Tips on this new i3 build?

[flapane]

Asrock H61M-GS
Intel i3-2120 (-100mV undervolt) - AC Freezer 7 pro skt775@ 900rpm
DDR3 4GB/1600Mhz Corsair 2x2GB CL9 [CMX4GX3M2B1600C9] @1333mhz [email protected]
Sapphire HD5670 512MB (13w at idle) (coming from e5200 build)
SSD Corsair F80-A
HDD 500gb 5400rpm HD503HI (coming from e5200 build)
Pioneer SATA DVD-RW (coming from e5200 build)
2 90mm LED fan, 1 80mm fan@5v (coming from e5200 build)
400w Be quiet 80+ PSU (coming from e5200 build)

PSU Calculator:


SSD:


CPU and various temperatures under Intel burn test and at idle:


AUXFAN (a 90mm Thermaltake LED fan connected to the 3-pin MoBo sensor) is stuck at 1800rpm, how can I control its speed? Speedfan, ASROCK tuning utility and even UEFI settings seem useless, the FAN remains at 1800rpm no matter how I set it.

I can hear AUXFAN noise and 500gb 5400rpm HDD spinning, while everything else is quite silent.

The system idles at 64w and draws 97w under Intel burn test.
A typical Pro Evolution Soccer 2012 match at 1680x1050 and with LCD switched on (14w), draws about 110w in total.
Encoding: x264 2nd pass (720p): 97w.

What about the temperatures and the power draws?
I would have expected about 50/55w at idle, and lower idle/stress temperatures.

[ntavlas]

Idle power consumption does seem a little high but the temperatures look fine to me. If the motherboard can`t throttle the fan you`ll have to resort to manual control. You could do that quite cheaply with a zalman fanmate. You could also get an Arctic Cooling pwm fan which features pwm sharing. Then you could use the motherboard cpu header to control it along with the cpu fan (the cpu fan is pwm right?).

[flapane]

Yes it's PWM and now it spins at minimum speed according to the UEFI (900rpm).
Please can you explain me the CPU header thing?

[ntavlas]

Arctic Cooling pwm fans have a built in Y splitter. You plug one of the fans to the motherboard then, connect the second fan (in your case the cpu cooler fan) to the header provided by the first fan. If you get your hands on one the manual should make it pretty clear, it`s quite easy really. The take home message is that you can use a single fan header to control more than one pwm fan.

[flapane]

Here's a pic (taken from the web) of my heatspreader, and it has only 1 cable coming from the fan and going directly to the 3pin plug.
http://www.joeteck.com/images/ACF7Pro-B.jpg

FAN: http://www.overclock3d.net/gfx/articles ... 14941l.jpg I can't see any splitter

[ntavlas]

The fan bundled with the cooler does not have one but if you buy a stand alone AC pwm fan it will have a splitter built in.

This is what it looks like: http://www.google.gr/imgres?q=arctic+co ... x=59&ty=67

[flapane]

Thanks

[Abula]

There is something strange at idle, my build is not the same but its similar to some point, mine idles at 38W, thats 28W lower than yours and your running yours undervolted, there has to be something that its drawing so much, i dont think the Intel mobo + seasonic PSU can net more than few watts difference. I would probably try to run it without the GPU, and just use the HD2000 to see how much the GPU is drawing, in my other build im able to idle around 14W, given that the 2120 has higher clocks it will downclock to the same 1600mhz as most of the sandy bridge cpus.

[HFat]

The PSU is probably inefficient at idle. How efficient can an old Bequiet be? If it's 60% efficient at 10% load, 38W DC would get you 64W AC.
The gfx card may not idle at 13W. What's the source for that number?

[flapane]

@Abula
I need to try with the IGP and see what happens.
I even undervolted my ram from 1.5v to 1.35v...

The PSU is probably inefficient at idle. How efficient can an old Bequiet be? If it's 60% efficient at 10% load, 38W DC would get you 64W AC.
The gfx card may not idle at 13W. What's the source for that number?

It's a 2009/2010 80+ model (BQT E7-400W) which is 84% efficient at 20% load, I doubt it will be much worse at 10%. (official website)
The source for my GFX power draw is the well known "The Truth About Graphics Power Requirements V2" chart.

[flapane]

I connected my DVI lcd to the integrated DVI port and installed the latest Intel HD graphics drivers.
It idles at 60/61w, just 3/4 watts fewer than with discrete VGA enabled. I'm perplexed...