Should I Change Heatsinks?

[HiTek21]

I currently have an Alpha 8045, great heatsink but recently the weather changed and case temps are now up to 33c and Idle CPU temps are in the low 50's. I recently decided to overclock my Xp1900+ to 1.73GHz thats why I have the 50 degree temps, before I got mid 40's when I ran at default speeds. I'm thinking of giving my Alpha a good lapping this weekend and maybe upgrade my fan from a Vantec Stealth to a Panaflo M1A but i'm not expecting too much. Would it be better just to upgrade to a Thermalright SLK800U?

 

[deerslayer]

I don't know much about the Alpha's except they are good and popular 🙂 The thermalright will do a good job, but i'm not sure if it's worth the upgrade. If idle CPU temps are in the low 50's, the Thermalright should remedy that, my full load temps on a 1600+ @ 180x are 44proc/31 case. If I cleaned the dust out of the heatsink they may drop a bit more.

 

[pelikan]

The extra air flow from a more powerful fan will work wonders for your temps. I would only switch heatsinks if you can't handle the extra noise.

 

[mrman3k]

With all high performance heatsinks including the Alpha, Thermalright, Swiftech, etc. you need high CFM for them to really shine which creates a problem with noise. I have an MCX462+ with an Antec LED fan on it which hardly pushes any air. This creates relatively poor performance compared to what is possible if I had a higher CFM fan.

 

[pelikan]

If you have good case cooling a low CFM fan can work well on a really good heatsink. I have a Panaflo L1A (24CFM, 21dB) on my slk-800. My 2100+ is at 2300MHz and 200 FSB. Under load the cpu runs at 36C. But that's with a duct. Before the duct and with the same low CFM fan my cpu ran at 42C under load.