So, first of all, I saw the official cooling thread but I really wanted to get a little more specific.. here I go. Ok, so, I just built a new computer. First time. Everything is working fine.. except that it's way too hot. I noticed that it goes up to about 57-60 C when idle.. and when I try to play any graphic intense games like CS:S it will automatically reboot my computer after like 40 seconds. I have THIS processor (AMD Athlon 64 3700+ / 1MB Cache / 1600MHz FSB / ClawHammer Core / Socket 754) and I bought THIS cpu fan because the description said it could cool CPUs up to Athlon 64 3800+ (Masscool / Socket 754, 939, 940 / AMD Athlon 64 / Ball Bearing / CPU Cooling Fan) Anyway, anyone have any ideas why this might be happening? Could I have put the thermal paste on wrong? Do I need a better fan? I have 2 case fans, and thats the max ports I have I think.. theyre right on top of each other. Should I put them both blowing out or in? How do you properly install the thermal paste? I'll start over if I need to. And lastly, do I just need a better CPU cooler? Looking at my CPU and its specs what do you think would be a better CPU fan/etc.. And hopefully it wont cost me an arm and a leg. THanks, sorry for the long post.
you should really be doing better than that with any cpu fan you can throw on there. you could try re-applying the paste, maybe even wiping that off and using something really good, like artic silver. also, make sure the cpu fan is mounted very tightly onto the cpu. sometimes this is tricky. i don't know what kind of device they use to attach yours, but my p4 cooler wasn't mounted right to start (i had immediate thermal errors) and i had to play around with it before i got it on all the way. you might also have played around with the paste too much and got an air bubble in it, which can cause some heat issues. my first check would be the case. run the computer with the side of the case off, and see what you get. if this solves it, then you probably have a problem with the case fans (mounted wrong way or something). you should try to make a path for air. in my case, i pull cool air in through the front fan and blow air out the back. its good to have air going in one direction. try a few things and see how it goes. the good news is that cooling problems are usually pretty cheap to fix (paste $10, case fans $11, new cpu cooler $35-$40, smooth running pc priceless) keep me posted
Start with the basics... did you remove the original "pad" of heat transfer material on the heatsink before applying the paste? (some heatsinks come with material already applied) If there is no transfer material on it originally, is there a possibility there is a clear or bluish piece of plastic film protecting the smooth contact surface of the heatsink? If so, remove it before applying paste. Only apply a tiny amount of paste, about a BB size. Sometimes it helps to put your finger inside a plastic bag and rub the paste into the surface of the heatsink, then spread a small amount of the paste onto the CPU core. Too much paste is as bad as too little. usually you have a fan in front of the case blowing in, and a fan in the rear blowing out. Sometimes it only has a fan in the front and uses the power supply fan as the only exhaust. Many times, the case has a spot for an exhaust fan in the back, but no fan. If a spot is available, add a fan.
I may have gotten a little cheap with the case, which I regret. My case has 2 80 MM fan ports in the back, one of top of the other. I think that's all the space for fans in my case. I tried with the case open, it seems to not effect the temperature very much and .. I think the problem might be that I made a mess out of installing the paste. Since it's the first time I ever tried to mess with computer parts, and I was too stubborn to ask anyone for help.. I simply put the whole tube of paste that came with my fan on top of the CPU and iced it like a cake with my finger (I later found out that it was dumb to ice it like a cake, and also dumb to use my finger.. and probably to use so much) Umm.. anyway, thanks for the replies. The heatsink didn't come with preapplied paste or any like protective film on the bottom. I'm going to buy new paste, so.. before I try this again, can anyone explain exactly how to apply it? If the paste thing fails.. do you guys think this fan is good/ok priced. http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1389576&Tab=0&NoMapp=0
I really think Arctic Silver 5 (NOT one of the generic copies) is better than most of those heatsink pads or other pastes out there. Just make sure that you THOROUGHLY clean off all the old paste residue before you apply the AS-5. Use pure rubbing alcohol (91% is fine) to remove all traces of the old stuff. Don't scratch the surface of the heatsink when cleaning it. You only need to use a tiny amount of the stuff, about the size of a BB, spread it evenly, being careful to keep it on the core of the chip-the smooth rectangular part in the middle. Reinstall the heatsink, and you're done. Sounds WAY more complicated than it is.
If you buy Artic 5 Silver (which I and lots of other use) then follow their very detailed directions on their website. Different thermal compounds have different applications, the Artic 5 Silver on an Athlon 64 is applied as a small bb sized dot in the middle of the cpu, other thermal compounds are spread evenly over the surface. It depends on which one you use. http://www.arcticsilver.com/arctic_silver_instructions.htm After the computer shuts down have you FELT the components? Are they hot to the touch? What's your voltage core running at? Also what sort of power supply are you using?
I didn't feel the parts, I'd try it now but I'm afraid to try and make my PC reboot again. I don't want to break a brand new CPU. I guess I'm going to have to pick up some arctic silver 5, do I have to order that online or would any popular stores sell it? I'm going to clean off the other stuff with alcohol and follow the instructions on the website. Also, someone else said something about the power supply.. umm.. all I know is that it's a 400 watt supply that came with my case. edit: sorry, i don't know what the voltage core is/how to check it.
