upgrade cooling to new build phenom 11 x4 955be

pk1

pk1

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i have just built a new gaming rig and its been fine but i have noticed temps up a little in places.

so im thinking of changing a few things in there and making it a little better on the cooling situation.

currently the cpu is using a stock cooler, after reading some good reviews i was thinking of fitting a scythe mugen 2 cooler on the cpu

on the corsair ram fitting an Corsair Airflow Dual-Channel Fan

on the sli gfx cards fitting Akasa AK-VC05 Freedom Force Graphics Card Cooler's and on gfx ram some Zalman ZM-RHS1 Silent VGA RAM Heatsink Kit

now as for thermal paste which is better? the tried and trusted Arctic Silver 5 or the new Arctic Cooling MX-3 ? i dont mind buying a tube of both to try them out.

what i noticed today was while playing assasins creed 2 on max settings , after a while the fans were going like crazy! so closed to game and loaded up cpuid monitor and the one gpu was at 59/60c the second was at 47/48c

the cores were within safe limits however i noticed that TMPIN2 was at 110c

i have not overclocked this in anyway, its running at stock, the bios is the latest, i have the latest directx, gfx and sli drivers. in the bios cool and quiet is running and i havent changed any settings in the bios other than boot sequence.

heres my setup info.
NZXT M59 case
MSI NF750-G55 SLI AM3 motherboard
2 GB Coarsair DDR3 1333 ram
2X NVIDIA 9600GT 1GB GFX cards in sli mode
1X AMD PHENOM 11 X4 955 black edition with stock cooler
5 x various sata drives 250/500gig
1x sata dvd-r
2x samsung syncmaster 2023nw screens and a saitek cyborg keyboard and mouse.

if anyone else has any other suggestions please let me know

here is a picture of the rig as it stands at the moment , i still have to finish my cable tidy up.

rig.jpg
 
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Do you know what TMPIN2 is for your motherboard? You cant really trust the reported core temps on phenoms because they are just software generated not real sensors. You are better off going with the TMPIN measure (whichever one relates to the cpu temp). If TMPIN2 is your cpu then it is WAY too hot. :eek:

You need to do one or all of the following:

1. get new cpu cooler - baram, mungen etc..
2. check the "stock" core voltage. Some mobos can put too much vcore by default and this can cause over heating. It should be around 1.4 at stock, depending on your VID.
3. Improve case air flow.
4. As you say go for tx3 or arctic silver 5 (dont know which is better).

I reckon its better not to let your cpu temp go above the high 50s.

Let us know how you get on / if any of that helps.
 

pk1

pk1

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spent a fewdays reading up and checking things through and i have decided what i wanted and have ordered it all.

i have decided to go with the Noctua NH-D14 cooler, a monster it is but its perfect at what it does! going to get rid of the 9600gt's and get some newer sli cards, something with ddr4 ram on hopefully, some more ram and a few other bits and pieces. i did think about water cooling but im happy with the noctua cooler choice.

i will probably have to remove the side panel fan from the door panel, however i can relocate that in the case and not loose air intake.

as soon as i decide what sli cards to go for i will stick these 9600 gt 1 gig cards on ebay and use the cash to get some other bits and pieces.
 

ssp

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I got the noctua nh-d14 cooler from ocuk and a few other things, and will be getting my gpu coolers tomorrow I have gone with the akasa neo vortexx coolers as 50 reviews give it excellent marks. I have also got evga precision installed and when playing i ramp up the fan speeds on the gfx cards to max and play fine.

it looks like the stock fans gor my gpu's just are not good enough, for some reason they never seem to want to go above the default 35% setting.



i managed to get the noctua into my nzxt m59 case nwith no problems and I did not have to remove any of the other case fans.

