DescentBB

Ok guys I got a problem. My computer overheats too much and it seems to be getting worse. The guys I was playing D3 with last night were probably wondering why I kept dropping. Well, my computer was locking up, FROM RUNNING DESCENT3! At the moment I have been running it with the whole side door off of the case to keep it from overheating with normal use. So I need to do something about it sence summer is around the corner.

Do you know of any good heatsinks or ways to cool my processor without spending a fortune? Water cooling is probably out of the question. What about a peltier? I haven't seen any combinations with peltiers though, maybe it costs too much.

Since I dont know what socket type youve got, im going to make the assumption its a popular one, and recommend this fan.

Blue Orb II

Im running one on my Opteron 165 OCed to 2.5ghz from 1.8, CPU remains a nice cool 30-32°C
Its also incredibly silent.

Thanks, that looks like what I will need. I'll have to check the socket type when I get home. It's a 3ghz prescott with hyper threading and that strange intel 64bit \"support\".

At the moment my cpu is at 63 degrees celcius and this is with my 18 inch floor fan blowing into the case while the computer is compiling. It will freeze or reboot its self (if the compiling doesn't crash first) when it reaches around 67 degrees.

I bet it's a 478 (P4 3.0E). You'll need some heavy duty cooling for that, pick one (higher ups more recommended):

http://directron.com/cnps9500led.html (best air cooler !)
http://directron.com/scktncu1000.html
http://directron.com/cnps7700cu.html
http://directron.com/clp0024.html
http://directron.com/clw0037.html

Heh, the Blue Orb is a good cooler, even though its only 35bucks, it perfoms just as well as, if not better then the Zalmans, minus the 9500, that things just a beast right dwon to the price tag.

I'd suggest checking the thermal paste first.

fliptw wrote:I'd suggest checking the thermal paste first.

hmm, what do you mean by check? If it has bubbles? I know I put it on, but I don't know if it is effective. Thanks for the tip.

I've got a Zalman 9500 and it keeps my athlon 64 3700 running at 2.6 cool just fine. It is big and expensive but I got it for Christmas. It was definitely bigger in person than I thought from pics on the web. It does run cool and quiet though. My old cpu and heatsink you could hear across the house. Now you actually have to look and check to see if it is running. Very nice. I've heard good thing about the freezer64 tower things as well. Good luck.

Ok, I just checked and the socket is a LGA775. Hey Grendel, how quiet is that top one? Noise is also a concern.

the 9500 is quiet as well, only at low rpm, but i think price to performace, the Thermaltake Blue Orb II, or the Big typhoon are your best bet. the big typhoon runs at 16dba, the blue orb at 17dba (both of these are max rpm). the Zalman runs from 18 to 27.5 variable.

The blue orb on top of my board

Very quiet. Dude, I would not run the orb on a 775 CPU. Besides excellent heat transport capacity, the 9500 has the adventage of directing the hot air towards the rear exhaust fans (or the PSU intake.) Very effective heat management.

Check this reviews:
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cooler ... s9500.html
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cooler ... -cool.html

( http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/coolers/ for more)

I just bought the blue orb II and now I come here and read your post Grendel. You gave me doubt. Do 775s run hotter than the other socket pentium 4s? In a few days I should get the orb and hopefully solve all my heat problems.

I should probably get a new case in the near future as well. My current case is an old huge 486 case. I don't think it is very good at getting rid of heat.

thanks for the help guys!

why wouldnt you run the orb on a 775?

The orbs designed to cool the Ram, as well as the power regulator next to it, the zalman 9500 is nice if youre strictly trying to cool the CPU and nothing else.


The orb runs at the same performance as the big typhoon, maybe a half degree hotter.

Immortal Lobster wrote:why wouldnt you run the orb on a 775?
[..]
The orb runs at the same performance as the big typhoon, maybe a half degree hotter.

Uh, did you read the caption of the picture ? "Intel Pentium 4 2.8@4.06GHz" .. Prescott CPU's (which I believe Xamindars is) are nasty heaters.

X-Bit Labs wrote:Before checking the coolers in action we must first choose the testbed configuration and the testing methodology. There can’t be any argument about the CPU – Intel’s Prescott-core processors are “unrivalled” in terms of power consumption and heat dissipation. Our tests show that an Intel Pentium 4 processor overclocked to 4GHz without increasing its default voltage consumes as much as 130 watts under load (for details see our article called FSP BlueStorm AX500-A Power Supply Unit Review)! This number will grow up much more at overclocking and at a higher voltage since power consumption is in a squared relationship with voltage.

