About to press "buy"...

strumpusplunket · 12 Apr 2010 at 19:57

I'm after getting some improved cooling for my Q6600. Currently got a Scythe Zipang in a HAF932. System temps are decent with the HAF (28C right now), but I'm fed up with my Zipang's mediocre cooling of my CPU and the pocket of hot air it seems to leave around the PWMs of my Abit IP35-PRO.

At 3.25GHz on 1.39V Vcore and stock NB & SB volts I get up to 75C on the cores and 79C PWM in IBT maximum stress. I'm hoping to do better, enough to push my clocks to 3.4-3.5GHz.

I like the quietness of my Zipang, but with four case fans on the go, my CPU fan isn't the biggest deal noise-wise in my case anyway, so I've decided to plump for better cooling and hope it's enough to push my clock speeds on.

I've got these sitting in my basket:

Thermolab Baram
Sharkoon Silent Eagle 2000
Arctic Cooling MX-3

Looking for suggestions/warnings/comments before I click "buy"!

I'm hoping to be able to use this solution in my next build (whatever that will be), which is why I like the Baram as it's a universal cooler (1156 bracket to come, I believe?) and so easy to re-use.
I'd like it to be reasonably quiet, as this my work as well as gaming PC and it's on my desk and about a foot from my right ear! Mostly concerned with idle noise levels, though, rather than load.
Most of all, I'm really hoping to get a decent drop in temps so I can push on with my clocking - though my CPU isn't likely to be a killer clocker (1.3125VID).

Is this a decent choice?

setter · 12 Apr 2010 at 20:03

The sharkoon se 2000's are great fans, but they are pretty loud at full speed, used to run 5 of them in a system, thankfully though they were on a fan controller.

strumpusplunket · 12 Apr 2010 at 20:24

Yeah, that did give me pause with this decision. After a bit of reading, though I got the impression that if I set it to 1000RPM at low temps and only to spin up to 2000 when the CPU goes up above 50C or so, then I should have fairly quite idle performance. Since my PC only really gets toasty when I'm gaming (with headphones) I don't really mind this.

Does that tally with your experience? I like the high airflow of these fans, but I don't want a wind-tunnel roar at idle either...

setter · 12 Apr 2010 at 20:28

If your gonna use the sharkoon as a cpu fan, does your motherboard allow speed control of a 3 pin fan when connected to the cpu header? My board was an asus which dont allow control of 3 pin fans via the cpu header, however when the silent eagles were dialled down on a fan controller to 1000 rpm the noise wasnt bad at all.

strumpusplunket · 12 Apr 2010 at 20:35

Yeah. Abit uguru lets me set the speeds of all fans plugged into any of the mobo headers by either CPU, system or PWM temp. It's a really nice feature.

Also interested in gut impressions of this change. It is likely to drop my temps a fair bit... isn't it? I know the Zipang only gets half-hearted reviews, but I'd be interested to know what sort of temps people would expect from a Q6600 on 1.39Vcore and at 3.25GHz. I can't help thinking 75C is a rather high for the cores, even under max IBT stress?