Temps in new build - opinions?

Morten74 · Post by **Morten74** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 11:36 am

Hi all

I finally had some time to play around with Speedfan, TAT and ATItool in order to meassure the temperatures in my new build. Any opinions would be very welcome, as I really have no idea if they are too high, or if there is anything I could do to improve.

System specs:
Antec Solo w. Scythe S-Flex E @ 800rpm (Asus Q-Fan "Silent")
Corsair HX520W
ASUS P5B Deluxe
Intel Core 2 Duo 6320
Thermalright Ultra120 w. Scythe S-Flex E @ 1200rpm
Corsair XMS2 PC-5400 2x1GB
WD SE16 320GB 16MB SATA
ASUS 1814BLT DVD-RW
ASUS EN8500GT Silent, 512MB (Will be exchanged for ASUS EN8600GT Silent, 256MB this weekend)

The heatsink was mounted using Arctic Silver 5 after cleaning CPU heat spreader and HSF with isopropyl alcohol; then an amount of paste the size of 1-2 rice grains was spread on CPU using a credit card. A small amount was applied to HSF and wiped of with a lintless tissue.

System is running Windows XP SP2, and at stock speed (no OC'ing).

After running ATItool for approx. 90 min. I got the following:
Speedfan:
System 40 C
CPU 47 C
Core0 39 C
Core1 41 C
HDD 38 C

ATItool:
GPU 91 C (no value for Ram)

Room temperature was 25 C

After running TAT for approx. 45 min. I got the following (rock stable readings, so I thought it was ok to stop):
Speedfan:
System 40 C
CPU 62 C
Core0 54 C
Core1 56 C
HDD 38 C

ATItool:
GPU 64 C (no value for Ram)

TAT:
CPU0 54 C
CPU1 55 C

Room temperature was 25 C

-The temperature of the CPU seem a bit high compared to SPCRs test of the Ultra 120, which only showed a 16 C rise during load?

So, what do you think of these temperatures? The only thing I can think of to improve airflow would be to lower the fan on the HSF, as currently it is blowing more air (@1200) than the case exhaust fan (@800), so I would imagine that the "warm" air from the HSF is blown around the case instead of getting blown out of the case. I have a Zalman fanmate2 - should I try to lower the HSF fan to 800rpm? All cables are arranged neatly in the cable guides behind the HDD drivebays, so the is nothing obstructing airflow.

As said already, all input is very welcome as I'm a complete newbie in the "Silent cooling business"

Thanks in advance

Best regards

Morten

Post by **NeilBlanchard** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 1:15 pm

Greetings Morten,

I think the temps a relatively low -- 56C worst case for a core is very cool indeed. I'd say that you could slow the CPU fan down to 900-1000RPM -- and it would certainly be quieter!

A 1200RPM 120mm fan might be quiet, but it certainly is not very quiet. It might get warmer, too, but even 65C is perfectly okay.

BIONIC_EARS · Post by **BIONIC_EARS** » Thu Jun 21, 2007 6:41 pm

Your CPU temp is definitely on the high side given those circumstances, but nothing to worry about if you're sticking to default clocks.

Like NeilBlanchard said, you could even reduce the noise at the cost of higher temps and still be fine, but I think your paste application might be less than optimal.

I had held the belief that AS5 should always be spread in a thin, even layer, but with these large heat spreaders and unlapped heatsink bases, the mating surfaces are often not entirely flat against each other, so applying a thin line of paste down the middle of the IHS according to AS instructions and letting it spread by the pressure of the heatsink will do a better job at filling those gaps.

As I've stated in other posts recently, I recommend Arctic Cooling MX-1 over AS5 for filling in larger gaps between unlapped surfaces. Better performance (especially if you put too much in each case), lasts longer, and is easier to apply.

If you have to remove the motherboard to reapply the paste, it might not be worth it though. Your temp is not too good for a stock machine, but pretty good if it was overclocked to over 3GHz.

