Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe cooling advice

[nugglets]

hey, im getting a new gaming rig and im pretty much going all out on it. ive now decided on the Thermalright XP-120 for the CPU and dual Zalman VF-700's for my SLI'd 7800GTX's. Mainly what im wondering is if anyone has a similar rig, or has attempted it, and if everything fit properly. it seems there should be plenty of room for the VGA coolers since the PCI-E slots are nice and far apart on the board, but i want to be certain before i buy everything. any suggestions would be appreciated though. the rigs setup will be:

Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ Toledo
2GB(2x1GB) DDR400 OCZ Platinum Dual Channel Kit
MSI GeForce 7800GTX 256MB PCI-E x2 (SLI)
Western Digital Raptor 36GB 10k RPM SATA/150
Seagate Barracuda 250GB 7200 RPM SATA/150
Aspire 520W ATX PSU
Aspire X-Cruise Black Case

thanks in advance for your help. also, is that PSU going to be able to handle what im throwing at it? and what about the 512 7800s, whats the release date and what kindve price range?

 

[suszterpatt]

Not sure about the vid cards, but the CNPS-7700 is really getting out of date. You should consider a Thermalright XP-90 or XP-120/SI-120 instead, depending on which on will fit with all the other stuff.

 

[nugglets]

i just checked it out, looks like the xp-120 should fit since its a bit smaller than the 7700. the Sl-120 on the other hand is just a tad bit bigger, and from what ive gathered about the 7700 even a few mm bigger might be too big for the A8N. im curious though, without a fan on the heatsink should the case fans near the cpu be intake or exhaust?

 

[suszterpatt]

Note that the 7700 is round shaped, while the XP/SI-120 are rectangular. So while they may list similar dimensions on their sites, the Thermalrights need space where the Zalman doesn't.


You can mount any 120mm fan of your choice on the TR coolers, no need to worry about case fans.

 

[nugglets]

yea, it shouldnt be a problem the only thing that came close with the 7700 was the far edge being extremely close to the RAM slots. i could be wrong though, anyone know for sure? any other suggestions?

 

[CraKaJaX]

personally I would get a zalman 9500, although my xp-120 idles my 3500+ @ 31c

 

[nugglets]

im thinking of just going with the 4400+ instead of the 4800+ and waiting on the A8N32-SLI Deluxe to be back in stock and then 512MB 7800GTX's if they are going to be out within the next week or two.

since the stock heatsink/fan on the 4400s and 4800s are supposed to do just fine at keeping the cpu cool, really the only advantage of changing it would be to keep the system temp down right? i dont really plan on OCing to the limit, maybe just a lil bit. so which would be better for lowering the system temp, the xp-120 or the 9500?

 

[CraKaJaX]

Originally posted by: nugglets
im thinking of just going with the 4400+ instead of the 4800+ and waiting on the A8N32-SLI Deluxe to be back in stock and then 512MB 7800GTX's if they are going to be out within the next week or two.

hi my name is nugglets, i'm poor. :laugh:

 

[nugglets]

heh, ive been saving for quite some time. ive been using my athlon xp2200+ with a geforce4 ti4200 for the past 2 years or more. soooo yea, its time once again to upgrade so i can play new games

what im wondering, the a8n32-SLI changed the locations of the PCI-E slots which makes it look like, without causing some heating issues, you wouldnt really be able to utilize any of the normal PCI slots. and is there really even going to be a difference in dual-16x at this point, or is it something that will become more useful later on. because to be honest i plan on building this and then leaving it alone for quite some time, so if the dual 16x isnt going to make a huge difference with 512 7800GTXs i might just stick with the a8n-sli deluxe. erf, ive been out of the game too long ;o