Artick Help w. CPU Fan

I have a Arctic Cooling Freezer LP fan for my HTPC. Fan is designed for HTPC configurations.

Anyhow my question is this, the fan screws to the motherboard. How do you know when it is tight enough? Does it screw right down to the motherboard? I just don't want to break the motherboard by overtightening the fan.

My system at idle is running around 20-25degrees. When stressed it overheats and powers off...


Case Fan link:
http://www.arcticcooling.com/cpu2.php?idx=129&disc=

 

Having not used that particular heat sink, I can't comment on specifics, but it's been my experience with screw-in heat sinks that when the screws stop turning, it's in tightly and where it should be. If it feels like you're forcing the screws to turn, stop. All the screw-in heat sinks I've used simply just stop turning and it's easy to tell when you're done. Of course the screws will turn more if you crank on 'em, but you're not supposed to crank on anything in a PC. If in doubt, contact the manufacturer via email or check their forums if they have 'em. Judging from the following quote, I'd say the heat sink is working just fine because a CPU will hit critical temps really fast without a heat sink and fan working.

I'm assuming that these two sentences are unrelated and you're just stating two completely independent facts about your PC. 20-25c degrees is VERY low, even though it is at idle. My PC idles in the mid 30s to low 40s (core 1 is always cooler than core 2). Under a heavy load whilst gaming, the temps get to the low/mid 50s. What kind of temps are you getting when the PC overheats and shuts down? Most newer motherboards have a setting in the BIOS where you can select the shutdown temp for a CPU. It could be that yours is set remarkably low. I have mine set to sound a warning at 60 and to shut down at 65. I have never heard the warning, let alone had a shut down due to high temps. Here's a link to a great temp monitor. Leave it running while you use your PC and it will record the high and low and save it to a log if you want.
HWMonitor http://www.majorgeeks.com/HWMonitor_d5842.html

 

I have been using CORETEMP.

I think I'm going to acquire a NEW heatsink as I don't feel this one is doing the job...

Question though. For a stock fan they have compound on the fans now out of the box. Should one require anything else such as a Zalman STG1 thermal grease?

 

After doing some research I have found that this CPU fan I have is COMPLETE JUNK.

http://www.frostytech.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=2094&page=4

I'm going to pickup the Zalman 8700NT.

 

You should NOT add any thermal snot to a new heat sink that has a pre-applied layer of thermal grease. If you'd rather use your own product, you can completely clean the pre-applied grease with a QTip and rubbing alcohol, then use a VERY thin but evenly spread out layer of grease.