I think I need a better heatsink for my P4 2.4Ghz

jerryk · Post by **jerryk** » Mon Feb 24, 2003 8:50 pm

Hi,

I just got a system put together with a P4 2.4 Ghz, ECS Motherboard, 80 gb Barracuda and EverMax PS. The system runs well, but is too noisy. At this time I do not have a case fan, but plan on adding one.

Most of the noise is coming from the fan on the Volcano 7+ heat sink. I have tried setting it to it's slowest speed and even put a second reostat in line to let me futher control the rpm. But, at this point if I slow it up to the point where it is very quiet (but not silent) at 1081 rpm the temps rise to 62c in a couple of minutes. If I reset the fan to run slightly faster, 2300 rpm, the temps peak at 60c after about 45 minutes in the BIOS hardware monitor. If I boot LINUX and do a little work, when I reboot and check the temps the CPU is in the 50C range.

So I guess what I am looking for is a recommendation on things I can do to make the system more silent. I saw the recommendation on the Thermaright SLK-900U. Should I go with something like this and 92 mm pana fan? Does this setup really cool that much better than what I have?

Also, is there a Linux utility that will let me monitor the temps while I am working away?

Thanks,

jerry

ChiefWeasel · Post by **ChiefWeasel** » Tue Feb 25, 2003 4:44 am

jerryk wrote:So I guess what I am looking for is a recommendation on things I can do to make the system more silent. I saw the recommendation on the Thermaright SLK-900U. Should I go with something like this and 92 mm pana fan? Does this setup really cool that much better than what I have?

Yes it will! Much better. With a good HS, you should need no more than an 80mm panaflo L1a at about 7V - assuming good case airflow. This will be much quieter than your Volcano at even the quietest setting.

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Tue Feb 25, 2003 6:42 am

Another very good P4 heatsink is the Alpha 8942. That plus an L1A will do just fine and be way quieter than your current setup. I'm using an 8942 + L1A to cool my P4 2.66 that's OCed to 3.0Ghz. Max Prime95 load temps are around 48°C, idle temps run around low-mid 30°C range.

Your CPU seems to be running kind of hot. What is your case temp with no case fans? I'd suggest getting some kind of case fan, a few L1A Panaflos or some of those 18cfm NMBs would probably help a lot and they are very quiet.

ChiefWeasel · Post by **ChiefWeasel** » Tue Feb 25, 2003 8:15 am

Im using an 8942 as well

Tho i have a papst NGML on it (19dB, 26CFM), running at about 9V. Both temps a coupla degrees higher than yours. Mines a 1.8A at 2.4 with vcore at 1.575V. Is your vcore above stock voltage?

gksam · Post by **gksam** » Tue Feb 25, 2003 10:21 pm

I am using a Thermalright AX478 with a Panaflo L1A @ 7V.

Idle is 34-36oC.
Load is 44-48oC
MB temp is 32oC
ambient temp is 19-21oC

No other fans in system except for a 7V L1A & a 7V stock fan in my powersupply. Also a 5V panaflo pointing down on my 8500 video card.

jerryk · Post by **jerryk** » Tue Feb 25, 2003 11:03 pm

ChiefWeasel wrote:
jerryk wrote:So I guess what I am looking for is a recommendation on things I can do to make the system more silent. I saw the recommendation on the Thermaright SLK-900U. Should I go with something like this and 92 mm pana fan? Does this setup really cool that much better than what I have?
Yes it will! Much better. With a good HS, you should need no more than an 80mm panaflo L1a at about 7V - assuming good case airflow. This will be much quieter than your Volcano at even the quietest setting.

Well, I have the SLK-900U and a 92 mm Stealth fan. I also added 2 - 80 mm exhaust fans to the case and my temps are still rather high, as measured with the system monitor in the BIOS. After about 20 minutes running the system monitor with all fans at 5v the CPU temp is approaching 63 C. The system temp is 35 C and the PS temp is 50C. I then jumped the voltage on all the fans up to 7.5 and the CPU temp is around 57C, system temp is 33 C, and PS temp is 48C. If I run the voltage up to 9 volts, the CPU is 52C, System 33C PS is 46C. At 12 volts the CPU is 42 C, system 32C, and PS 45C.

So thus far, the only way to acheive low temps is to run the fans pretty hard. Now I don;t know how hard the BIOS system monitor runs the CPU, but if I boot Linux and log in, try some things, log out, and immediately reboot the CPU temps are 8-10C less.

Any thoughts?

Jerry

ChiefWeasel · Post by **ChiefWeasel** » Wed Feb 26, 2003 3:00 am

Ok, jus wondering how your measuring your temps ie what prog? how is the PSU temp measured? are you sure you're measuring the right temps?

Have you tried using a CPU stress test like Prime95 and using MBM to measure temps?

I would say have the CPU fan at 7.5V and the case fans at 5V. What are the specs for the fans you have? Also ambient temps? (There is at least one advantage of living in cold climate

)

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Wed Feb 26, 2003 6:13 am

ChiefWeasel wrote:Im using an 8942 as well Tho i have a papst NGML on it (19dB, 26CFM), running at about 9V. Both temps a coupla degrees higher than yours. Mines a 1.8A at 2.4 with vcore at 1.575V. Is your vcore above stock voltage?

