Not Enough Airflow to Cool My FX-55

[Deadalus]

Hi,

I have a Lian Li v1100B (see HERE) and I am using a Zalman CNPS7700-AlCu HSF (see HERE) cooling my Athlon FX-55 processor.

With Cool & Quiet on, it idles at around 40-42 °c which is OK, but under load this has risen (and risen quickly) to 61 °c which I am concerned about.

If I take the side off the case off, the CPU idles around 32 °c and maxes out at around 54 °c.

I think the problem is that I am not getting enough air intake - there is no intake fan in the main chamber of the v1100B case!

What do you guys think?

I use my PC for gaming and design work, so I need good cooling power, but I also need to leave my PC on at night sometimes, so I would like a solution that is relativly quiet.

I think my options are:

A: Get a new case, I have been looking at the Thermaltake Tsunami, but have heard mixed reviews. Any other suggestions are welcome.

B: Install watercooling. I'm slightly hesitant about this as I don't want to cause more harm then good. This is my first 'self-built' PC. I was looking at the "Corsair Cool" as a solution. Again suggestions are welcome!

Many thanks.

 

[LouPoir]

Ive ever been particularly impressed with your Zalman cooler. I have one.

I would suggest a different HSF.

Lou

 

[jose]

If you decide to get a new case, take a serious look at the CM Stacker..

You can put 2 - 120mm front fans, 1 - rear 120mm fan . Also if you want to mod it alittle you could fit a 120mm fan in the side panel where a stock 80mm fan would fit.

Regards,
Jose

 

[NetDevil]

You should see if you applied the termal grease corectly. The cooler is good enough for your fx55. Also install the upper back fan to bring air into the case not to exhaust it. That might do the work.

 

[Deadalus]

I've reapplied the thermal grease a couple of times (Arctic Silver 5) and I am reasonably happy that I got the amount right...

Thanks for all the suggestions guys, keep them coming!

 

[theMan]

thermalright xp-90. heatpipe technology triumphs.

 

[Deadalus]

As per NetDevil's suggestion I have made the rear fan an intake rather than an exaust and it seems to have helped. I will need to do some more testing, but it is a temporary solution at least. Thanks NetDevil.

My only concern is that there is not really any exaust fan now, although the case does have some holes near the top where I can feel heat escaping from.

I may try fitting a XP-90 in the near future to see if that will help even further.

Any further suggestions are still welcome.

Thanks again, I knew I could rely on the Anandtech community for good advice!

 

[furballi]

Definitely an air flow issue with your rig. Once you open up the case, the Zalman is able to draw cold air for cooling. No fancy heat pipe is going to fix your cooling problem if you are recirculating HOT AIR!

Definitely check out the Antec SLK3000B. It has a side vent that will allow the CPU cooler to draw cold room temp air for cooling.

32C is about right for the Zalman. Mine idles around 33C with Cool n Quiet ON. It's at 52C when running Prime95 (max heat mode). The room temp is around 25C. I have a 3000 Winchester overclocked to about 2.4 GHz.

 

[miketheidiot]

my zalman hits 59 on prime, but my room is warm, case temps in the low 30's C.

I have a questions, is the HSF above the rear exhaust fan? remember heat rises, and the hot air at the top won't get sucked out. You could try a pci slot fan. Blow in with the exhaust probably helps a lot because you have cold air moving right into the hsf.

EDIT: its the case

 

[Aries64]

Originally posted by: Deadalus
Hi,

I have a Lian Li v1100B (see HERE) and I am using a Zalman CNPS7700-AlCu HSF (see HERE) cooling my Athlon FX-55 processor.

With Cool & Quiet on, it idles at around 40-42 °c which is OK, but under load this has risen (and risen quickly) to 61 °c which I am concerned about.

If I take the side off the case off, the CPU idles around 32 °c and maxes out at around 54 °c.

I think the problem is that I am not getting enough air intake - there is no intake fan in the main chamber of the v1100B case!

What do you guys think?

I use my PC for gaming and design work, so I need good cooling power, but I also need to leave my PC on at night sometimes, so I would like a solution that is relativly quiet.

