A general rule of thumb is [edit] for your case temps, [/edit] within 5C of ambient temps is very good cooling and within 10C is desireable. I think there may even be an older AMD spec that calls for it to be within 9C. Lower is always better because with air cooling, unless you're ducting to your components, your internal case temps are the coolest they can get.
There are a bunch of other variables out there. Smaller cases tend to run hotter. Some mobos report higher temperatures than others. If you're not in an air conditioned room, your ambients will be higher.
Of course it's possible your computer may be running well within safe operating temperatures. Though I'm not familiar with your mobo, I suspect 129F / 54C may be on the high side. If you're concerned, try hunting down other people with your same mobo and processor. Find out their temps and see if yours are close. It can be very misleading to try and compare your A64 temps to a Athlon XP on a completely different chipset.
[edited for clarity]
Noisy X800
Moderators: NeilBlanchard, Ralf Hutter, sthayashi, Lawrence Lee
Mmmm... forgot about Fahrenheits there. If your CPU is idling at ~54 degrees Celcius I'd say that is a bit on the high side. On the other hand: mine idles somewhere around 50 degrees but that is with dynamically controlled cpu fan speed... low fan speed at idle leads to somewhat higher CPU temperatures and Athlon XPs run hotter than A64s generally. The 39 degrees you posted before sound great (not high at all). The temperature that actually matters of course is the temperature under load. To see that, load up a tool like CPUburn or Prime95 and see where the temperatures go. Also, there is a difference between the temperature reported by the motherboard (socket temperature) and the actual core temperature (die temperature), so be sure to find out which temperature you are looking at.
Chang, I'm not sure I agree with your rule-of-thumb but that may be due to how I'm reading it. You don't mean that CPU temperature should be within 10 degrees Celcius of ambient, do you? That would be unattainable for all but the most undervolted/mobile CPUs. Like I said before, I tend to take case temperature as reported by a motherboard with a grain of salt since so little is known about the location or accuracy of the motherboard sensor. As for actual case temperature, depending on where I measure temps, I get values between 28 and 35 degrees Celcius which I am perfectly happy with (ambient about 20).
davids, if I may offer a suggestion: don't worry too much about your temperatures. You've spent enough time on the subject as it is, start enjoying your new rig
Load up your rig with CPUburn and 3Dmark. If it is stable then CPU and GPU temps are probably fine. The only thing to watch out for are those harddisk temps. When those are high, you should worry about case temps but otherwise I'd leave 'em alone.
Chang, I'm not sure I agree with your rule-of-thumb but that may be due to how I'm reading it. You don't mean that CPU temperature should be within 10 degrees Celcius of ambient, do you? That would be unattainable for all but the most undervolted/mobile CPUs. Like I said before, I tend to take case temperature as reported by a motherboard with a grain of salt since so little is known about the location or accuracy of the motherboard sensor. As for actual case temperature, depending on where I measure temps, I get values between 28 and 35 degrees Celcius which I am perfectly happy with (ambient about 20).
davids, if I may offer a suggestion: don't worry too much about your temperatures. You've spent enough time on the subject as it is, start enjoying your new rig
Load up your rig with CPUburn and 3Dmark. If it is stable then CPU and GPU temps are probably fine. The only thing to watch out for are those harddisk temps. When those are high, you should worry about case temps but otherwise I'd leave 'em alone.I think you've hit it on the nail. The MOBO is a small micro ATX one (new ATI Xpress 200) and the case is smaller than norm. There are NO additional fans, other than the one in the PSU. I believe 129 degrees for the CPU equates to about 54 degress celsius, which, as you pointed out, is slightly high. I have just tried removing the case side panel and it has dropped a few degrees- so it obviously benefits from increased ventilation. I just spoke to the PC OEM customer service and they recommended leaving the side panel off permanently!Chang wrote:
There are a bunch of other variables out there. Smaller cases tend to run hotter. .
It does beg the question, though: Why was a sold a PC with not great ventilation?
Last edited by davids on Wed May 25, 2005 6:25 am, edited 1 time in total.