You voltage core is the voltage that the CPU is running at, your motherboard may be giving your cpu too much voltage. This is sometimes done deliberately when overclocking a cpu. Create a signature to tell everyone what your system is, follow mine for detail needed. It really helps when you ask hardware questions. Download Cpu-Z and install it, it will tell you your voltage core. It's freeware. http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php The reason power supply is important is that if the power supply is overstressed then the voltage can be uneven, since cpu's operate at very low volts then this can really cause problems. Gaming is the most stressful activity on power supply units (psu). So a stressed out power supply can cause power fluctations which cause cpu overheating. You'll read guys bragging about their "steady rails" that means that the voltages stay stable with little to no fluctation under load. There are programs out there that will monitor your voltgages but they are motherboard dependent, so that's just ONE reason why the sig. is important.
I'm almost certain it said voltage: 1.500 v .. the reason I can't check right now again is because I am scared to use the computer since i whiped off a lot of the thermal paste. Anyway, so I am definitely getting Arctic Silver 5.. that's like $10? So, should I also get a new fan? (the one I linked to?!) And do you think I need to buy a new power supply? ______ By the way, I'm sort of a lucky guy.. I tried to take off the CPU fan out of pure frustration and I accidently ripped out the CPU from its locked socket.. and 4 or 5 of the pins got bent and I couldn't get the CPU back into the socket. Then I got thermal paste on my fingers, and accidently rubbed it on the CPU .. (green part). I had to whipe off most of the thermal paste, and there is only now very very thin smears of it on the heat sink and CPU.. but I managed to bend the pins back with tweezers and the CPU seems to be still be working fine. Thank god. P.S. Sorry for wasting your time, just wanted to tell the story.
I would try the Artic 5 Silver first, your temps at idle should be no higher than around 30C, period. The types of temps you posted for idle, a bigger fan won't make much of a difference. My dual core Athlon64 with a 20% overclock was 24C-26C at idle, 43C under full load with STOCK fan and heatsink. Leave the case open, that will eliminate airflow problems as a cause. Also you still haven't created a sig. to identify your gear.
Ok, I made the thing for my signature. I havn't tried to check the graphics card temperature, so I'm not sure how, but yeah I'm positive I was checking the CPU temperature. With the case open, it was 50-51 idle, then it rose to 54 after about half an hour. I guess I'll let you guys know what happens when I try the arctic silver 5. p.s with arctic silver 5, would you guys still put some on the heatsink then whipe it off? or should I skip that step (like I gathered from the directions) edit: Ran this program called everest.. --------[ Sensor ]------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Sensor Properties: Sensor Type SMSC LPC47M192/997 (SMBus 2Dh) Temperatures: Motherboard 31 °C (88 °F) CPU 54 °C (129 °F) Aux 30 °C (86 °F) Seagate ST3120026A 23 °C (73 °F) Cooling Fans: CPU 4388 RPM Chassis 2793 RPM Voltage Values: CPU Core 1.52 V +1.5 V 1.66 V +2.5 V 2.54 V +3.3 V 3.28 V +5 V 5.08 V +12 V 11.94 V Debug Info F FF FF FF FF 00 FF 00 FF Debug Info T C7 36 1F 1E Debug Info V 36 82 BF C3 BF
yeah, put it on the heatsink and then wipe it off. this gets the silver particles into the metal of the heatsink. i don't know how much of a difference it will make, but i'm sure it will help at least a little bit with the transfer of heat.
I'm having trouble finding Arctic Silver 5, have any of you heard of OCZ Ultra 5? (I found that on tigerdirect) Everything about it reads the same as Arctic Silver 5, as far as I could tell. Should I stay away from it?
go here: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835100007 this is the usa amount may be different where you live,just search newegg.com for artic silver 5,it will pop up.what kind of heatsink you have now?
Thanks I ordered the 3.5 gram tube of arctic silver 5, ok. I currently have this heatsink/fan http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?Sku=S457-1017 If it doesn't keep cool with the arctic silver, I will have to buy a new heatsink/fan.
Ok I don't think I should reuse this fan, theres a few small scratches on it. I don't know the importance of that, but I heard scratches were a bad thing. Anyway, do you guys think I should get this? http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1432339&CatId=0 or this? http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1389577&Tab=0&NoMapp=0 Note: I know one is $10 more, but if it's really not worth it, I wont pay it. I know $10 doesn't sound like a lot but I already went over my original budget.
both of those are pretty serious heatsink/coolers. either should get the job done with room to spare. i really think the problem has more to do with how the heatsink is mounted and how the thermal compound is applied. AMD processors tend to run on the cool side, so it is unusual that you're getting this type of heat. i'm not saying don't replace the heatsink, i'm sure that will help, but i'm just thinking theres more to it than that. most likely the heatsink and fan aren't mounted properly, fairly common mistake.
Then how about this one http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1389576&CatId=1187 Well, mine just clipped on i dont think i could have mounted it wrong. I mean, I guess it's possible, I just don't see how. I did do the thermal paste wrong, but one thing that was interesting is that.. when I had a whole bunch of it just iced on there, the temperature was the same even after I whiped most of it off except for the dry/hard stuff that was left over. Anyway.. do you think the scratches on the heatsink I've got already will mess up the temeperature.
that looks like a sort of stock one.look on newegg.com under heatsinks and fans.i have the same processor with a asus star ice h/s this hs has blue leds on it.and my cpu never gets above 42c on a full load playing fear max out 4x antialising,full graphics.its a pain too install but its worth it.you have to take out motherboard to install.look at my sign.seach in yahoo pc heatsinks and fans.you need more airflow to keep cool if you want to game.