So, I took an Intel Pentium 4 521 (2.8GHz, 1MB L2 cache, Prescott E0 core) for the tests – this processor can work at 4.06GHz at its default 1.35V voltage and at 4.2GHz at 1.425V voltage.

Xamindar, you should be ok w/ the orb if you have some good airflow through the case.

You know... it might not be overheating - it could be power supply, if its a prescott, and his PS isn't up to the task...

Gives us more detail Xamindar. CPUID would tell you what kind of P4 you've got, then you need to read the amp for each of the voltage lines off the side of your PS.

You know, i wondered about that. But I figured the sensors were incorrect regarding voltage.
M/B Temp is in fact the CPU temp.
I did have to buy a new power supply for this cpu so it should be okay. But I guess anything is possible.

it waasnt by any chance a compusa PSU was it?

Yeah, Id hope your sensors are bad, those voltages are all over the place

Best air coolers bar none are found here:

http://www.thermalright.com/

The 'Ultra' designs have the added advantage that they are pretty lightweight.

Make your choice depending on your CPU and case dimensions.

Peltier is not recommendable, as it requires extra effort to keep condensing water from the surrounding circuitry, it consumes quite some power producing additional heat that needs to be removed, and needs powerful cooling of the hot side. Usually you cool a peltier element with water.

What you can do to improve cooling is provide good airflow through your computer case. Also, don't keep the computer in a corner below a desk or so, because the exhaust heat will gather there and decrease cooling performance.

You may also want to make sure your GPU doesn't overheat (who says it was your CPU that 'froze' - unintended pun, heh - the machine?)

Arctic Cooling Silencers are a very good choice for powerful low noise GPU air cooling. They offer coolers for most main stream gfx cards.

Finally, you may want to look for a well cooled low noise PSU. I can recommend Be Quiet parts. Hint: Read the voltage specs from the label on your PSU, not from the BIOS display. Intel CPUs need good values for the 12V lines. The combined values are also pretty important and say more than the single voltage ampere values.

Bottom line: Just cooling the CPU is not enough. There's a lot more circuitry inside a computer that can overheat and fail.

Bottom line: Just cooling the CPU is not enough. There's a lot more circuitry inside a computer that can overheat and fail.

Hence why radial fans are best overall, the 9500 is great if you just want to cool the CPU

Id doubt his video card would overheat playing D3, his voltages are indeed all over the place, Id try another PSU, see if it changed anything. I recommend ePower, Libertys had looked nice, but a lot of guys at the AMD support forums are saying they go sloppy after a while.

Also, as pointed out, if its inside an old 486 case, its definetly not evacuating as much air from the case that it needs to. this will make nearly any cooler worthless in that situation.

Id recommend getting a new case, see if that solves it, as the cooler itslef might only aid it, but its not going to totally fix it.

Immortal Lobster wrote:Id doubt his video card would overheat playing D3, his voltages are indeed all over the place, Id try another PSU, see if it changed anything.

My 6800U indeed gets hottest while playing D3 (waiting for the new RivaTuner to check the 7900).

Looks like a problem w/ the PSU -- what's the brand/type of that thing and what are you using to measure it ? Is that configured right ? W/ those voltage values I wouldn't expect the PC to run at all..

If you run windows, I'd be interested in the 1st page of CPU-Z ( http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php ).

My suggestion: Antec Smartpower 2.0 480w

you are crashing because your PS can't power the prescott.

you did plug the 4-pin square connector into the motherboard right?

It will not power up w/o the 4-pin connector plugged in

Immortal Lobster wrote:Also, as pointed out, if its inside an old 486 case, its definetly not evacuating as much air from the case that it needs to. this will make nearly any cooler worthless in that situation.

I didn't notice that. He should definitely get a new case then. Antec P160 is a great case.

The Zalman coolers aren't that good in cooling the circuitry around the CPU socket due to their rather large footprint. The Thermalright Ultra's are better.

you keep getting thermaltake and thermalright confused

However, the Orb is designed to direct air down to the circuitry, as well as through the ram, all in all its a damned good cooler. =)

and my 5900 never got hot playing D3, my 7800GT says \"oh come on\"

True. Thermaltake sucks.