Morten74 · Post by **Morten74** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 1:22 am

Thanks guys
I thought these CPU temps were a bit high for an non-OC'ed C2D... Also I did suspect the paste application to be the culprit; when I was applying it, I looked at the instructions for the AS5 which said to put a line down the middle of the IHS, and the Thermalright HSF instructions said to spread a thin layer on the IHS and to apply a thin layer on the HSF and then wipe it off - I followed the instructions from Thermalright

Anyway, I do not have many components on the mobo, so I guess it can come out so I can re-seat the Ultra 120... But first I'll have to see how the ASUS 8600GT Silent behaves while fiddling with the fan speeds (I will remember to close the case during tests, as I read elsewhere that an open case prevents the ASUS heatsink from working as intended). Will post back when I have some new results.

Morten

sjoukew · Post by **sjoukew** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 4:36 am

Found on a thread on tomshardware a time ago, the maximum temperatures for a core2duo. The only thing which look strange to me are your cpu temperatures, those are higher than your core temperatures, something I have never seen before. I think that your speedfan isn't configured correctly. I would trust intel TAT the most.
Tcase => cpu
TJunction => Core
Tcase/Tjunction

--70--/--85--85-- Shutdown
--65--/--80--80-- Throttle
--60--/--75--75-- Hot
--55--/--70--70-- Warm
--50--/--65--65-- N
--45--/--60--60-- O
--40--/--55--55-- R
--35--/--50--50-- M
--30--/--45--45-- A
--25--/--40--40-- L

Morten74 · Post by **Morten74** » Fri Jun 22, 2007 10:48 pm

Small update:

I swapped the EN8500GT Silent for a EN8600GT Silent last night; quite a difference in GPU temperature!

EN8500GT: Idle 64 C, full load (1h of ATItool) 92 C
EN8600GT: Idle 48 C, full load (1h of ATItool) 80 C

And ofcourse an increase in 3DMark05 from approx. 4400 to 8400...

For a price difference of 30 euro I'd say it was money well spent

Next in line: re-seat the Ultra-120...

Morten

Morten74 · Post by **Morten74** » Thu Jun 28, 2007 8:07 am

Ok, I removed the Ultra-120, and the clearly my paste application was not optimal (=there was no contact with the Ultra-120 in the middle of the IHS

). So I cleaned everything up with isopropyl alcohol, q-tips and lintfree cloth, and re-seated the Ultra-120 as described on Arctic Silvers webpage. Then I ran the same tests as above:

[room temperature was 2 C lower, so I have added 2 C to all new meassurements, just to have a fair comparison]

After running ATItool for approx. 90 min. I got the following:
Speedfan:
System 40 C -> 39 C
CPU 47 C -> 46 C
Core0 39 C -> 37 C
Core1 41 C -> 37 C
HDD 38 C -> 38

ATItool:
GPU 91 C -> 81 C (note that this is the 8600GT, which replaced the 8500GT)

After running TAT for approx. 45 min. I got the following (rock stable readings, so I thought it was ok to stop):
Speedfan:
System 40 C -> 39
CPU 62 C -> 59
Core0 54 C ->52
Core1 56 C -> 53
HDD 38 C -> 38

ATItool:
GPU 64 C -> 54

TAT:
CPU0 54 C -> 52
CPU1 55 C -> 52

Idle temps are (at 23 C room temperature, no correction to these):
Speedfan:
System 35 C
CPU 36 C
Core0 27 C
Core1 27 C
HDD 36 C

ATItool:
GPU 48 C

Both fans have been set to approx. 800rpm, so the system is very quiet/silent.

I guess the decrease in temps. was not major, but then again, according to Arctic Silver, the CPU temps should drop 2-5 C during the burn-in period...

What do you think?

Morten

ayjay · Post by **ayjay** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 8:44 am

Sounds about right to be fair. My q6600 runs at similar temps, though the cpu temp reads about 45, so a great deal lower than the core temps

Never pulled the Ultra120 off and had a look. I don't for fear of having to spend ages cleaning the gunk off and reapplying it.

cmthomson · Post by **cmthomson** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 9:54 am

ayjay wrote:Sounds about right to be fair. My q6600 runs at similar temps, though the cpu temp reads about 45, so a great deal lower than the core temps
Never pulled the Ultra120 off and had a look. I don't for fear of having to spend ages cleaning the gunk off and reapplying it.