I think my options are:

A: Get a new case, I have been looking at the Thermaltake Tsunami, but have heard mixed reviews. Any other suggestions are welcome.

B: Install watercooling. I'm slightly hesitant about this as I don't want to cause more harm then good. This is my first 'self-built' PC. I was looking at the "Corsair Cool" as a solution. Again suggestions are welcome!

Many thanks.

Personally, I wouldn't have reversed the exhaust fan - I would have kept it blowing out, but if it seems to have helped you fine. I have the V1000 (really a V1100 without the door) and I have reservations about both cases' dependency upon the rear pulling cool air in and pushing warm air out, especially with a guaranteed amount of "bleed" inherent in the mesh design of the V1000 and V1100.

One thing you might try is installing an Arctic Cooling Silencer on your videocard if you don't already have one (and if one is available to fit your card if you don't). If you aren't familiar with the Silencers they feature what AC calles a DHES (Direct Heat Exhaust System). The DHES consists of a high-efficiency, copper/aluminum HS, a plastic shroud and "vented" expansion-slot cover to channel the warm air drawn off the GPU to the outside of your PC, and a very quiet ceramic bearing fan. Because of the efficiency of this setup, it will keep your videocard cooler than the stock SHF while also running more quietly.

By lowering the ambient inside your PC the CPU's HSF will be able to work more efficiently because they will be circulating cooler air over the CPU's HS. This in turn may further quiet your PC because the HSF won't have to run at full speed as much.

After you get a Silencer and are acyually venting that GPU heat outside of your case
you should also look into a Thermalright XP90 and a high-efficiency 92mm fan. The Retail FX-55 fan is good (is that even what you're running?), but the XP-90 is better, especially when mated to a good fan.

 

[Operandi]

You never mentioned what the ambient case and room temp is. Without that it?s hard to judge how well your system is being cooled. If your room temp is high it may be doing just fine, and just for the record 61c is nothing to worry about.

I will say though the exhaust fan should remain and exhaust fan, Lian Li designed it that way for a reason. You may have been able to lower your CPU temp a bit but overall it's going to do more harm then good.

 

[NetDevil]

I don`t think that putting the fan as an intake it would do any harm. The cold air will cool the cpu, motherboard,gpu,etc. You should buy a pci slot fan to exhaust the hot air because i don`t think that the psu can exhaust it all.

 

[imported_rod]

But air from the back of the case will be getting warm due to the PSU exhausting hot air.

Do you have an intake fan at the front of your case? If not, a 120mm fan there would make a difference (of course, you'd have to put the rear fan back as an exhaust).

RoD

 

[NetDevil]

The case has an intake fan at the front but it`s in the lower chamber and i don`t think enough cold air is getting in the upper chamber.

 

[Deadalus]

Thanks for all the replies guys.

My case (system) internal temp is normally about 40 °c and my room is normally about 20 °c (give or take a few degrees).

The following LINK is a picture of the inside of my rig, so you can get an idea of the layout. Notice that the only intake fan is in the lower chamber opposite the hard-drive cages.

Thanks again.

 

[furballi]

The case temp should be about 10C higher than the room temp if you have good airflow. I see a lot of wires that will impede air flow.

These is no fresh air coming into the bottom chamber to cool the chipset, video card, and CPU.

I'd seriously consider switching to the Antec SLK3000B case. If you're not getting enough cooling, then add one Panaflo 80 mm case fan (low speed) to the side vent. I don't think you will need to add another 60 mm case fan to the bottom vent to cool the video card.

 

[paadness]

Did u change the CPU voltage and forgot to reverse it. I had this experience, switched from 1.5V to 1.7V for fun and forgot to change it back. Saw my temperatures going full 10C higher.

Check the BIOS just in case.

 

[Operandi]

Originally posted by: furballi
The case temp should be about 10C higher than the room temp if you have good airflow. I see a lot of wires that will impede air flow.

These is no fresh air coming into the bottom chamber to cool the chipset, video card, and CPU.

