Finally!

I finally got my Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe temperatures down.

I added two 80mm blowholes + fans to the side of the case.

Old Temps (including an Antec PCI Exhaust fan)
----------------------


CPU 36 idle 47 load
MB 43 idle 49 load
HD0 40 idle 43 load
HD1 33 idle ??load

New Temps (minus Antec PCI fan)
---------------------

CPU 33 idle 45 load
MB 36 idle 43 load
HD0 38 idle ?? load
HD1 30 idle ??load


Now I can safely add that second GTX without worrying about my motherboard burning up on me.


To think it only took:

2 90mm fans
2 120mm fans
2 80MM fans




Specs:

AMD 64 X2 4400+
Asus A8N32 SLI Deluxe
2gb PC3200 DDR
XFX OC Nvidia 7800GTX

 

Don't go deaf.

Better yet you might have to put some weights on it to stop it taking off.

 

No joke.

The sickening thing is, with the two extra 80mm fans, its quieter than when the 7800GTX spins up to full speed, which it no longer needs to do.

 

Sounds like the cooling is under control now.

Good to know it has that bit extra if needed.

 

With this one?

Sure is.

 

Unless you have a side case fan, try to find a mb that does not use passive cooling via heatpipes.


Its a neat idea, but it doesn't dissipate heat fast enough.

It does enough to stay within spec, and thats about it. I don't feel comfortable with mb load temperatures of 49-50c.

 

Interesting and it seems that your mobo showing the greatest difference. On that point I was wondering where you positioned the fans?!? I already have one located roughly over the CPU. It has an 80mm fan but it also has a bay for two additional fans where the Video Card is (256Mb).

My Sys:

(All degrees C)

CPU Idle 49 Load 60
MB Idle 41 Load 48
HDD Idle 42 Load 55
Room 29

Look at the pic and you will the fan grill for the two extra fans.

What do you think?
Should I place 2 x 80mm fans ($6ea) here to cool my sys slightly further? and if so;
Both as inlets or 1 in and 1 out or 2 out (draw heat from Vid Card but may exhaust heat to above side inlet fan)? or
Should i get a Vid Card fan to mount over the heat sink with an exhaust out of PCI slot ($35)?

 

Well, the case I have is a TT Armor:

http://thermaltake.com/product/Chassis/fulltower/armor/va8000bns.asp

So initially, my fan placement is a lower 120mm intake, 120mm exhaust. At the top, I have a rear drive cage with a 90mm exhaust, and a 90mm exhaust fan in the top.

I cut two holes in the case, not quite in the center. One is lower, near the bottom, and it catches part of the rear of the video card, and hits the lowest part of the mb chipset (northbridge) head on. I then put one above it about 2 inches, and it hits mostly the ram. That one I believe was probably less effective, but I figured I might as well.

My holes are roughly where your vents are, except a little further closer to the center.

I think the key for the mb is to hit the northbridge. Its the hottest part of the board, and even a little fresh air does wonders. Keep in mind though, my fan placement was purely for mb cooling, although the CPU benefited by a few degrees. I am using stock cooling. The excellent CPU temperatures lend a large hand to Cool N' Quiet.

as for your other questions, I am no expert, but I would make them both intakes. My logic would be that hot air rises, and the idea behind it is to get the hot air off of the equipment asap. Your top exhaust, or top rear exhaust can take it from there.

--Like an NV Silencer type of thing? I heard those were excellent.

As for the fan at the top, I'd experiement with intake and exhaust and see which yields best results. I would worry that too much air against the cpu would negate the effectiveness of the HSF. I could be wrong of course, being a novice at it.

This is a poor pic, hope it answers your question:

 

Thats a nice looking air cooled case. I only have one front inlet but it has to draw from beneath the front panel, hence I elevate 5cm to facilitate. Am considering a top exhaust shortly especially if I add two further inlets. Once winter hits (2 months) will tweak my sys a bit and see what it can do but just making sure I get some excellent air cooling setup firstly.

 

I now understand your comment about the second motherboard. With mine the CPU temperatures are higher than the motherboard. Its currently running with CPU 49C and MB 37C while idle. I'm thinking its the Zalman Fatal1ty CPU cooler that is having a positive effect on a lot of the surrounding motherboard components. Ambient room temp is about 23C

 

Now having read everything here I think I should add some more. It appears we are using the same case so to get some idea of load temps I ran Prime95 in the background then executed the HL Lost Coast Video stress test. The Cpu did reach 60C but the MB never went above 41C. The CPU cooler IMO is cooling the NB, memory modules and the two heatsinks to the left and above the CPU. Just for the record I have an 80mm where the PCI slots are but if I'm honest I don't really think it is doing anything especially as a resistor is reducing rpm to cut out the noise.