Antec TruePower 2.0 550W

Fortron Source 600W PSU

or if you REALLY want to be DAMN sure:

Fortron Source 700W PSU

PC Power & Cooling 1000W PSU

It's absolute nonsense to use an overpowered PSU using a lot of energy. The best thing is a PSU that is burdened to 90% of it's maximal output - that will give you the most bang for the buck. If it's a quality PSU, this will not cause any stability problems.

Or he could, ya know, get a decent sized one NOW so he won't have to buy a new one everytime he upgrades.

Xamindar wrote:I need a GOOD heatsink for my prescott.

Do you. Yes, indeed you do.

Diedel wrote:It's absolute nonsense to use an overpowered PSU using a lot of energy. The best thing is a PSU that is burdened to 90% of it's maximal output - that will give you the most bang for the buck. If it's a quality PSU, this will not cause any stability problems.

You only use the amount of power you need. Just because you have a 500 watt ps doesnt mean you are using 500 watt. ANd if you have teh same components and get a 600, you are not using any more than you did before.

Not to mention the more power your PSU can put out vs its load, the cooler it should run, and the cooler it runs the more efficient it should be.

Top Wop wrote:

Diedel wrote:It's absolute nonsense to use an overpowered PSU using a lot of energy. The best thing is a PSU that is burdened to 90% of it's maximal output - that will give you the most bang for the buck. If it's a quality PSU, this will not cause any stability problems.

You only use the amount of power you need. Just because you have a 500 watt ps doesnt mean you are using 500 watt. ANd if you have teh same components and get a 600, you are not using any more than you did before.

PSUs are less efficient when working way below specs. So drawing 300W 'net' from a 1000W PSUs costs more 'gross' power than from a 350W PSU.

Diedel, what the hell are you smoking?

It doesn't matter if the power supply is rediculously large or not. 300W is 300W is 300W. It doesn't matter if the power supply is capable of outputting 400W or 4000W. The only difference here is that one has a larger supply. Thats like saying a large helium balloon is less efficient than a smaller helium balloon.

Ok. the wattage on power supplys? thats from DC/ current, draw from the mains is AC current, and thats logically needs to be higher than the DC cause we all know that we aren't getting 100% efficancy.

That being said, the parts in a 500W PS are not the same as parts in a 300W powersupply - the ones in a 500W are designed to operate more efficently at higher AC inputs than a 300W PS.

This is from a review of Power Supply I recommended above, scroll down to the table and look at the Efficiency row - its not very good at lower wattages is it?

Nobody where would recomend putting 350Ws of load on a 350W power supply, so why are jumping on someone that states the other side of the coin?

random: CPU power consumption round-up - it really makes a case on how much slacking Intel has done with the P4's power consumption. My 3800+ X2 consumes 40w less on average than the P4 670, which I think is the CPU that started this thread.

At the same time flip, most PSUs tested on that site seem to perform their best efficiency at around 150w load, even the 500+ watt units. It is highly unlikely you will find a situation where your PC is using much less then 100w so the really low wattage numbers are basically irrelevant.

aye, my PC as a whole sucks down about 410Watts, ive got a 450 on it, thats already pushing it, I just cant afford another PSU atm,most PSUs from the info Ive picked up over the years work best between 70 and 80% of thier full load. lucky for me i guess, my PSU is 530peak, but Im trying to ignore that number the best I can so I dont start frying stuff. Lots of PSUs are indeed advertised based on thier peak output, not thier real, full load. so careful on those gimmicks =)

MD-2389 wrote:Diedel, what the hell are you smoking?

Power conversion from input to output voltages isn't lossless. A PSU's efficiency factor rises when output is nearing it's max.

Being impolite doesn't exactly compensate for being clueless.

flip,

Afaik you should get into the 90% range of your PSU's max. output for the best efficiency factor.

Diedel: I suggest you look at that review site flip posted, the efficiency of the PSUs all dropped as they approached their maximum load, at around 150-200 watts was where they all ran a solid 5-10% higher efficiency then at their peak load or at 40-60 watts load.

Being impolite doesn't exactly compensate for being clueless.

acting like a smartass doesn't exactly compensate for being a dumbass either diedel

also, this is what happens when your PSU runs at it's max rating

Diedel wrote:

MD-2389 wrote:Diedel, what the hell are you smoking?

Power conversion from input to output voltages isn't lossless. A PSU's efficiency factor rises when output is nearing it's max.

Can you read? Go back to that site fliptw linked to and LOOK AT THE TABLE.

Being impolite doesn't exactly compensate for being clueless.

Says someone that can't even comprehend Ohms law and the basics of transformers (which is what a PSU is).