Fan orientation In Case With Freezer 7 pro

smegle · 13 Feb 2007 at 19:58

Hi guys/gals,
got a new 120mm case fan today and thinking of installing it on my case.
I`m running about 44 deg c on idel at standard on an e6600 with my arctic.
I currently have a 120mm exhaust fan under the psu, the psu fan exhausting, and an 80mm intake fan at the front with a hardrive stuck behind it.

i`ve just bought a new 120mm fan today, so would you recomend swapping out the small 80mm one at the front and replacing with this 120mm one?
I could then use the small 80mm one at the bottom at the rear to exhaust some of the warm 8800gtx deg air that it bellowing out.

Was also thinking moving the h/d out of the way of the primary airflow a bit.

You think this will improve the temps?

Cheers, ollie

smegle · 14 Feb 2007 at 18:47

Evening!
Hope you can help, i`ve now i`ve got 120mm fan at the front on the bottom, an 80mm fan above this (both sucking), then a 120mm fan at the back (exhausting) and a 80mm fan at the side exhausting.

My cpu temp is still 38 deg in bios and 30 deg motherboard temp (in bios).
all running at 2.4ghz.

volts are set at 1.29 in vcore.

I put a small amount of ac5 on the heatsink last night (you could see through it) then a smaller line down the middle (across the cores), mounted my ac7 pro (its tight as a nuns bits on my motherboard, really have to push in the location tabs) then ran it.

its running at core 0 = 42 and core 1 = 44 in core temp.

any ideas how to further lower my core temps as i`m gagging to overclock!!!

p.s. what the highest temp i can go up to when overclocking it?

vanandjuanunited · 14 Feb 2007 at 18:50

Use intel TAT for temps and see what they read.

smegle · 14 Feb 2007 at 19:06

williamw11 said:
Use intel TAT for temps and see what they read.

intel tat won`t work on my comp, any ideas of anything else?

smegle · 14 Feb 2007 at 23:05

right i`m now thinking of a new case, i`ve search but everyone recomends different things. Can anybody give me a definitive answer on the best cooling case at around 65 quid (not bothered about looks!)

WJA96 · 15 Feb 2007 at 07:45

You might want to take this across to Case Central.

In terms of airflow, more fans does not equal better airflow.

Airflow is purely about pressures. If you have a front fan pulling air into the case then it is not very efficient as the air coming into the case has to push air out of the case over a large number of nooks and crannies. This gives low air speeds and poor cooling (cooling is directly proportional to air speed and surface area - so bigger coolers and bigger fans should give better cooling). A rear fan pulling air through the case works very well indeed as it can pull air from anywhere and the airspeed directly in front of the fan is very high. If this is making any sense then what I am going to suggest next will come as no surprise.

Turn off all the fans except the rear 120mm and the one on the AC Freezer 7.

If you have a 'normal' type case you now have all your fans in the top rear corner of the case - PSU fan, CPU fan, exhaust fan. This will give faster air over the CPU cooler and will also encourage more air mixing in the case. It's counter-intuitive, but it works.

The other thing you need to be aware of is that some Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro's are bound to be be defective. I would return the CPU cooler and ask for a replacement on the grounds that an idle temperature of 44C is unacceptably high on a cooler that is supposed to outperform the stock CPU cooler. AC Freezer 7 Pro's either perform spectacularly well or they just work poorly in my experience. The claims on the box clearly show what sort of temperatures you should be looking for - so send it back and ask for one that performs as well as the claims on the box. If it doesn't then ask to exchange it for a better cooler.

If you want a recommendation on a good case, then the Akasa Zen works exceptionally at £30 and spend the other £35 on a Thermalright Ultra-120 (mount the front fan from the Zen on the CPU cooler) or Thermalright HR-01 with the 120mm fan duct so the rear fan is the CPU cooler fan. Excellent cooling, few fans, good cooling, low noise, big win all round.

smegle · 15 Feb 2007 at 22:27

WJA96,
thanks for the really indepth reply,
i`ve turned all the other fans off and the temps seem to have gone up a degree, qhich could be put down to the room temperature!

i`ve looked tonight at the contact area on the cpu and heatsink and it seems that its only making good contact around two of the edges (i.e. makes contact in the middle where i`ve put more paste on but is really biting on the edges)

looking at the heatsink i`m pretty confident that my cpu hsink is concave. do oyu think lapping this to get a proper contact could unlock the key to my crap temps?

WJA96 · 15 Feb 2007 at 23:43

LOL! so you've turned off 3 fans and the temperatures only went up by 1C? I think that's OK. It must be a bit quieter, surely?

