Overclocking with Arctic Freezer Pro 7 - Upgrade?

[SteveCliff]

My quad core is currently oc'd to 3.3Ghz on air using an Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro and (thankfully!) appears to be nice and stable with whatever I've thrown at it so far.

However, in order to get it that stable I've had to up the volts quite a bit and currently at idle the core temps on my CPU are about 56-58°'s. under normal "gaming" full load they are 65-68°'s and flat out in Prime95 are about 70-71°. Probably the highest I really fancy going I think?

What are anyone's thoughts on the Arctic Cooler though? Would a better cooler give me enough extra headroom to go up to 3.4 or 3.5Ghz? If so, what cooler would you use?
A friend has the Tuniq 120 and to be honest, he doesn't like it that much - he says it was a real pain to fit as the screws were not particuarly strong and his cooling isn't great (although he's checking that airflow in the case isn't the cause of this).

Comments anyone?

(If it matters, I have an Abit IP35 board with a longish 8800GTS in it, but that still leaves a fair chunk of room round the CPU i think)

[not_my_ip]

Quite often overclockers use Ninja Scythe. Good cooling and it is silent. But I'm not sure, if it will give you better performance, fan on Ninja is slightly bigger.

[barker967]

From what i have read of others opinions, the Freezer pro 7 is great if you only plan on mild overclocking. For pushing things further and keeping good temps the Thermalright Ultra 120 is a very good cooler, quite expensive (about £35ish) but very good, i plan on getting one when i go quad core.

[zephod]

Thermalright Ultra Xtreme and the Tuniq Tower seem to be the winners in most cases. However, anything of a similar design and good rep will do you fine. In these coolers the noise is generally down to the fan choice. There is plenty on the forums about which cooler/fan combo to go for! Also checkout recent(ish) Hexus reviews of many cpu coolers and anandtech have a similar test online. Would link you but in a rush so cant really find them for you, sorry.

[Pob255]

The Scythe Ninja plus is a good choise, but it is far larger then the f7p
The Scythe Mine is also good, not quite as good performance than the ninja but a smaller.

not surehow much more of an OC you'd get with one of these but your cpu will be cooler.

[redlight]

I switched my Freezer Pro 7 for an Akasa AK-965 when I went Quad it is a great cooler.
From Scan
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=608228
Last page of review for comparisons
http://www.frostytech.com/articlevie...id=2137&page=4

Running at 3.1Ghzs 33c idle 38-40c load

[Pob255]

?? strange swap they are basically the same cooler

[redlight]

?? strange swap they are basically the same cooler

May look similar but the Akasa is way better with my Quad.
Check out a few reviews on the Akasa they are all very favourable.
May be down to tighter mounting because it was a devil to seat properly.
Anyway I stick by view of it.
Another review here
http://www.xtremecomputing.co.uk/rev...?id=362&page=7

[SteveCliff]

Thanks for the comments so far - reading through (lots!) of Frostytech reviews etc. at the moment ...

[SteveCliff]

The Scythe ones do get a good write up, but ooh - I like the look of the Zalman CNPS9700 LED - very snazzy and looks a good performer. Would need to check if the damn thing would fit in my case though first!

Very tempted .... anyone got one who can comment?

[DoubleDs]

SteveCliff, I had similar temp to yours when I was using the AC Pro 7 with my Q66 OC to 3.1. It was rock solid stable, but the temp was a little too high for my liking.

I've now swapped the AC Pro to a TR 120 Extreme, and I'm getting max temp of 55C running quad prime and SMP folding. This is max temp in the middle of the day, in the evening, the max temp is as low as 50c, that's a massive 15-20C lower then what I was getting using the AC Pro.

The AC Pro is very good for C2D, but for quads, you really need to look at something substantially better.

The TR 120 extreme is expensive and I was a little apprehensive about it's performance at the beginning, but now that I've seen it in action, it's well worth the money if you're worried about the temp of your quads.

In case you're not seen it, OCUK is doing a special on the TR 120 Extreme this week

[zephod]

I use a CNPS9700 and it is a very good cooler. However, its quite pricy and is usually beaten out by the larger push-pull heatpipe coolers. Also, you have no fan choice, and it is quite noisy at high revs imo. I do think it looks good tho. Cools my q6600 no problem.

[Oldjim]

Looking at some of the links I have for cooler reviews these may help
http://firingsquad.com/hardware/core...up/default.asp
http://www.frostytech.com/articlevie...id=2125&page=6
http://www.silentpcreview.com/section11.html

[SteveCliff]

SteveCliff, I had similar temp to yours when I was using the AC Pro 7 with my Q66 OC to 3.1. It was rock solid stable, but the temp was a little too high for my liking....

After doing a lot (far too much!) of reading, I think I might blow some cash on the TR 120. But even though I've pretty much decided on that - I now have to choose a fan!!!

What fan are you using with yours? I've used Akasa fan's in the past and found them very quiet but still powerful?

[SteveCliff]

Just a quick "thanks" btw for all the damn good information in this thread - I love this forum and the people in it - it makes purchasing stuff that you're not too clued up on much easier!!!

[Pob255]

May look similar but the Akasa is way better with my Quad.
Check out a few reviews on the Akasa they are all very favourable.
May be down to tighter mounting because it was a devil to seat properly.
Anyway I stick by view of it.
Another review here
http://www.xtremecomputing.co.uk/rev...?id=362&page=7

Yes I've read up the reviews of the ak-965 and they all pritty much say the same as the reviews for the AC f7p
The one thing I've not seen is a review directly compairing the two.
They "should" both fit as well as each other as they both use exactly the same copy of the intel stock connector (push pins and crossbar) the only thing that I can think of is that your ac f7p crossbar had gotten bent slightly redceing the tension.

Don't get me wrong it seems to be a great cooler and slightly cheaper than the AC f7p which means I'd sugest it to someone coming off an intell stock cooler or for small overclocks.