Yes, the 39 degrees, I posted earlier was from the bios and, therefore, inaccurate. The true temp is actually 54 celsius.teejay wrote: The 39 degrees you posted before sound great (not high at all). The temperature that actually matters of course is the temperature under load. To see that, load up a tool like CPUburn or Prime95 and see where the temperatures go. .
I downloaded Speedfan and it immediately increased my fan speed even with the case side panel off (although facing a wall), but this was accompanied by an increased wine from the stock AMD fan!!. So I've disabled it. I might try CPU burn and ATI tools (for the Artic-cooler on the GPU) later- downloaded 3DMark but it won't open.
You are right, I need to start enjoying the damn thing. Got Adobe Photoshop Elements on the way, plus a scanner.
david
Forza Milan.
Hello again
With the Artic Cooler on my X800 being so disappointingly noisy (not much quieter than the stock ATI fan), I wonder if it may be because I did not put enough thermal paste on the chip when I installed the cooler?
If the GPU was not covered with sufficient paste, might this lead to the fan spinning faster and, therefore, more noisily?
Thanks
D
- I have had no email response from Artic-Cooling to the above question
EDIT. I've since realised I, in fact, put too MUCH paste on the chip, and have duly replaced it with less.
With the Artic Cooler on my X800 being so disappointingly noisy (not much quieter than the stock ATI fan), I wonder if it may be because I did not put enough thermal paste on the chip when I installed the cooler?
If the GPU was not covered with sufficient paste, might this lead to the fan spinning faster and, therefore, more noisily?
Thanks
D
- I have had no email response from Artic-Cooling to the above question
EDIT. I've since realised I, in fact, put too MUCH paste on the chip, and have duly replaced it with less.
Last edited by davids on Fri Jun 10, 2005 12:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.
davids welcome to spcr. a silent PC is truely an awesome thing, once you have one you will not be able to bear any clunky noisy PC again. however the problem with making your PC silent is that there is always be a component which will be the loudest in your case. for example, I used to have loud, crappy chinese OEM case fans obstructed by exorbitant grilles and filters. I replaced them with quality fans. Then all I could hear was the terrible sounds of a stock CPU and GPU fan. I fixxed that with zalman stuff. Then my hard drive was chittering and grinding away at my ears, day and night. Finally I suspended it and it is quiet.
unfortunately you have a new system with a bunch of components which are unfamiliar to you. how do you know what is making all the noise? you really need to test everything individually and find out what the major culprit is. from your posts so far, you already found out that the stock GPU cooler is a horrendous cause of noise in your case and you bought an arctic cooler fan for it which is slightly quieter.
here is what I would do. you have said that your case doesnt even have any external cooling. that is good and bad. the good part is that you will get less sound escaping from the rig through open fan holes. the bad is that (obviously) your system is just a giant heat sandwich and any fan in there with a thermistor (thermally controlled) is just going to spin up to a high speed and be very annoying.
as for the video card, see if you can change the fan speed through the ATI software as someone suggested. it will be fine up to 70C at least, because video GPUs can handle alot of heat, I think up to 110C. I would bet that the arctic cooling thing is spinning fast because of the case temperature that it is detecting. there really isn't much you could do about this, unless you found a fan controller that was compatible with it. i would even say buy the superior zalman GPU cooler but I dont want you to spend any more money if you don't have to.
if you are still having problems and thinking about ways to control individual fans, the cheapest way is with a small speed adjusting box from zalman called a fan mate (link).
also look into hard drive suspension.
unfortunately you have a new system with a bunch of components which are unfamiliar to you. how do you know what is making all the noise? you really need to test everything individually and find out what the major culprit is. from your posts so far, you already found out that the stock GPU cooler is a horrendous cause of noise in your case and you bought an arctic cooler fan for it which is slightly quieter.
here is what I would do. you have said that your case doesnt even have any external cooling. that is good and bad. the good part is that you will get less sound escaping from the rig through open fan holes. the bad is that (obviously) your system is just a giant heat sandwich and any fan in there with a thermistor (thermally controlled) is just going to spin up to a high speed and be very annoying.
