I've just finished rebuilding an old PC around a new P35-DS3L board, in an Antec 300 case, and I've got a bit of a stability issue which I think I've identified, but thought it's worth getting a second opinion seeing as it's an odd one.
Rest of the parts are an E6300 with a mild overclock, Thermalright 120 cooler with an arctic cooler fan stuck on it, 4gb of OCZ special ops PC2-7200 ram (4 sticks, not ideal), one F1 750 drive, one samsung dvd-rom, 8800GT at stock clocks, corsair 620W psu. The case has 3 extra yate loons stuck in it as well as the standard 120mm and 140mm exits.
Basically, it slowly overheats over time... But the displayed temps are all rock-bottom, and the CPU cooler's barely warm. All the major components seem fine, with *** exception of the ram- a feel around found some very hot heat sinks. So a wee bit of further investigation, and it looks like the 2 case fans in the rear are cooling the CPU cooler so much that the fan never spins up. As a result, the airflow over the RAM's really, really weak. Or so it seems to me.
Does that sound plausible? There's no chance at all that it's a CPU or GPU overheat here, they're both running cool, and the NB is hot but not too hot. The RAM's running within its stock speed (it's at about 875, it's rated at 900 at 5-5-5-15). But obviously 4 sticks with heat sinks on means they're very crowded.
Assuming I'm right, what should I try next? Put the fan onto constant 7V instead of under mobo control? Seperate ram fans? Or should I just cut my losses on the 4 sticks and sell up, and get a pair of 2gb sticks?
I never expected my build to be thwarted by excessively good cooling
Rest of the parts are an E6300 with a mild overclock, Thermalright 120 cooler with an arctic cooler fan stuck on it, 4gb of OCZ special ops PC2-7200 ram (4 sticks, not ideal), one F1 750 drive, one samsung dvd-rom, 8800GT at stock clocks, corsair 620W psu. The case has 3 extra yate loons stuck in it as well as the standard 120mm and 140mm exits.
Basically, it slowly overheats over time... But the displayed temps are all rock-bottom, and the CPU cooler's barely warm. All the major components seem fine, with *** exception of the ram- a feel around found some very hot heat sinks. So a wee bit of further investigation, and it looks like the 2 case fans in the rear are cooling the CPU cooler so much that the fan never spins up. As a result, the airflow over the RAM's really, really weak. Or so it seems to me.
Does that sound plausible? There's no chance at all that it's a CPU or GPU overheat here, they're both running cool, and the NB is hot but not too hot. The RAM's running within its stock speed (it's at about 875, it's rated at 900 at 5-5-5-15). But obviously 4 sticks with heat sinks on means they're very crowded.
Assuming I'm right, what should I try next? Put the fan onto constant 7V instead of under mobo control? Seperate ram fans? Or should I just cut my losses on the 4 sticks and sell up, and get a pair of 2gb sticks?
I never expected my build to be thwarted by excessively good cooling