That combined with another 4 gig of ram from ocuk as well and the machine is really improved. looking forward to fitting the new gpu coolers now. only other thing after that is to change all the internal case fans with noctua fans.

so far.
100_3815.jpg
 

ssp

ssp

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just spent 30 mins fitting the vortexx coolers, i had to trim a small corner off the aluminium chipset plate because it hit a crystal, but this took 2 mins and i then filed and cleaned the edges up.

i re-cleaned the gpu with arctic cleaner and surface preparer, then applied some AS-5 applied the pads to the chips and then fitted the cooler. I had to repeat this with the second 9600gt but it went much quicker second time around as i had used the first chipset plate as a guide and scored the other one. The amount i took off was very small, it was just a corner piece so nothing to worry about there.

once back in the case the temp drop was instant! i was not sure about these , even with the 50 good reviews and the price being so cheap. I am glad i went for these , they look good in the case and do the job as they should!

here is the first temp with the stock coolers
temps1.jpg


the second with the vortexx.
temps2.jpg
 

ssp

ssp

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i got this info from another forum

MSI will not talk about unsupported software like Speedfan and Everest. However, if you prod them with pointy sticks, they will talk about supported software that ships with the motherboard. AMD Overdrive TMPIN readings apply to the following devices:
TMPIN1 = CPU die temp.
TMPIN2 = Chipset temp.
TMPIN3 = System/Motherboard temp.


so im guessing its the chips under the heatsink next to the cpu cooler. unfortunately theres no room for me to change it with a different cooler as the noctua is so large.

ok heres what everest gives me
Sensor Properties:
Sensor Type Fintek F71889 (ISA A00h)
GPU Sensor Type Diode (NV-Diode)
Motherboard Name MSI MS-7578

Temperatures:
Motherboard 35 °C (95 °F)
CPU 26 °C (79 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #1 37 °C (99 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #2 37 °C (99 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #3 37 °C (99 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #4 37 °C (99 °F)
MCP 56 °C (133 °F)
GPU1: GPU Diode 46 °C (115 °F)
GPU2: GPU Diode 40 °C (104 °F)

Voltage Values:
CPU Core 1.32 V


i have been told basically that the tmpin2 is an erranious sensor and to ignore it, however i have left a msg for msi tech and hopefully they will get back to me with a definative answer.

but the damn thing is running really cool now even under load.
i will get temps under load tomorrow.

noctua.jpg
 
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ssp

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yep the tmpin2 is a non existent sensor reading and its to be ignored, with no sensor for that it gives wildly fluctuating readings. i was advised to use everest ultimate to check things over and my temps are real low and all is good.
 

ssp

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well i pulled the noctua out of the case today to have another look at it, i noticed that one side of the cooler the pipes to the cpu plate were shorter than the other side. so i removed the fans, moved the rubber anti vibration mounts to opposite sides in the fins, and after cleaning the cpu and cooler plate and new arctic silver paste, re-fitted the cooler.

i was pleased to find that the cooler pipes no longer touch the rear heatsink at all now and my temps are cooler again, looks like the cooler is now mating correctly to the cpu.

very pleased, here is a pic for reference.

cooler.jpg


im going to run maya later and do a large render and check with crysis, farcy2 etc then get a temp check under load.

--------[ Sensor ]------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sensor Properties:
Sensor Type Fintek F71889 (ISA A00h)
GPU Sensor Type Diode (NV-Diode)
Motherboard Name MSI MS-7578

Temperatures:
Motherboard 32 °C (90 °F)
CPU 18 °C (64 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #1 26 °C (79 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #2 26 °C (79 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #3 26 °C (79 °F)
CPU #1 / Core #4 26 °C (79 °F)
MCP 52 °C (126 °F)
GPU1: GPU Diode 43 °C (109 °F)
GPU2: GPU Diode 36 °C (97 °F)
Maxtor 6V200E0 33 °C (91 °F)
Seagate ST3160215A 30 °C (86 °F)
Seagate ST3160215A 31 °C (88 °F)

Cooling Fans:
CPU 1342 RPM
Chassis 1212 RPM
Power Supply 2673 RPM
GPU1 35%
GPU2 35%

Voltage Values:
CPU Core 0.94 V
+3.3 V 3.28 V
+5 V 5.05 V
+12 V 12.14 V
+3.3 V Standby 3.28 V
 
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