speedfan is a great program, but you have to know how to configure it. you actually HAVE to configure it to work, it doesnt work just by loading it up the first time. it is a fully customizable program that sets fan speeds according to temperatures you specify. also, your motherboard needs to support software cooling on the 3-pin fan connectors. see if you can get it to work so you can turn the fans up and down.davids wrote: I downloaded Speedfan and it immediately increased my fan speed even with the case side panel off (although facing a wall), but this was accompanied by an increased wine from the stock AMD fan!!. So I've disabled it.
as for the video card, see if you can change the fan speed through the ATI software as someone suggested. it will be fine up to 70C at least, because video GPUs can handle alot of heat, I think up to 110C. I would bet that the arctic cooling thing is spinning fast because of the case temperature that it is detecting. there really isn't much you could do about this, unless you found a fan controller that was compatible with it. i would even say buy the superior zalman GPU cooler but I dont want you to spend any more money if you don't have to.
if you are still having problems and thinking about ways to control individual fans, the cheapest way is with a small speed adjusting box from zalman called a fan mate (link).
also look into hard drive suspension.
Hello Clipse
Thank you for your very informative post. I have just refitted the artic-cooler using less thermal paste than previously and immediately ATI tray tools shows that the GPU temp is 3 degrees less than before, although it is still too noisy.
I am a bit concerned about the overall lack of circulation inside the case, as it is quite a small tower and the 80mm intake and exhaust fans were not supplied by the computer manufacturer
I have 2 further questions:
ATI tray tools says that the temp inside the case is around 44 degrees (not sure if accurate) with light use. Does this sound too warm?
If yes, can you recommend quiet 80 mm fans- one intake and the other exhaust? This might encourage the Artric Cooler to slow down. I know the Nexus ones are meant to be good. How about the Zalman 80mm. I suppose I could buy fan mates to go with them.
Many thanks.
D.
Thank you for your very informative post. I have just refitted the artic-cooler using less thermal paste than previously and immediately ATI tray tools shows that the GPU temp is 3 degrees less than before, although it is still too noisy.
I am a bit concerned about the overall lack of circulation inside the case, as it is quite a small tower and the 80mm intake and exhaust fans were not supplied by the computer manufacturer
I have 2 further questions:
ATI tray tools says that the temp inside the case is around 44 degrees (not sure if accurate) with light use. Does this sound too warm?
If yes, can you recommend quiet 80 mm fans- one intake and the other exhaust? This might encourage the Artric Cooler to slow down. I know the Nexus ones are meant to be good. How about the Zalman 80mm. I suppose I could buy fan mates to go with them.
Many thanks.
D.
A good source of Panaflos in the UK:
http://www.dorothybradbury.co.uk/
(Credit goes to Aleksi for the link)
Dane.
http://www.dorothybradbury.co.uk/
(Credit goes to Aleksi for the link)
Dane.
Thanks Woody
Yes, I've located a mail order site for Panaflo fans. When you say "on a fan controller at 7v" do you mean using the fan in conjuntion with a Zalman Fan Mate 1??
So, using these fans will lower the case temp (there are currently no case fans), which in turn might encourage my naughty Artic-Cooler to slow down?
Thanks
D
Yes, I've located a mail order site for Panaflo fans. When you say "on a fan controller at 7v" do you mean using the fan in conjuntion with a Zalman Fan Mate 1??
So, using these fans will lower the case temp (there are currently no case fans), which in turn might encourage my naughty Artic-Cooler to slow down?
Thanks
D
I'd ignore the 80-L-R (Seems aimed at servers, etc and has low airflow)
If you look at the pics you'll see that the FBL 80L1A can only be mounted one way (i.e. as an exhaust in a case). The design is best suited for restricted areas and would be a good cpu fan.
However for versatility you're best off with the 80-M1A - it's louder but moves more air and can be mounted either way. It mentions the specs at 7V which are very good.
