12 degrees cooler without case?

[TheLeviathan]

Well, I have been lurking around here for a couple of weeks now and have become hooked. I am building a new system and have got a case, mobo and floppy drive so far and 1 stick of 256 mb memory.Well this morning I put the memory in my other rig to test run it. Normal temps for my 1 gig T-bird under full load is 48. While testing the memory the case is off and the temp maxed out at 36 under full load. I am using the stock cpu HSF(AOC). Does this mean that the stock HSF is good and I need More fresh air in the case? I took the case and drilled some(alot) of holes in it on the side just above the mobo mounting plate by the cpu and now full load is hanging at 44. Anybody got any thoughts on this?

 

[bacillus]

the ambient case temperature has a direct relationship to how efficiently your HSF can cool your cpu!
better ventilation/cooling of your case with additional case fans to lower ambient case temperature will improve your cpu temperature !