I'd seriously consider switching to the Antec SLK3000B case. If you're not getting enough cooling, then add one Panaflo 80 mm case fan (low speed) to the side vent. I don't think you will need to add another 60 mm case fan to the bottom vent to cool the video card.

Go from a Lian-Li 1100V to SLK3000, yuck.

He already has one of the best cases made, changing would be pretty pointless. Cooling between the two can't be much different one way or the other and the Antec is eye sore compared to the Lian Li.

 

[Deadalus]

Originally posted by: paadness
Did u change the CPU voltage and forgot to reverse it. I had this experience, switched from 1.5V to 1.7V for fun and forgot to change it back. Saw my temperatures going full 10C higher.

Check the BIOS just in case.

It's set to auto, shows as 1.504 in CPU-Z when Cool & Quiet is off...

Originally posted by: furballi

I see a lot of wires that will impede air flow.

This is the case becuase I have 3x HDDs and 2x CD/DVD drives, so this can't really be avoided in the lower half of the case. There are no wires really effecting airflow in the top-half because there is no front intake fan in the top half.

Thanks again for all your replies.

 

[furballi]

Bottom line is that when you open up the case, the temp drops. Has NOTHING to do with the Zalman heatsinks. The CPU temp will only drop if you blow more cold air directly into the CPU cooler.

As is, the incoming air is heated by the hard drive. By the time it gets to the Zalman CPU cooler, it will be 10 to 15C higher than room temperature. This will naturally elevate your CPU temp by the same amount.

If you have a side vent on the case, then the CPU cooler will be able to use the air that's 10C cooler. Translation...lower CPU temp.

 

[Operandi]

Originally posted by: furballi
Bottom line is that when you open up the case, the temp drops. Has NOTHING to do with the Zalman heatsinks. The CPU temp will only drop if you blow more cold air directly into the CPU cooler.

As is, the incoming air is heated by the hard drive. By the time it gets to the Zalman CPU cooler, it will be 10 to 15C higher than room temperature. This will naturally elevate your CPU temp by the same amount.

If you have a side vent on the case, then the CPU cooler will be able to use the air that's 10C cooler. Translation...lower CPU temp.

10c is bit much, even I remove the side panel completely from my Lian Li 6070 the most I see is a 5c drop, north bridge temp stays about the same. I should also note my case has pretty low air flow, two L1As @ 5v and 2 L1As that are temp controlled, the highest they reach is prolly no more then 1200 RPM. A case with better air flow would see even less of a difference.

CPU temp is primarily determined by the CPU HS/F, if you decent air flow in your case your fine, it doesn?t have very big role to play in CPU temps.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: LouPoir
Ive ever been particularly impressed with your Zalman cooler. I have one.

I would suggest a different HSF.

Lou

Same.
Go with a Thermalright XP-90 or XP-120... temp problems be gone!

 

[ssvegeta1010]

It looks like you could maybe add an intake fan in your spare 5.25" bays. That may help.

 

[Deadalus]

Originally posted by: ssvegeta1010
It looks like you could maybe add an intake fan in your spare 5.25" bays. That may help.

I gave it a go as I had a spare 92mm fan lying about, but unfortunatly it hasn't made any difference as my case has a door...

Thanks for all the suggestions guys.

My CPU is running a lot cooler with the 'exaust' fan running as an intake, About 30-32°c idle and 52-54°c under load.

A couple of people have mentioned this could cause more harm then good, how so?

Lian Li actually sell a duct that you can buy to attach to the rear 120mm fan for when it is being used as an intake...

Also, I have previously tried a NV Silencer, but it wouldn't fit my 6800GT properly unless I was prepared to do some serious modding (which I was not). So I went with the Zalman VF700 - which is doing its job nicely.

 

[pelikan]

I wouldn't worry too much about your temps. For one thing 61C is well within the specs. And the other thing is that motherboard temp reporting can be wildly innacurate.

If I were you I would run prime 95 all day and see if there are any errors. If no errors then your temps are fine.

The reason not to use the rear fan as an intake is because, while your cpu is benefitting, the rest of your components are suffering from the extra heat.