 

Well, I've done quite a bit of research on this board, and imo, the culprit is the heatpipe solution. There are cases all across the net running into the same problem. Some worse than mine, some slightly better. It should be noted that under no circumstance does my CPU ever hit 60c, even with two instances of Prime95 running (one on each core).

You can feel the heat building up on the chipset, just by feel. Mostly, its centered around the SB, which is located very, very close to my 7800GTX, which keeps it nice and toasty (Its not unheard of GTX temps hitting 80c+). If I direct a stream of cool air right onto the SB, the temperature drops almost instantly. In the past, I ijnitially thought it was the NB(something Asus told me too), but doing more research I don't agree that it is entirely the problem.

I don't think changing CPU coolers is going to help that much.


Note my idle temperatures with a stock CPU cooler is 33c, CPU and 34-36c mb, give or take a few degress.

If I turn off Cool n' Quiet, I'd probably have higher CPU temps vs. mb temps, because the CPU would then idle at about 43-45c.

On my Prime95, and 3dmark, PCmark tests, the motherboard never moved above more than a few degress either. However, I've found that real gaming is a little different.

TES: Oblivion heats it up the most, which saw my mb hit temperatures of 46c. It seems the hotter my video card gets, the higher the mb temperatures jump.

Heatpipes are just a bad idea, all around for a mb cooling solution. The heat isn't pulled off all of the chipsets quick enough.

My NB is midly warm to the touch. My SB is sweltering.

One of my 80mm fans is where my PCI slots are, too. Its the one that drops my temperatures so much.

I'm on my second board, but I am usnure it was a heat related failure. It croaked after 60 days, eventually to be stuck in a BIOS recovery mode, but intially started out as Stop erros in eveyr mode and the inability to enter the BIOS without locking. Thats giving a very compressed explanation of events.

 

Without Cool and Quiet:

 

Without CnQ, running Prime95(x2) with Large FFTs for max heat and PcMark05:

 

OK that's interesting and there are some things I'd like to ask that might help me outsome if you don't mind. Firstly, I've not used the Cool and quiet settings at all. I just have the CPU overclocked with FSB running at 225MHZ. I'll point out straight away that I have not done this off my own back, I'm still getting to grips with what's been changed and what effects they have. Can I run the cool 'n' quiet without losing settings?

Secondly with regard to the Fan at the PCI slots, I think my mistake has been thinking I needed to extract warm air rather than supply more cool air, would you agree? If so maybe I can just turn it around.

My South bridge seems to cooled pretty effectively by the 120mm front intake, it is cool to the touch now i'd guess not more than 20C (idle)although I can verifiy if you want later (we have a optical temp sensor at work that I've been dying to bring home for 30mins to test components.). The airflow from the front is uninterupted as the HDs are next to the PSU.

 

It also looks like you get to run your fans more quietly, I do prefer to run with the fans on full all the time since the CPU was overclocked prior to this minimum was fine. Also do you know how to take screenshots of the BIOS settings because I'm pretty certain when summer arrives I'm going to have to return the FSB to 200MHz.

 

Any screenies of the BIOS are usually a camera. Cool and Quiet cannot be used while overclocking, and my side fans are intake fans. Interesting that my SB is so much warmer, but we have similar mb temperatures. My SB would be cooled fine by the intake too, if it werent for my hard drives being in the way

Try unplugging that side PCI fan and see what happens.

In regards to my fan speeds, the fans being shown there are only a couple. One is a chassis fan(120mm), one is the CPU fan, and one is a PSU fan.

There isnt enough monitored headers to monitor all of my fans.

 

I think my VGA cooler must also be helping, both have Zalman VF700-CU and that is blowing air right across the SB. I think I've misled you somewhat with the position ofthe PCI slots fan. I mean it really is where the PCI slots are. I've open the 3 unused covers to allow at least some air through. I may be wrong but I'm guessing you mean yours are in the side panel? I'll try spinning it 180 so its putting air into the case and see what happens.

 

Yes, mine are on the side panel.

 

hey is anyone here. my first time logging in.say hello to me.

 

hey is anyone here. my first time logging in.say hello to me.

 

http://forums.majorgeeks.com/forumdisplay.php?f=41

Please post in the welcome forum, not in an old thread.

Thanks!