I really don't go in for CPU lapping - it wipes out the warranty, reduces the resale value and the whole temperature thing seems a bit of an e-penis thing. It does seem to significantly reduce the temperatures though.

smegle · 16 Feb 2007 at 07:42

WJA96 said:
LOL! so you've turned off 3 fans and the temperatures only went up by 1C? I think that's OK. It must be a bit quieter, surely?

I really don't go in for CPU lapping - it wipes out the warranty, reduces the resale value and the whole temperature thing seems a bit of an e-penis thing. It does seem to significantly reduce the temperatures though.

so could this be the problem with the chip in the fact that it is concave?

how about a swap for an alternative from the shop, do you think they`d swap for an "un concave chip"?

WJA96 · 16 Feb 2007 at 08:48

My money is still on the cooler not having any gas in it or something. I would ask to change that first.

The problem with a concave IHS is that at stock speeds, with the stock cooler, it's probably still well inside thermal specification. At that point they are perfectly within their rights to say no.

smegle · 18 Feb 2007 at 00:45

WJA96 said:
My money is still on the cooler not having any gas in it or something. I would ask to change that first.

The problem with a concave IHS is that at stock speeds, with the stock cooler, it's probably still well inside thermal specification. At that point they are perfectly within their rights to say no.

right, i`ve lapped my cpu heatsink and put all my stuff in an atec ultimate gaming case.
idles at 41 degrees now without overclock. would you say it ok to overclock now?

WJA96 · 18 Feb 2007 at 08:27

smegle said:
right, i`ve lapped my cpu heatsink and put all my stuff in an atec ultimate gaming case.
idles at 41 degrees now without overclock. would you say it ok to overclock now?

I still think the Idle temperature is quite high (most E6600's I've seen idle in the mid-30's with Speedstep off and the mid-20's with Speedstep on using even the stock cooler, which is not as bad as everyone makes out.

The AC Freezer 7 Pro is supposed to have a Thermal Resistance 0.06C/W better than the Intel cooler so you would expect it to be at least 4C better than the stock cooler based on a 63W Thermal Dissipation from an E6600. If it's still idling over 40C after lapping then it definitely sounds like it's not working properly.

They are good coolers, but no production batch is perfect and I genuinely think you should try and get this one replaced.

I've just been playing about with my own motherboard and turning off the fan speed control in the BIOS makes a huge difference to idle temperatures. With it turned on the system idles at almost 40C and with it turned off it idles at 30C with Speedstep and C1E turned off. It may be worth trying disabling that in the BIOS before going any further (if you haven't already done it).

smegle · 18 Feb 2007 at 09:47

WJA96 said:
I still think the Idle temperature is quite high (most E6600's I've seen idle in the mid-30's with Speedstep off and the mid-20's with Speedstep on using even the stock cooler, which is not as bad as everyone makes out.

The AC Freezer 7 Pro is supposed to have a Thermal Resistance 0.06C/W better than the Intel cooler so you would expect it to be at least 4C better than the stock cooler based on a 63W Thermal Dissipation from an E6600. If it's still idling over 40C after lapping then it definitely sounds like it's not working properly.

They are good coolers, but no production batch is perfect and I genuinely think you should try and get this one replaced.

I've just been playing about with my own motherboard and turning off the fan speed control in the BIOS makes a huge difference to idle temperatures. With it turned on the system idles at almost 40C and with it turned off it idles at 30C with Speedstep and C1E turned off. It may be worth trying disabling that in the BIOS before going any further (if you haven't already done it).

spoke to overclclockers on friday and they said that it basically "couldn`t be" a bad cooler as the cpu would overheat if it was faulty.

i have the two settings off as you describe above already.

The olny thing i can think of now is, again the fit between the h/s and the cooler. When putting on the cooler its a right arse to get right. i put one corner down, then the other pops up, then i have to lock that down first then go to the other corner. its really hard to get it seated properly.

is there a secret was of getting these 775sockets to fit down easilly?
or shall i just try to re seat it again (shall i replace the arctic 5 as it only been on for a day)

hmm, just turned it on and after 5 mins its still idling at 35 on one core and 37 on the other. could the TIM be curing?
mobo temp is ~5-10 deg cooler than the cpu on initial bootup in the bios screen

WJA96 · 18 Feb 2007 at 10:10

smegle said:
spoke to the retailer on friday and they said that it basically "couldn`t be" a bad cooler as the cpu would overheat if it was faulty.

To mis-quote Mandy Rice Davies - "They would say that, wouldn't they?". Phone them up again. Tell them you are not happy with the performance as it is no better than a stock Intel cooler. Tell them you believe you have fitted it correctly and that you believe it may be faulty. Any store that won't take back kit that the customer is unhappy with and that may be faulty is giving very poor customer service and I wouldn't trade with them again. That's my opinion on any retailer, in any area of business.

smegle said:
i have the two settings off as you describe above already.