Note that these fans don't have a third rpm monitoring wire - so you can't control them by using software (speedfan, etc). Best bet would be to either get a simple fan controller or an adapter that feeds it with 7V directly.
Just my observations - but I'm no expert and have yet to use any of these fans. Guys like Aleksi and Frankgehry seem to be the most knowledgeable about fans around here.
Dane.
If you look at the pics you'll see that the FBL 80L1A can only be mounted one way (i.e. as an exhaust in a case). The design is best suited for restricted areas and would be a good cpu fan.
However for versatility you're best off with the 80-M1A - it's louder but moves more air and can be mounted either way. It mentions the specs at 7V which are very good.
Note that these fans don't have a third rpm monitoring wire - so you can't control them by using software (speedfan, etc). Best bet would be to either get a simple fan controller or an adapter that feeds it with 7V directly.
Just my observations - but I'm no expert and have yet to use any of these fans. Guys like Aleksi and Frankgehry seem to be the most knowledgeable about fans around here.
Dane.
If you want to run it at a fixed voltage then you can get converters like these: http://www.koolnquiet.co.uk/index.php?m ... &cat_id=46
(There are many places that sell them - this was simply the first one I went to - You can probably get cheaper - try eBay)
Otherwise there are many basic fan controllers which fit in either 3.5 or 5.25 bays. Read the reviews here: http://www.silentpcreview.com/section13.html
This should get you an idea of what you want for your case - in other words how much control do you want over it - do you want to be able to turn them up whilst gaming and lower them when idling - or simply leave it alone?
Dane.
(There are many places that sell them - this was simply the first one I went to - You can probably get cheaper - try eBay)
Otherwise there are many basic fan controllers which fit in either 3.5 or 5.25 bays. Read the reviews here: http://www.silentpcreview.com/section13.html
This should get you an idea of what you want for your case - in other words how much control do you want over it - do you want to be able to turn them up whilst gaming and lower them when idling - or simply leave it alone?
Dane.
Thanks again for all that.Dane wrote:.... how much control do you want over it - do you want to be able to turn them up whilst gaming and lower them when idling - or simply leave it alone?
Dane.
I think I'd like to have the option of complete control. Is it safe to take 7volts from the PSU using the standard IDE power connector? Edit: I'll just buy a Zalman Fan mate
d.
Last edited by davids on Fri Jun 10, 2005 12:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Try this: http://www.lowestonweb.com/Products/Dis ... 1CC501C267
Seems identical to this http://www.silentpcreview.com/article133-page1.html
They do it in silver as well.
This sort of thing is about as primitive as it gets - but seems to have good voltage control.
Dane.
Seems identical to this http://www.silentpcreview.com/article133-page1.html
They do it in silver as well.
This sort of thing is about as primitive as it gets - but seems to have good voltage control.
Dane.
Glad to be of help - just one question though.
Is the fan on the Arctic-cooler actually thermally controlled? - Because if it isn't then you could put your case inside a fridge and it won't make a damn bit of difference.
Sorry if this question seems patronising but I don't want you to spend extra money on lowering your case temps only to discover that the fan runs at a fixed voltage. (An 80mm exhaust still wouldn't be a waste though)
I have no experience with them so I don't know for sure - I know the early versions featured manual switches but I always thought these were fixed. I hope I'm wrong.
Dane.
Is the fan on the Arctic-cooler actually thermally controlled? - Because if it isn't then you could put your case inside a fridge and it won't make a damn bit of difference.
Sorry if this question seems patronising but I don't want you to spend extra money on lowering your case temps only to discover that the fan runs at a fixed voltage. (An 80mm exhaust still wouldn't be a waste though)
I have no experience with them so I don't know for sure - I know the early versions featured manual switches but I always thought these were fixed. I hope I'm wrong.
Dane.
Hi Dane`clipse wrote:...I would bet that the arctic cooling thing is spinning fast because of the case temperature that it is detecting....
