Newbie cooling question about temps?!

Hey everyone, Im new into the overclocking world, I am wondering if what I have here is normal or not, and would appreciate any feedback or anything.

First off, lemme get this out of the way, Im rumming a P4 1.8A not overclocked, on an Abit SD7-533, Thermaltake's Dragon478 copper heatsink, and intel's stock P4 fan (i dont like the hairdryer noise of TT's 6k rpm fan hehe ) Arctic Silver 2 i believe, open case, with a 5 inch fan pointing toward the HS base and a 4 inch fan at the back of the case to get some air flow going around it all.

Anyway, I have noticed my temps are really high compared to what ive read, but I dont know whats going on...

My idle temps are around mobo-36/37 C, cpu-42/43 C
full tilt 100% cpu useage for 10 minutes solid gives me board-40/41 C, cpu-49.5 They dont seem to ever go higher than that yet...

these are readings im getting from Abit's hardware monitor deal by the way

I see readings in the low 30's with Intel's stock heatsink... I wonder what im doing wrong? Is there anyone that can help out if these temps are normal / good / bad?

I appreciate any feedback or help I can get, I have gotten this proc clocked at 2.5some Ghz and sandra gave me a PR2751 rating, which, from what ive seen, isnt too bad When I had it running that speed, I really didnt see much temp increase, maybe a few deg C, but nothing at all really....

Well, thanks everyone, sorry for the novel, anyone who's seen my posts on the neons.org forum hates me already for it

[email protected]

Just thought Id throw in a lil more about it, see if it'd help?

I live in florida, right smack on the middle east coast, and its high 80's during the day usually, feels hotter though, anyway, I know that doesnt help my open case much, but would closing the case, and putting the 5 inch fan right on the case blowing onto the HSF with the 4 inch exhaust just doin its thing help me much?

right now when i did these tests, its um, eesh 3am, and its quite cooler out, im going to do this tomorrow at 2 pm (when i wake up hehe) and see if the temps get above 50C full load during a hot day, if not then thats the cooling mark, if so, then eesh, its getting high and making me nervous

ADDED - Actually I just remembered, this is the 2nd motherboard Im using for the setup, my first one didnt want to play nice, but I remember the one day I had it all together, the first time I put arctic silver on and set it all up, my temps I think were low 30's idle, and 42 full load, these sound a lot better... but maybe i just had a bad reading motherboard? all it was was open case and the HSF, i didnt have any fans in the case, and I put those in after i saw this increase, but they didnt really help, a few C here or there maybe.... I cleaned everything with alcohol and i couldnt see or feel any silver left on from the first run, made sure it was clean, did a nice job on the silver again and mounted it all up and these temps now....

Well, Ill wait a while and stop posting until I start seeing some feed back, i hate talking to myself

Florida is in the middle of the east coast?

Anyways, I don't know Intel's too good but what I do know is they are supposed to run cooler than AMD, and 45+ load isn't that good for an AMD...

With hot *** florida swamp weather that could be your prob. Any heatsink can only cool to within X degrees of the ambient temp, and if your ambient is hot like that that'll raise it.

I know everyone talks isht about the Dragon orbs but I've been doing real good with the AMD version (and they look cool)... Try re-installing it and make sure you put the thermal grease on there right, and maybe put the fast TT fan back on.

--Illah

Hi, Nope, I mean im on the east coast of florida
yes with hot *** swamp weather mixed with coast weather hehe

I've tried reapplying, and it didnt seem to help, right now its not too hot out, so ambient isnt doing it, maybe I used too much silver and its insulating just a bit?

I used enough to cover the cpu chip where it looked like a thin layer, not see through though because my HS isnt totally smooth, I havent been able to find out how lap it, and not really sure i could do it safely yet, never tried...

the first board i mounted the new proc to read low 30's, but when i changed boards and reapplyed both times, these are my readings, both times very similar, so im thinking either A) I cant clean for s*it, or B) my first board was reading cooler than it was...