My Vcore is 1.55V, stock for the 2.66 is 1.525V.

jerryk · Post by **jerryk** » Wed Feb 26, 2003 6:18 am

ChiefWeasel wrote:Ok, jus wondering how your measuring your temps ie what prog? how is the PSU temp measured? are you sure you're measuring the right temps?

Have you tried using a CPU stress test like Prime95 and using MBM to measure temps?

I would say have the CPU fan at 7.5V and the case fans at 5V. What are the specs for the fans you have? Also ambient temps? (There is at least one advantage of living in cold climate )

The BIOS I have has a page called "Hardware Monitor". This page list all power supply voltages, fan RPM, and temps for the PS, system and CPU. This is what I have been using to measure temps.

The more I look into the temps, the more I think this page is not representative of the "real world". I ran a chess program where the computer played against itself fo 10 minutes. The CPU was pegged at 100% active the entire time. As soon as it was finished I rebooted and when to the "Hardware Monitor" page. It showed PS and CPU temps in the mid 40C range, and system temp in the 32C range.

jerry

ChiefWeasel · Post by **ChiefWeasel** » Wed Feb 26, 2003 8:13 am

Have a look at the software page in the links page from the main site. Get MBM5 and use that to measure your temps directly in Windows. Theres also a link to a prog to stress the CPU.

Ambient temps in the room the computer is in?

jerryk · Post by **jerryk** » Wed Feb 26, 2003 9:49 pm

ChiefWeasel wrote:Have a look at the software page in the links page from the main site. Get MBM5 and use that to measure your temps directly in Windows. Theres also a link to a prog to stress the CPU.

Ambient temps in the room the computer is in?

I would get the program, but this system only has linux.

The ambient temp is around 72F, so 20 C or so.

jerry

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Thu Feb 27, 2003 6:04 am

If you're using the BIOSes Hardware Monitor to check your temps you're probably in worse shape than you think. You need to know your CPU's max temp under load. Sure, you can run some CPU-intensive app to heat up your CPU then reboot and check the BIOS temps but P4's cool off very fast once they go from load to idle. Just during the time your system is shutting down and rebooting you could very easily be getting a 6-8°C drop in your CPU temp. Therfore whatever temp you're seeing in your BIOS after immediately rebooting is definitely somewhat lower than your actual load temps while in the OS.

If those temps of 62-63°C are taken from the BIOS after rebooting you are actually running ±70°C while in the OS. That's right at the temp where the P4 starts thermally throttling itself for protection. You need to fix that. I wouldn't even thing about trying to make your system quieter until you first cool it down to more reasonable levels.

First off I'd try and find a software temp monitoring app that runs in Linux, then start figuring out how to cool things down. You really need to know what your correct temps are.

Post by **MikeC** » Thu Feb 27, 2003 8:10 am

This thread at a computing.net forum-- http://www.computing.net/linux/wwwboard ... 17106.html -- suggests

you want the "i2c" modules, the "lm_sensors" modules, and either xsensors (for gnome) or ksensors for KDE.
I think you can get packages for mdk for all of those, rpmfind.net might be able to help

jerryk · Post by **jerryk** » Thu Feb 27, 2003 9:39 am

Ralf Hutter wrote:If you're using the BIOSes Hardware Monitor to check your temps you're probably in worse shape than you think. You need to know your CPU's max temp under load. Sure, you can run some CPU-intensive app to heat up your CPU then reboot and check the BIOS temps but P4's cool off very fast once they go from load to idle. Just during the time your system is shutting down and rebooting you could very easily be getting a 6-8°C drop in your CPU temp. Therfore whatever temp you're seeing in your BIOS after immediately rebooting is definitely somewhat lower than your actual load temps while in the OS.

If those temps of 62-63°C are taken from the BIOS after rebooting you are actually running ±70°C while in the OS. That's right at the temp where the P4 starts thermally throttling itself for protection. You need to fix that. I wouldn't even thing about trying to make your system quieter until you first cool it down to more reasonable levels.

First off I'd try and find a software temp monitoring app that runs in Linux, then start figuring out how to cool things down. You really need to know what your correct temps are.

First, thanks for the warning.

Last night I did really push the CPU by having it play itself in chess for 20 minutes or so. CPU utilization was 100% for the entire time. I then rebooted and the BIOS monitor showed the CPU at 34C. I then tried the same test again, but this time I touched the heat sync in the middle of the run. It was warm, but not hot. So I think the CPU is getting pretty well cooled.

The higher number you are referencing were from an earlier test, with a different heatsync/fan combo at 5volts. I obtained these by just leaving the system in the BIOS hardware monitor page for 20 minutes or so. It was very interesting to watch the temps climb over time.

However, I want some numbers with the system running a "real" load. I am going to play a bit more with the linux system. If I can't get numbers soon I may just swap the disk and put in one with Windows 2000 or XP. If I do that I will be able to duplicate the testing that other people are doing.

jerry

powergyoza · Post by **powergyoza** » Thu Feb 27, 2003 12:26 pm

JerryK,

What case do you have?

jerryk · Post by **jerryk** » Fri Feb 28, 2003 6:58 am

powergyoza wrote:JerryK,

What case do you have?

I don't know the name of the case. You can find the case here http://www.svcompucycle.com/almidtowcasw.html. It is Aluminum and seems pretty light which is probably bad for quieting the fans down.

jerry

I think I need a better heatsink for my P4 2.4Ghz

I think I need a better heatsink for my P4 2.4Ghz

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