New build too hot?

NotAGolf · 12 Nov 2010 at 19:24

Just put together a new build:
- Phenom 955 @3.2Ghz
- Gigabyte 880gm-ed2h
- Coolermaster Hyper 212 cooler

After installing windows and running orthos it seems to be a little toasty. It idles at high 20's and after 30 mins on orthos gets to high 40s and can nudge over 50.

Does this seem too high? I'm not planning on overclocking now but if I were to do so in the future (quite likely) that doesn't give me much headroom.

Airflow should be good as I've got 3 fans pushing a round a fair bit of air and the case ambient temp is low 20's.

I used a rice/pea sized amount of Arctic silver 5 and think it spread ok, although I did wiggle the heatsink round a fair bit trying to get the damn thing screwed in!

Would you be comfortable with those temps or do you think I should try again? Anyone else have a similar setup? What temps do you have?

Thanks.

NotAGolf · 13 Nov 2010 at 17:09

Hmm, after a bit more testing I've seen it touch 60 and considering the max temp is 62 there's definitely something going wrong.

I'm not sure what I did wrong though, after looking through a few guides I think I put on the right amount. I may have wiggled it a bit too much trying to get the heatsink on but would that really make that much difference? Surely having it spread out would be better for cooling?

The only other thing I can think of was that the Arctic silver I used was about 3-4 years old. Is it possible it has 'gone off'? I got some coolermaster paste with the cooler but thought the AS5 would be better.

ThomasTheTankEngine · 13 Nov 2010 at 19:01

Wiggling it about might have allowed some air pockets to form in the TIM, so it's worth taking it off, cleaning, and trying again. Taking it off will allow you to see how well it's spread about, and then you can adjust the amount you use accordingly.

Also, your cooler is one of the ones where the heatpipes have direct contact with the chip. With these type of coolers its advisable to smear some TIM across the whole thing, and then wipe it all off..... so any gaps or cracks get filled with TIM.

I'm pretty sure AS-5 doesn't go off. I used 5 year old AS-5 on my recent build and it performs just the same as new stuff.

NotAGolf · 13 Nov 2010 at 19:55

Thanks jimbob.

What would you advise to use when cleaning off the paste? I've heard Isopropyl Alcohol is a good bet, but what do you use to apply it? I've heard people mention cue-tips but surely these leave some of bits of cotton fibres??

Also when you say smear it on the heatsink so it fills gaps in the pipes, how should you clear it off after? Presumably not with the alcohol otherwise you'd be back at square one with it all clear!

**edit** - and also, when I take it off, should the paste cover the whole chip face, or just the centre (so I know whether I applied the right amount)

GoogalyMoogaly · 13 Nov 2010 at 20:11

I think there are soem good guides o nthe arctic silver website for applying thermal paste.
I think they also say on there that you should use a lint free cloth for cleaning off excess paste. I think they also say a coffee filter can be used (I'm guessing they're lint free).

MichaelM · 13 Nov 2010 at 20:57

mpledge52 said:
Just put together a new build:
- Phenom 955 @3.2Ghz
- Gigabyte 880gm-ed2h
- Coolermaster Hyper 212 cooler

After installing windows and running orthos it seems to be a little toasty. It idles at high 20's and after 30 mins on orthos gets to high 40s and can nudge over 50.

Does this seem too high? I'm not planning on overclocking now but if I were to do so in the future (quite likely) that doesn't give me much headroom.

Airflow should be good as I've got 3 fans pushing a round a fair bit of air and the case ambient temp is low 20's.

I used a rice/pea sized amount of Arctic silver 5 and think it spread ok, although I did wiggle the heatsink round a fair bit trying to get the damn thing screwed in!

Would you be comfortable with those temps or do you think I should try again? Anyone else have a similar setup? What temps do you have?

Thanks.

Hey,
My personal experience might be of some help.
I have a 955 overclocked to 3.6Ghz and I am on stock heatsink with the stock paste that came on it and 4 hours of Prime95 in a room with 15C ambient it saw a max of 59C and idle (with CnQ) of 31C. This is in a 700D case with only the ram and GPU power cable possibly blocking any air flow.

I would hope an aftermarket heatsink/thermal compound would do a better job then you are experiencing. Someone posted this article recently which has great detail in how to apply paste and how it acts.

Also i have used 6 year old AS-5 not long ago and it did exactly what i expect it to do 6 years ago.

NotAGolf · 19 Nov 2010 at 08:45

The isopropanol arrived yesterday so I took everything apart and had a look at the paste coverage. I had put on way too little, basically the size of an oblong penny so there was a huge 1cm gap round the edge of the cpu.

So I cleaned it all off, and reapplied using the two line method used in the link in MichaelM's post above with a bit more paste than before. I also tried to fill the gaps on the base of the heatsink (where the pipes joing the base block) using a bit of paste as described in the article in case there was air getting trapped in there.

Put it all back together and turned i on but the temps are still pretty poor. Maybe a degree or two lower but certainly not enough.

Looks like I'll have to try again tonight

Don't think it could be a problem with the airflow as the rest of the case temps (hdd, gfx, ambient) are all reasonable. One thing I did notice was that the fan on the cpu doesn't seem to make much difference whether running at 500rpm or 2000rpm. I could buy a new fan but I doubt that'd make much difference would it? Especially on these huge tower heatsinks. I could even try switch the fan around so it's pulling the hot air off rather than pushing cool air through. Anything else I could try?