Well, My Artic-cooler has been too noisy from the off. Earlier today, Clipse quoted the above. I don't know if it is thermally controlled or not, to be honest. But I think my case temp is on the warm side anyway (I say this because an MSI software utility registered 54 celsius for the CPU when running idle and immediately tried to shut dowm my PC!!) Therefore, perhaps I should lower the case temp anyway...and if THAT doesn't work.......well, I'll take it from there.
d
Ok - just read the SPCR review of the ATI 2 cooler (Basically the same as yours) and the fan speed is regulated by the PWM controller on the graphics card.
ATI never used to put temp sensors on their cards (Like my 9800 PRO) hence the manual switch on the early models.
So in other words - yes you case temps will effect the speed (and thus noise of your fan) and as you say they are a little on the high side anyway.
If you lower your temps and your still not happy with the noise - then one option will be to control the cooler fan yourself by whatever means you like (If it's a standard 3 pin connection then you could probably do it with a fan controller) This will of course raise your GPU temps slightly but these things can run seriously hot (More so than cpu's). And I thing AC have been quite conservative with the base rpm of the fan.
Hope it all goes well & report back once you've made any progress.
Dane.
ATI never used to put temp sensors on their cards (Like my 9800 PRO) hence the manual switch on the early models.
So in other words - yes you case temps will effect the speed (and thus noise of your fan) and as you say they are a little on the high side anyway.
If you lower your temps and your still not happy with the noise - then one option will be to control the cooler fan yourself by whatever means you like (If it's a standard 3 pin connection then you could probably do it with a fan controller) This will of course raise your GPU temps slightly but these things can run seriously hot (More so than cpu's). And I thing AC have been quite conservative with the base rpm of the fan.
Hope it all goes well & report back once you've made any progress.
Dane.
OK Dane I'll try those 80mm fans and see what happensDane wrote: If you lower your temps and your still not happy with the noise - then one option will be to control the cooler fan yourself by whatever means you like (If it's a standard 3 pin connection then you could probably do it with a fan controller)
Dane.
Re: Lowering the Artic cooler speed. I already tried this using ATI tray tools. But I found that lowering it only reduced the slight 'hum' but not the actual 'whirring', if you Know what I mean... I suppose this doesn't bode well. Anyhow, I'll try the two 80mm fans next.
to be continued....
d.
You might try 5Ving the fan. It's done in this article with a similar cooler here:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article197-page4.html
At 5V it should be very quiet.
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article197-page4.html
At 5V it should be very quiet.
[quote="Elixer"]You might try 5Ving the fan. It's done in this article with a similar cooler here:
Hi Elixir
How exactly do I 5 volt the fan ? The review you linked said" The ATI Silencer 2 fan sounded smoother with the voltage controller than when plugged directly into the VGA card's fan header." So I guess you just plug it into a separate controller and from that, straight to the pSU?
Regards
D.
Hi Elixir
How exactly do I 5 volt the fan ? The review you linked said" The ATI Silencer 2 fan sounded smoother with the voltage controller than when plugged directly into the VGA card's fan header." So I guess you just plug it into a separate controller and from that, straight to the pSU?
Regards
D.
Use this as a guide. Or you can just grab a Zalman Fanmate.
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article6-page1.html
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article6-page1.html
D,
Assuming the fan can be connected to a basic fan controller like the one I mentioned - then turning it down to the minimum setting should give you roughly 5V.
The range is approximately 5-12V on all of these controllers - it can just be a bit difficult to judge via the dial - but since your concern is the noise level then just use your ears and turn it down to a level that your happy with.
If your not satisfied with the noise at 5V then I'm afraid you'll have to look at an alternative cooler. But I wouldn't give up on the AC just yet.
Dane.
Assuming the fan can be connected to a basic fan controller like the one I mentioned - then turning it down to the minimum setting should give you roughly 5V.
The range is approximately 5-12V on all of these controllers - it can just be a bit difficult to judge via the dial - but since your concern is the noise level then just use your ears and turn it down to a level that your happy with.
If your not satisfied with the noise at 5V then I'm afraid you'll have to look at an alternative cooler. But I wouldn't give up on the AC just yet.