I know arctic's page said use 99% isopropyl, but I used the 70% rubbing alco... would that be causing it? This is my first proc that ive ever had to worry about this with, my old P3 i ran without a fan an a heatsink held on with tape for a few days hehe

right now, temps are in the 70 F here ambient or so, and my proc is at 40 C, and my board is saying its 35...

Ive been thinking about using a rheostat with the Thermaltake hairdryer, and finding a happy tolerance level with the noise, the stock intel fan is running about 2.7k rpm, but it has about a 1cm space between the bottom of the fan and the top of the heatsink fins... but I dont know if that would do anything?

Im just at wits end, ive been fighting a 2 month problem with the computer not shutting down (hence having to get a 2nd board, turns out the first one didnt like my old keyboard, and would restart instead of power off hehe)

thanks again

Ok, I decided to get creative with my sleep lacked brain, here is what Im looking at, you guys will laugh at me I know, but, hey im new at this

Now ive never posted a picture, so lets see if that itself works

well, just as an update if anyone cares, or knows if it would make any difference, I zip tied that 5 inch fan on the side of my case directly over my hsf, and now, at 1 pm, my temps at max are 38 board, 48 cpu, looks like i knocked 1 deg off there

and idle is 36 board, 42 proc, so on idle i didnt help cool the proc, but i did the board, so that means the 42 is coming from the HSF assembly somehow

Ive been thinking about lapping the heatsink because it has radial grooves in the bottom from when it was made, but ive never done it before and a little nervous...

well, if anyone else has any ideas let me know?

toodles

Sounds like you've been trying all the right things- if there are significant grooves in your heatsink surface it's a real crapshoot as to whether you can get effective heat transfer out of it- lapping would be a great idea (assuming you want to put the time into it, rather than $ into a new HSF- Swiftechs don't need lapped). I've done it very simply by using fine sandpaper on a flat, hard surface and just working the heatsink back and forth over it- a finishing polish can be done with steel wool. Clean well with alcohol afterwards, and refill the surface pores with Artic silver per their directions....
And PUT THE NOISY THERMALTAKE BACK ON! Think of it as the sound of power- like glass packs on a Camaro- feel the testosterone rush everytime you boot...... you'll learn to love it after awhile

Hahaha, well, glasspacks on a camaro are a lot more fun to live with than a hairdryer 3 feet from my head constantly

im a corvette man myself, so, poo on that idea just cause you said camaro anyway hey, but just thinking about this, i should be running really cool, because i have a flowmaster sticker on my case

Yeah, sometime next week i am going to give lapping a shot, after finals ill have the time to waste...

The only way ill put the thermaltake fan back on is if i can figure out and obtain a rheostat for the thing, im thinking running it about 4k rpm wont be too loud, and will be better than intel's, so ill give that a shot if i can figure out how, unless someone has a bunch of extra rheostats they wouldnt mind parting with around here? for a college kid with no job, money is hard to come by hehe, specially since i blew 100 bucks on a motherboard that didnt work, and couldnt get a refund, so i had to buy the abit i have now...

anyway, i was figuring it out, my ambient temp here is 32/33, so the board really is almost at ambient, and the processor is about 10 deg C above ambient at idle, and about 18 deg higher at full load.

im not sure if thats good or not, but i just know the number 50 is high

and just to tweak the car crowd, even though mustangs bite, flowmasters on the 302 sound a little better than glass camaros

Too much is made of terminal temp. What is important is what is the difference between the ambient and the cpu temp. Its an important reference. An example is the FOP-32/38 I was using. That had a delta of 20C under load.
The most effective way of getting cool air into the HSF is by making a ducted fan on the side of the case. I found that the cpu was always 20C above ambient under load. You also need to get the heated air out of the case by using an exhaust fan fan near the HSF.

well, I run open case and I have enough flow around to keep air circulating, and at full load, im about 18 deg C above ambient it looks like.

last night when i was doing this testing, the ambient temp was much lower, but my proc temp wasnt, so im not sure whats going on or if it was just how i had the fan last night, im going to try it again tonight when the temps are in the 70's (F) and see how it goes, changes are though its going to be almost 50 C again though...