The "CPU temperature" reported by P5B and P5W boards is a thermistor near the CPU socket and is meaningless. Always use the core temperatures reported by Everest, TAT, Core Temp or SpeedFan. Probe 2 is useless.

ayjay · Post by **ayjay** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 11:01 am

Ah ok, thought that was a bit backwards. How about "system" temp? Does that mean ambient or something else? It's often in the 40s which seems a bit mad for ambient. Room temp here is only about 20!

cmthomson · Post by **cmthomson** » Fri Jun 29, 2007 5:24 pm

ayjay wrote:Ah ok, thought that was a bit backwards. How about "system" temp? Does that mean ambient or something else? It's often in the 40s which seems a bit mad for ambient. Room temp here is only about 20!

The "system temperature" on these boards is a sensor in the south bridge chip. You will notice a lower reading if you take the goofy cover off the heat sink and replace the crappy TIM with something decent. Mid to low 40s is normal.

Morten74 · Post by **Morten74** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 5:55 am

UPDATE

After having run the system for some time now, the cores now stay below 50 C (at same ambient temp) - the paste must be starting to 'work'...

Morten

ayjay · Post by **ayjay** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 7:52 am

hey that's cool. Since reading this thread I've reseated my ultra 120 heatsink which kind of had the appearance of a heavily iced cake

I did the grain of rice thingy and shifted fans about a bit. Managed about an 8 degree drop on my q6600 doing that

Still loads up near 60 on stock but looking around the net a lot of them do. Boo to them!
I'd get that thing oc'ed next morten

Go on...

cmthomson · Post by **cmthomson** » Tue Jul 10, 2007 6:18 pm

ayjay wrote:my q6600 ... still loads up near 60 on stock but looking around the net a lot of them do.

60C under load is a very good temperature for a C2D or C2Q CPU. They don't throttle until 85C. Don't worry, be happy.

[There seems to be an expectation out there that CPU temperatures need to be in the 40s. That might be true of some AMD processors, which use a different technology from Intel, but P4s and C2s run happily at much higher temperatures than that...]

Morten74 · Post by **Morten74** » Fri Jul 13, 2007 3:34 am

Hmmm... based on a post I read here, I checked the airflow in my case. I started TAT and when the core temps had stabilised (approx. 50 C), I removed the side panel. Within a couple of minutes, the core temps dropped to approx. 45 C. Apparently, my airflow is not optimal...

What are my options for increasing airflow, while keeping the PC silent? As far as I can see, my options are:

- Increase exhaust fan rpm (currently 800rpm), or

- Add intake fan

But both will increase the noise, so should I just live with the 50 C max load temps, or do I have other options?

Thanks in advance

Morten

ayjay · Post by **ayjay** » Fri Jul 13, 2007 3:47 am

Possibly live with it. I replaced my cpu fan with a 1600rpm s-flex yesterday so i have extra headroom for the sweltering days which aren't afflicting Britain atm

I found afterwards that the temps in my case dropped 5 degrees when taking the side off

I have an intake and exhaust, both 1200 s-flexs at about 800rpm and even at full blast they wouldn't make up for the 5 degree difference.
Ultimately the fans are there to stop the case getting hotter and hotter. 5 degrees above room temp ain't so bad imo. Somebody prove me wrong

I'd like lower temps too.

BIONIC_EARS · Post by **BIONIC_EARS** » Sat Jul 14, 2007 11:47 am

50C TAT core load temps are excellent. It might be considered a little high for a stock-clock CPU with a highend cooler, but in terms of the actual result, it's cool and exceeds manufacturer specifications with the stock cooler.

Besides, if your aim is to make the computer as quiet as possibe, then you should expect to see temps rise within the normal range as you find the right balance between performance and silence.

cmthomson · Post by **cmthomson** » Sat Jul 14, 2007 8:07 pm

50C running TAT is exceptionally low. You do not need to change anything.

In fact, I'd be inclined to reduce the fan speeds (I run my CPU much hotter; almost 70C folding and over 80C TAT).