Bite the bullet and go with water ?

[Rosco127]

Hello all,

My PC keeps on freezing whilst I have been playing various games, around 5 minutes after I start. Anyways, I decided to check the temp of the cpu whilst I was playing and was getting temps of around 60 to 70 degrees, which I know is not too good!

My system at the moment is a 775 Pentium 4 3.2 using the X800XT PCI-E Graphics card. The case (can't remember name) but I think it's a basic shape, 2 places for intake fans at the front bottom (2 x 80mm), 2 places for rear exhausts (2 x 80mm, or 1 x 120mm), 1 place for a side fan (80mm). I was already thinking of drilling through the top of the case to make a space for a blowhole, but I thought I'd ask for peoples opinions first.

So, I've been wondering if I should head for;

A)water cooled system (cpu + vga, don't really know much about this subject really)
B)get a proper airflow in my case (2 intake fans from front, 1 intake fan from side, 1 top blowhole, and 2 rear exhaust fans,
C) a combination of both water and air ?

I think I'm at the stage where I want decent results whilst playing games without the chances of either frying something or the PC reseting itself. Obviously I don't want the equivalent of a helicopter in my room but it seems I can no longer sacrifice the temps because of noise.

If a few people could list some ideas/parts from here it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

1 more thing, I need to get some more thermal paste or similar thing on both my graphics card and cpu, and I stumbled across some Thermal Pads, any good or should I just stick with Thermal Grease ?

Ta once again.

 

[Rosco127]

Monring, unless I'm being blind I don't see anything about your cpu being overclocked?
If it isn't overclocked then there is something wrong, a stock cpu shouldn't get that hot.
What heatsink are you using?
is it fitted properly?
has thermal paste been used?
does the heatsink have a fan and is it spinning?

Yep, I havn't got anything overclocked, which is why I really need to do something about the heat. The heatsink I am using is either the Zalman CNPS7000B, or the Zalman CNPS7700 (bought it from here some time ago as I was getting even hotter temps with the stock Pentium fan). As far as i could tell it was fitted properly, and I applied a thin layer of Thermal Grease as well.

Before taking everything apart last night, the fans I had running were...120mm fan at the back, 1 80mm at the side, 1 stock fan on the X800XT and the fan on the Zalman. They were all spinning, maybe they wern't blowing/sucking in the right directions ? Another reason why I want to sort this mess out from scratch, so I can be sure it's as good as it should be.

 

[Rosco127]

No front intake fan? If not get a couple of good 80mm ones. You will be surprised at the difference. I would have a go at modding your case if i were you before going to watercooling.

Cut a blowhole in the top for a 120mm fan if you have the room, if not a 92mm or an 80mm will do and set it to suck air out. That should make some difference. Then set up the side to suck in and the rear to blow out the back.

You could also get a cpu cooler that blows the hot air towards the rear exhaust fan. All the Zalman does is disrupt the airflow in the case by blowing it around. Also get some Arctic silver 5. Don't bother with thermal pads as they are rubbish.

Thanks, I'll go and get 5 x 80mm fans for the front and rear, and 1 x 120mm for the top blowhole. I'll also look in to a decent cpu cooler.

On a side note, do you have to actually buy Exhaust fans or will a normal fan blow 1 way, where as turn it around and it will suck ?

 

[Rosco127]

I'm looking at the various fans and I have no idea which ones to get.

Could someone suggest 5 x 80mm fans, and 1 x 120mm fan please (like the look of the vantec stealth ones) ?

Also what would be the recommeneded CPU cooler for the 3.2 775 P4 (read about the Arctic Freezer...the one that fits the p4, not sure if my PSU unit is too close though) ?

One more question, I am thinking of getting a fan controller, that supports 6 fans if possible, any suggestions ?

It's not being lazy, its just there are so many to choose from, and I want a nice cool PC for the first time

 

[Rosco127]

in terms of heatsinks:

thermalright SI120 - good heatsink, but need to purchase 120mm fan
scythe ninja - good heatsink, and performance, but supplied fan a little noisy
ac freezer - good heatsink and fan, good value for money but not TOP performance

make of that what you will

I really like the look of the Scythe Ninja but I'm doubtful that it will fit in my case. It reads 150mm heigh, I have a Premium P5AD2-E Mobo, I can't see it coming in to contact with my PSU, but its a question as to if I can get the side of my case back on

With the AC Freezer, I don't see how having the fan blow/suck along the motherboard would help much, maybe it's because I'm not used to it, all I've ever used is the normal fan pointing away from the mobo.

Thermalright, tis interesting, but I'll have to buy an adapter...so not sure yet.

 

[Rosco127]

thanks for all the advice, it certainly has helped me in choosing the various bits and bobs.

In the end I ordered the Thermalright SI-120 + adapter clip for 775 (I would have ordered the Scythe Ninja but I seriously doubt that it would fit in my case).

For the fans I ordered 5 x 80mm Vantec Stealth (2 rear, 2 front and 1 side), 1 x 120mm Vantec Stelth (top blowhole) and 1 x 120mm Vantec Thermacool to sit on the SI-120.

Went for the Vantex Nexus 4 channel fan controller, and then also got a couple of round Ide/floppy cables to tidy my case up a bit and a fan guard + fan filter (for the blowhole on my case, had to do a bit of DIY and make the hole).

The plan is (may not work as I don't know much about all this) to connect the 2 front 80mm intake fans to channel 1 on the fan controller, the 2 rear 80mm exhaust fans to channel 2, 80mm side intake to channel 3, and channel 4 for the 120mm blowhole. The reason I decided to try the Thermacool Vantec 120mm for the heatsink is because it has a heat sensor, so hopefully it will adjust its speed as it sees fit.

Won't be getting these parts until tuesday/wednesday I think, because of the bank holiday and all that. Hopefully once I set it all up I'll be able to post here my cooler settings.

Thanks!

 

[Rosco127]

I'm back with all fans installed. Still sily temps really, sitting idle between 30 and 35 degrees. Maybe the thermal paste isn't on correctly ? I thought I did it right