im going to lap my heatsink later on, but right now in the 90 deg day we have now, idle its 10 c above ambient and load is 18, so I guess thats ok?

the computer is in a corner so, any fresh are that gets to it isnt perfectly circulated but its not hotter than ambient...

i have never seen closed case run cooler than how i have it set up now, but if theres a way ill give it a shot....

i did try a bowl of ice right next to the intake fan, but that didnt help

oh well, im not really going to worry about it anymore, it seems the temps dont break 50 which is still in the safe range, but id like to figure out how to get them lower a bit

thanks again everyone

hmmm, yep, temps in my room are now 26 C, but my board and proc temps are still high, seems like the 35 for board / 43 for CPU idle temps are the same no matter if its 32 C inthis room or 22 C...

at max load the temps seem to be solid at 38 board, 50.5 cpu (highest ive ever seen it, and that was after a half hour or hour at 100% cpu usage, never climbed above it though)

well, im going to lap my heatsink in a bit, maybe track down a rheostat if i can and use thermaltakes fan with it.

anyone have any ideas at all what else I can do?

I have good airflow on the board, but doesnt seem to do much?

other than lapping the HS and thinking maybe i used too thick a layer of AS2, I dont know what else to do. Im using the WinBond hardware doctor software with the Abit SD7 - 533, and the temps are the same as in my bios when I boot, if those are correct then im just running hot for some reason, im not overclocked at all

im stumped.

Sounds like lapping would be a good next step... we picked the Swiftech MCX370 partly because of it's light weight/cooling capacity, but also for the Pabst fan that comes on them- it's a nice balance between cooling power and noise. You might want to give one of those a try- or do the adapter thing and go with an 80mm- they're considerably quieter per cfm....

(that Flowmaster sticker alone probably adds 3 db .. )

Hehehe, well, I like the sticker, its my anti-honda reminder that louder isnt better

There is an adapter for the P4 cooling?

For the heatsink its like AVC's flower but its all copper (thermaltakes dragon 478)

I have the fan but not hooked up, its a 6k rpm fan vs the 2600 stock intel, im thinking a rheostat job at 4k or so would work nice, and not be too noisy, and atleast be better, they are the same size diameter I think... not sure though..

I really cant spend any more money, I blew 70 bucks on a bum motherboard the first time, and poor college student with no job syndrome is running me dry plus this darn computer habit.

I have some 600 grit and 1500 grit paper im going to use next week sometime to do the heatsink, im going to radio shack tomorrow and see if they have a rheostat and how much it is, ive never seen one before

Im hoping this whole thing boils down to too much AS2 on the cpu case? Ive never used it before so dont know how thick to use, i know the smoother the base of the HS the thinner, and my base of my HS feel like the side grooves on a quarter (US quarter anyway), so I did a thick layer, maybe too thick, but we shall see....

IM a little depressed the ambient temperatures being mind 20's didnt give me ANY different temp readings at idle even, so its not an ambient thing to some extent... guess i have to keep playing...

im in the safe zone so i dont have to worry, but now its a pride thing

hehe i decided to get a bit whacky and give this a shot, i took the TT fan, and put it between the 5 inch and the stock p4 fans... all pointing from intake -> HSF

that didnt do a darn thing hehehe, but the TT fan wasnt touching the heatsink, just blowing air onto it from about an inch or two away, but I don tknow if that should have changed anything or not...

Anyone heard of this fan? its supposed to be a 50 cfm i think, but Im not so sure i believe that, but i know its more powerful than intel's stock fan... but does anyone think it would work much better?

the intel stock fan has a 1 cm or so gap between the HS and it, because of the way it was made, so i think that right htere is cutting some usefulness from it, but im wondering if it really matters at all?

anyone have any experience with stock intel fans vs a TT fan?
http://www.thermaltake.com/products/orbs/dragon478.htm

ack wouldnt you know it, the *******s put out a speed control switch hehe, oh well, id rather have a rheostat, id rather get the exact speed i want instead of relying on medium

well, if anyone knows or could suggest anything now seeing exactly what HSF i have, maybe that would help?

thanks again