Dane.
True! But I have already given up on their 'customer service'- no reply to 2 emailsDane wrote:D,
If your not satisfied with the noise at 5V then I'm afraid you'll have to look at an alternative cooler. But I wouldn't give up on the AC just yet.
Dane.
So, summarising the advice from Clipse, Woody, Dane and Elixer is:
Install 2 X Panaflo 80-M1A
Get a Generic 3-ch Fan Controller
Link up the controller to the 2 fans in 7v , as well as the Artic-Cooler itself in 5v.
Thanks
D.
"I'll get on the case" (literally)
The third wire carries the rpm monitoring signal. Strictly speaking you don't need that one for the fan to work.cjpark wrote:I'd like to try using a fanmate on the stock cooler to eliminate the pwm noise but I don't know what the 3 wires are on the cooler. theres a red, black and white...anyone here know? 12V, ground, ? ???
But then if you are using the Zalman FanMate this shouldn't be important, because you just plug it between the fan the motherboard. It has the appropriate connectors and can only be plugged one way.
Thanks for the help.
The third wire is still the rpm monitoring for the ati cooler? The wires aren't set up in the same way as a normal 3 pin. the normal 3 pin is ground, 12V, sensing...this one is red, black, white which I would guess to be 12V, ground, sensing? but I don't know anything that actually tells you the rpm of the cooler which is why I wasn't sure what that wire really does.
I bought a second ATI cooler so I don't mind cutting off its connector to put on a real 3-pin but I just want to make sure I get the wires connected properly.
The third wire is still the rpm monitoring for the ati cooler? The wires aren't set up in the same way as a normal 3 pin. the normal 3 pin is ground, 12V, sensing...this one is red, black, white which I would guess to be 12V, ground, sensing? but I don't know anything that actually tells you the rpm of the cooler which is why I wasn't sure what that wire really does.
I bought a second ATI cooler so I don't mind cutting off its connector to put on a real 3-pin but I just want to make sure I get the wires connected properly.
couple of things
1)
2) ok well you have kind of a two part problem davids. keeping the ambient temperature is within operating ranges for your componentsand keeping your noise level down. normally this is simple if you have a case with airflow, unfortunately you do not. do you have a picture of your case? because you said it has no fan openings right? I think you should buy some controllers and see if you can make everything quieter and keep the temperatures within range. if not, then cut your holes and put some quiet fans in, or just do it anyways because they will be very silent anyways.
hmm, you should search around but off the top of my head here are safe temps to just keep near:
gfx CPU- less than 70
system CPU- less than 65
gfx RAM- less than 55
system RAM- less than 50
h.d.- less than 40
ambient case temperature- less than 40
(someone feel free to correct the temps i just listed, such as the safe "max" temperature for a silent system).
that way when you are turning down your fans, you know the right compromise of fan speed and component temperature
actually you can control them fine but cannot monitor their RPM. all of my panaflow's don't display a RPM but run fine software controlled under speedfan.Dane wrote: Note that these fans don't have a third rpm monitoring wire - so you can't control them by using software (speedfan, etc). Best bet would be to either get a simple fan controller or an adapter that feeds it with 7V directly.
2) ok well you have kind of a two part problem davids. keeping the ambient temperature is within operating ranges for your componentsand keeping your noise level down. normally this is simple if you have a case with airflow, unfortunately you do not. do you have a picture of your case? because you said it has no fan openings right? I think you should buy some controllers and see if you can make everything quieter and keep the temperatures within range. if not, then cut your holes and put some quiet fans in, or just do it anyways because they will be very silent anyways.
hmm, you should search around but off the top of my head here are safe temps to just keep near:
gfx CPU- less than 70
system CPU- less than 65
gfx RAM- less than 55
system RAM- less than 50
h.d.- less than 40
ambient case temperature- less than 40
(someone feel free to correct the temps i just listed, such as the safe "max" temperature for a silent system).
that way when you are turning down your fans, you know the right compromise of fan speed and component temperature