The olny thing i can think of now is, again the fit between the h/s and the cooler. When putting on the cooler its a right arse to get right. i put one corner down, then the other pops up, then i have to lock that down first then go to the other corner. its really hard to get it seated properly.

is there a secret was of getting these 775sockets to fit down easilly?
or shall i just try to re seat it again (shall i replace the arctic 5 as it only been on for a day)

I always take the fan off the ACF7 Pro before fitting as it makes it very much easier to press down on the pins. I always fit the CPU cooler outside the case. Other than that;

1. Rotate the black tabs so they are in the 'locked' position
2. Drop the 4 barbed feet through the holes in the motherboard so you can see all the white plastic tabs.
3. Using two thumbs and gripping the motherboard, gently press two of the black tabs down into the slots so they click ONCE
4. Then press the other two tabs down gently so they click ONCE.
5. Then press any two tabs hard to the lock into position with another click.
6. Finally, press the last two tabs down hard so they also click into the locked position.
7. With the cooler locked down you should be able to carry the motherboard using the CPU cooler as a handle. There should be almost no play between the CPU cooler and the motherboard ie. they should be very firly joined together.

The two-clicks thing is very important as it makes sure the cooler is centred properly and also ensures that air-pockets are kept to a minimum.

smegle said:
hmm, just turned it on and after 5 mins its still idling at 35 on one core and 37 on the other. could the TIM be curing?
mobo temp is ~5-10 deg cooler than the cpu on initial bootup in the bios screen

Yes, the TIM will cure over 200 hours and gets better with each thermal cycle ie. it has to cool down as well as heat up to cure correctly. Read the AS5 instructions thoroughly for best results.

smegle · 18 Feb 2007 at 17:15

now at 100 percent cpu useage (using prime 95 torture test and super pi at the same time) under load it is between 40 and 45 deg in core temp (on cor 0 - the hotter core)
thats after re-seating cpu as you said (out of the case), put on new atric silver 5 (there was to much on before!)

should i be relativley happy with these figures now?
they`re a lot lower than what i was previously getting, so do oyu think it`ll be safe to over clock onthese?

thanks for your help! feel like i`m getting somewhere noW!

WJA96 · 18 Feb 2007 at 17:34

smegle said:
now at 100 percent cpu useage (using prime 95 torture test and super pi at the same time) under load it is between 40 and 45 deg in core temp (on cor 0 - the hotter core)
thats after re-seating cpu as you said (out of the case), put on new atric silver 5 (there was to much on before!)

should i be relativley happy with these figures now?
they`re a lot lower than what i was previously getting, so do oyu think it`ll be safe to over clock onthese?

thanks for your help! feel like i`m getting somewhere noW!

40/45 is quite a difference between the cores, but it's not unheard of. If those are your load temperatures then by the time it's bedded in you should be set for some excellent load temperatures.

I would be quite happy to start overclocking that system now. Maybe try for 3GHz for a week (it should do 3GHz on stock volts) and then try for 3.3-3.6GHz after you've let the TIM cure a bit.

On stock volts the temperatures shouldn't increase too much. Once you start to increase the VCore then you will see a marked step up in temperatures. This isn't really anything to be worried about as long as you have TM1 and/or TM2 enabled in the BIOS. With those active you can heat the CPU as much as you like and it'll just shut the system down nice and tidy after it's throttled itself down a bit.

smegle · 18 Feb 2007 at 17:54

WJA96 said:
40/45 is quite a difference between the cores, but it's not unheard of. If those are your load temperatures then by the time it's bedded in you should be set for some excellent load temperatures.

I would be quite happy to start overclocking that system now. Maybe try for 3GHz for a week (it should do 3GHz on stock volts) and then try for 3.3-3.6GHz after you've let the TIM cure a bit.

On stock volts the temperatures shouldn't increase too much. Once you start to increase the VCore then you will see a marked step up in temperatures. This isn't really anything to be worried about as long as you have TM1 and/or TM2 enabled in the BIOS. With those active you can heat the CPU as much as you like and it'll just shut the system down nice and tidy after it's throttled itself down a bit.

thanks mate, really appreciate your help.
its current running at 1.28vcore, 2.8ghz and is averaging ~53 deg under 100 percent load with both super pi and prime 95 torturing my system!
tim hasn`t even bin on for an hour so once thats cured hopefully it will be ok!

might step it up to 3hz then go to the pub (leaving it torturing) lol