock HSF both my rigs are running the stock HSF too, once my temps start bugging me, ill upgrade cooling..

edit: a piece of wood? isnt it a stock Intel HSF unit?
do you have a picture of the one you have... i doubt its wood lol

but its from a dell computer...if that makes any difference

aha..... what are the stock HSF's dimentions?

the stock intel HSF unit is 80*80*something like 100
if its a dell, is the stock HSF seated onto the mobo in the same way as with a normal PC? (by a plastic thingy.. with four braces on it)

yes its seated on the mobo, and btw Basicly the only thing left from the dell is:

HD
HS/FAN
CPU
RAM
and a few storage devices

the rest has been replaced and I'm getting an Gigabyte 865PE Motherboard For Pentium 4 Processors Model "GA-8IPE1000Pro 2004 GT Edition" from newegg... will the zal fit on this board?

also I was just kidding about the wood thing... I'm just trying to say it looks like a peice of crap and it doesn't seem to be that great of a cooler.

Ok well I'll get the Zalman+AS5 then... unless someone has another suggestion.

as i said, STICK with the stock HSF unit... the stock HSF is good enough for some testing and tweaking... once you got the hang of it, you can get a HSF that suits your needs...

i wouldnt recommend the zalman, unless youve got plenty of experience with replacing parts inside the case...

the SP-94 HS from thermalright has great cooling capabilities, but it would need a good CFM fan (thus often DB) to dissipate the heat from it...

stick with stock.. thats my advice, youll see/learn what you want soon enough when the entire PC is running..

Zalman cools decently up to 3.4ghz i believe, so its up to you if you want to buy it.. im not going to, im working on insides of PC's for 2 years now (im 17) and i dont feel confident enough to place 700+grams on my CPU..