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Need new heatsink for Q9650

ljtatej

Member
I'm kinda late in the game due to my budget, but with all the experience here this is the best place to start. I need the best cooler that will fit in an Antec Solo case. My temps are horrible after repeated applications of my trusty Zalman 9500a with different thermal compounds. It works fine for a dual core, but not this quad. I know this thing can do more than 3.8 but the temps skyrocket near 80c or over using linpack. I get scared at anything over 70c.
 
I have had great luck with the arctic cooler freezer 7 pro
I got a e8400 to 4.2ghz and a q9400 to 3.8ghz using that cooler.

Maybe you should try a cooler that will allow you to mount a good hi cfm case fan on it, the acf7pro fan is around 40 some ide cfm, slap a 80cfm or higher fan on the cooler and see what happens..
 
CCT Freezer 120 works like a champ with my Q9650, is able to withstand the temperature of my CPU at 3.82GHz with a room temperatures over 86F.
 
Well I now have a True Black that I have lapped along with the cpu. Temp are 12 degrees cooler than my Zalman. I realized something though during this whole process, My psu is struggling with overclocking my current system. 3.6 is great but anything more and it gets hot(both cpu and psu). I did pull one of the vid cards and noticed a dramatic improvement. So I guess I will be in the market for a good psu soon. I am thinking of going with a corsair 750 or 850, but until I get the money I guess I'm stuck at 3.6 if I want to use crossfire.
 
Well I now have a True Black that I have lapped along with the cpu. Temp are 12 degrees cooler than my Zalman. I realized something though during this whole process, My psu is struggling with overclocking my current system. 3.6 is great but anything more and it gets hot(both cpu and psu). I did pull one of the vid cards and noticed a dramatic improvement. So I guess I will be in the market for a good psu soon. I am thinking of going with a corsair 750 or 850, but until I get the money I guess I'm stuck at 3.6 if I want to use crossfire.

You have an EW 650? That's really odd, you shouldn't be having power issues with your config, your cards aren't that demanding. At peak you're pulling about 450W. Video cards aside (I run Xfire 5850s), my machine is quite similar to yours, and it hums right along with a Corsair HX650. Have you checked your Antec with a meter while the machine is under load? What's it reading on the 12v rail?
 
if you have a Q9650, you dont wanna get anything less than a TRUE or a megahalems. i would honestly go for the new venomous-X from thermalright though if you want to stick to air. my Q9650 wouldnt run linpack at all with the specs in my sig, it would immediately hit 80c and then thermal shutdown would kick in a second later. im water cooling it now but i was running it OCCT 24hr stable under a megahalems with those settings. temps under occt were in the 65-70c range on an average day (72f ambient), tends to get a lot hotter here though in the summer.

ed: if you cant fit any of those tower coolers in the antec solo, i would consider looking at the corsair H50 as an alternative, and putting push/pull fans onto it. its a reasonably good performer, nothing like a DIY water cooling setup but it performs alongside the best of the air coolers. comes with shin etsu thermal grease preapplied as well, so aside from swapping out the fans its ready to go out of the box
 
You need a used Tuniq Tower with a good 120mm fan that can do 2000 rpms when needed. Also, put as many fans as your case will allow. Good air flow is the key... the tower takes the heat off your cpu and the case fans removes the heat from your case.
 
Tuniq tower isn't that good for quad OCing. The 3 heatpipe design just can't keep up with the high heat an OC quad can put out. He would probably see minimal improvent with it. The tuniq tower extreme might do it, but it's rather expensive, better to just go by what I said in my prior post

Ed: I need to read the thread better LOL. Good call on the lapped TRUE, the EW line isn't as robust as some newer designs and if taking out a high draw device fixed stuff I would get a psu. Will link some good options when I get home
 
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I got the ThermalRight True Black with 2 Cooler Master 120s 2000rpm. It helped like I said but this power supply has been through the ringer. My first system with it got hit with a power spike that blew an e6750 oced to 3.6 on an evga 680i. I was skeptical about using it, but served me well through 3 systems after that. Now its going into my wifes new system...she loves my hand-me-downs. Anyway I have a bfg ex-1000(new revision) on the way that I got in a trade. I know its overkill but hopefully it will last a couple more builds down the road.
 
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