Temperatures | CPU's | 80mm case fans - Your Advice Please

[Vimeous]

It's review time for my PC's and it seems I'm in need of improved cooling!
To this end what do you think of the following questions and queries?

1. My Coolermaster Black-Widow (system 3 in my siggy) is to become a media server so it need to be quiet and run cool. It's already running Zalman CPU and GPU flower coolers which made a big difference. It's also running it's full compliment of 3x 80mm fans, two shiney blue Akasa's and the original case fan.
My question for this machine is this: Are there better 80mm shiney blue fans that pull through max cfm at sub 25dB?

2. System 4 in my siggy is due to go to a new home but suffers overheating when gaming. It is now aimed at a home office user who has limited space to cram the case into but equally won't be playing anything more strenuous than WOW.
a) Are there still good value coolers for the AGP 6600GT gfx cards available?
b) The case is limited to 2x 80mm fans so what is the best cfm sub-30dB fan out there?
c) The CPU cooler is a massive Coolermaster Aero with rear-slot mounted speed control which is much to fiddly for the new user who needs fit and forget. Should I refit my original Akasa HSF or are better alternatives still available for Socket A CPU's?


CPU Temperatures
As you can see both of these systems run older CPU's, a Socket 754 Sempron 3100+ and a Socket A XP2600 (barton). The XP generation of CPU's in particular were well know for running hot.
Ignoring performance differences do you think a new CPU/MBoard/RAM on either of these two systems would make a cooler, quieter PC build much easier?


Can you offer your advice? Do you know of a TDP comparison sites for old vs new CPU's? As always any and all suggestions are welcome

[Jasp]

System 1, tbh if its the Akasa fans im thinking of on scan they state they pull 28.76cfm at 27.45db, thats actually quite a lot for a little fan lol anywho what about getting a fan controller? either way golfball jobby sounds like what you are after they claim 17.8db and 22.7cfm though you are gonna lose airflow going the quiet route.

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/80mm-...se-Fan-227-CFM

Cheaper but louder:http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/80mm-...LED-Quiet-22db

& If price and shiny blue are not a concern : http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/80mm-...Quiet-Case-Fan http://www.dvhardware.net/review106_2_noctua_fans.html

System 2, if you replacing your fans anyway can they not go to this system as a cheaper way of doing things?

[Vimeous]

Thanks Jasp.
The golfballs certainly look a possibility. If I want to retain the blue glow through the front grill I guess I can venture into the world of cold cathode tubes. Those fans look as though they'd reflect the nicely.
I wonder if the Akasa 182's would do the same despite the amber colouring (25.4cfm/20dB http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/80mm-...-and-Long-Life). Does anyone have experience with either of these fans?

The Coolermaster fan looks very similar to the rear case fan. As the machine won't be running games it's possible a pair of these blowing across the four drives at the front will be enough. My concern would be positioning, I need to find somewhere with better airflow to house the system!


As for system 2 you're right. The Akasa's would suit that perfectly and I've no idea why I didn't think of it earlier! Oh ok maybe because it was gone 2am when I posted lol
The Akasa's I have are the 170's as you thought. I guess I'll run fingers crossed for that and hope it's enough.

Meanwhile does anyone know of the relative heat output between the CPU's I mentioned?

[Zhaoman]

the golfballs are silent but they pull practically no air. i have one in the pc i'm using now and honestly i don't even know if it's pulling any air at all...

[scaryjim]

The S754 Sempron's have a TDP of 62W. Your old Barton XP 2600+ has a TDP of 68.5W. So neither of them is meant to be a particular heat hog (when compared with todays multicore processors, that is). Then again, since they produced less heat I guess that heatsinks for them were built to a lower tolerance / performance point? I'm still running a Thoroughbred Athlon 2600+ with a big chunky HSF and several 80MM case fans and my computer is as noisy as anything (although relatively cool). It might be a good idea to make sure the HSF is completely free of dust - I cleaned mine recently and it made a couple of degrees difference!

The other option would be to do some cheap water cooling which would assist in reducing noise - but you'd be looking at an absolute minimum spend of £100 for the cheapest you could get, and while that would reduce your noise to 2 80MM fans it probably wouldn't produce any huge benefit in terms of reducing temperatures...

[Jasp]

Wiki answers all. Not 100% sure its what ya after but does list all the TDP of the chips.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...icroprocessors

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...icroprocessors

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...icroprocessors

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...icroprocessors

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CPU_power_dissipation

[Pob255]

The Akasa ambers are good, but I'm not sure what the amber blades would do to the color of a blue light behind.
However you're just going to hit the same problems with any 80mm fan you cannot get very much air flow while still remaining silent.
You could try these for the rpm control so you can adjust it for air/sound volume.
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/80mm-...1-Ball-Bearing

Modding the cases for bigger fans may be a good idea, or even cheap replacement cases
I take it this is the spec you are giving away, 4 : XP 2600+ | 0.75Gb PC2700 | K7NF2 RAID | 6600GT | 160Gb + 120Gb | DVD | 350W | Centurion |
And that that is a Coolermaster Centurion case? but which one? CM have made a lot of different Centurion case.
What's the size issue? a cheap £20 case with 120mm fans may be a better move, if you don't actually open up a pc and dig around inside it the quality of a case is no ware near so important.
eg. http://www.ebuyer.com/product/150289#
£20 and your average user will think "oh black and shiny and look the fan lights up" they will not care that the steel isn't that thick or changing the hard drive will be like rummaging around in a kitchen draw full of knives.
They'll not care because they'll never open it up and if something goes wrong they'll call you.

[Vimeous]

Zhaoman your concerns are duly noted

Scaryjim your regarding cleaning HSF's is very valid and something home users should pay more attention to. I once knocked a whole 10degC from a CPU temp by emptying the dust out! lol

As you and the links Jasp provided point out, the Sempron (mines the earliest flavour) has a TDP of 62W and the XP2600 68.5W. A bit more searching (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...22_.2845_nm.29) shows an E5200 runs the smack in the middle of this little lot at 65W.
The implication is that these older cases with 80mm fans should still be able to cope without resorting to any mods

Pob thanks for the vote of confidence in the Akasa ambers. I actually have a pair of the rpm controlled Akasa's in storage after I got fed up with routing the cables through the USB port access in the Black Widow case. The standard 170's replaced them and it saved me fiddling with a screw driver in hot weather
You're right about the machine. The Centurion doesn't seem to have a subname, I think it is the original variant and v cheap it was too! (£35 methinks)
Meanwhile I spotted this: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Scyth...System-Cooling which should sit nicely in the three spare bays without any chopping up. While it's not huge airflow it should make a big difference if the PSU can help to shift air out of the rear of the case.



So at the moment it seems I can forgo new CPU's.
The first system should get some Akasa ambers while I ignore the colours and worry about that later.
Meanwhile the second system gets the removed Akasa blues and a swap of the Aero cooler for the simpler Akasa in my spares draw (http://www.akasa.co.uk/akasa_english...k_824cu_bl.htm). Add the Scythe bay convertor and I reckon we've got a winner!

[Zhaoman]

is there a dust filter on that Kama bay fan? if you get it can u keep us posted thx, i'm thinking about one for my aurora case which has a measly intake

[Pob255]

Instead of the Scyth you could go with the sharkoon fan frame, granted this is designed to normally sit behind mesh drive bay blanks so may not look so pritty.
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Shark...-or-120mm-fan)
You can then get one of the nice 140mm Sharkoon system fans to go in it.
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/140mm...200rpm-27db(A) for air flow, but would be best with a fan controller if you have one.
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/140-S...900rpm-22db(A) probably a safer bet if you want low noise with out mucking about.
Or a blue LED 120mm fan.

Or get the Scythe take the fan out and put a different one in there, which will leave you with a nice slient fan it's the same ones Scythe supply with some of there coolers (eg Scythe ninja)

@Zhaoman, Yes there is a filter in there http://www.modthebox.com/review458_1.shtml

[Mithrandir]

is there a dust filter on that Kama bay fan? if you get it can u keep us posted thx, i'm thinking about one for my aurora case which has a measly intake

Yes, there is a dust filter on the Scythe kama bay as I have been using one in my CM cavalier 3

[Zhaoman]

cool thx will be getting one soon then

[Pob255]

Yes, there is a dust filter on the Scythe kama bay as I have been using one in my CM cavalier 3

As you've got one Mithrandir what's the air flow of the fan like?