Which heatsink should I use with a Q8200?

yelo333

Senior member
Dec 13, 2003
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Apologies if this is an oft-asked question. I've been out of the loop for a few years. My Socket A Abit NF7 mainboard died, so I've upgraded to an Q8200. Along with supporting mainboard & ram, it'll get to my house today. I'm planning on keeping it at stock speeds for now, maybe slight overclocking a few months from now when/if I get bored.

Anyway, it of course comes with a stock heatsink. I also have a cooler master one which is still sitting in its box, purchased free after rebate several months ago:

COOLER MASTER RR-CCH-L9U1-GP 92mm Hyper TX2 CPU Cooler

I was just wondering what AT's opinion was: Should I use the stock heatsink, or the Cooler Master one?

Also, I have a tube with some thermal paste that is now 2-3 years old. Is it OK to use, or should I stick with a thermal pad?
 

Duvie

Elite Member
Feb 5, 2001
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I went with the aftermarket one....Eventhough 92mm fans are a bit weak for the Quad cores it is still heatpipe technology and far better then Intel stock coolers....I have seen the paste go a bit bad, but never seen Artic silver go bad.....
 

Denithor

Diamond Member
Apr 11, 2004
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Stock HSF + thermal pad is my vote.

Old thermal paste usually doesn't go bad - but it can separate. So if you decide to use that squirt some out onto another surface first to make sure it's still homogeneous.

If not overclocking to 'mild' OC the stock cooler is adequate.
 

Duvie

Elite Member
Feb 5, 2001
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Agreed...if not ocing use their HSF....if ocing then try the aftermarket one....if you want to OC to high end on then look for a TRUE 120 as neithe rof those are really sufficient IMO.
 

yelo333

Senior member
Dec 13, 2003
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Thanks for the replies!

I went with the stock cooler because of the following
- You both agreed that the aftermarket cooler wasn't worth much, and only marginally better than the stock
- The stock cooler does a better job cooling parts around the CPU area and works better with the intel funnel thingy on the side of my case.

I'm up and running on it now. Wow is this thing fast compared to the old AXP 2000+. :)
 

f111

Junior Member
Jan 22, 2009
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no way, a Thermalright HR-01 Plus or xigmatek 1283 would be a far better cooler, because why shouldn't you overclock? a q8200 practically begs you to overclock it, provided you have the motherboard to do it. Arctic silver is the way to go too, its such a small investment but will cool the CPU an additional 3 or 4 degrees C or more.
 

yelo333

Senior member
Dec 13, 2003
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Originally posted by: f111
no way, a Thermalright HR-01 Plus or xigmatek 1283 would be a far better cooler, because why shouldn't you overclock? a q8200 practically begs you to overclock it, provided you have the motherboard to do it. Arctic silver is the way to go too, its such a small investment but will cool the CPU an additional 3 or 4 degrees C or more.

Yes, I may follow your advice when/if I get bored in a few months. My question was stock vs. a specific cooler I already owned. Since that one had some problems & wasn't much better than stock, I went with stock.

I think we all agree that a real quality cooler would be better than stock. I just needed to be up-and-running ASAP, and didn't have time to research aftermarket cooling solutions when I placed my order. So my question was between the two I had on hand.

But yes, I think my motherboard should be able to handle a little OCing. It's the Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3R.
 

dbcooper1

Senior member
May 22, 2008
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Without a doubt; I have that board with a Xigmatek s1283 running a Q9550@4.0Ghz and I've been very happy with it. Good luck with your setup; I'm interested in how far the 8200 will go too.
 

cubeless

Diamond Member
Sep 17, 2001
4,295
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got a q8200 as a forray into quadding... the stock hsf is such a tiny thing, at least it has a copper core... i didn't even think about using it...

the chip seems to have bad temp sensors (or the interface to an ip35-e is bad) since it idles at 45c under my true, but then never goes over 60c loaded (@3.1)...
 

Denithor

Diamond Member
Apr 11, 2004
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Even with stock hsf I think you'd be fine setting fsb to 400 for a small OC to 2.8GHz.

Probably won't take a voltage bump or anything.
 
Apr 20, 2008
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Denithor, i thought the same thing, until i overclocked it.

HWmonitor was giving me temps of 68-70-72-68 with prime 95 running on all cores after a few hours. That stock HSF is only 3/4" high. My S775 P4 3.2 has a 1 5/8" hsf. My Acrtic Freezer Pro gets me 54-55-59-57 with the same overclock.

CPU voltage didn't have anything to do with my OC really, but my board (GB EP45-DS3L) would take it any higher then where i'm at now. Even with adjustments to the NB voltage i came up empty with huge instabilities and bsod's.
 

Tweakin

Platinum Member
Feb 7, 2000
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Originally posted by: cubeless
got a q8200 as a forray into quadding... the stock hsf is such a tiny thing, at least it has a copper core... i didn't even think about using it...

the chip seems to have bad temp sensors (or the interface to an ip35-e is bad) since it idles at 45c under my true, but then never goes over 60c loaded (@3.1)...

I'd make sure you have the latest bios v18 as it has improved on the sensors and 45nm acceptance. Also be careful of the vdrop on that board with a quad...it can get pretty high.
 

yelo333

Senior member
Dec 13, 2003
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Originally posted by: Kickaha
Since some of you guys seem to have Gigabyte boards: check this out

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?p=5897521

Thanks, that's a helpful read.

I don't want to go any higher until/if I get a better PSU & cooling (currently stock cooler & Antec 24-pin 350w smartpower PSU), but I'm at an apparently stable 2.8ghz (currently in hour 20 out of 24 on prime95, still have an overnight run of memtest planned).

Voltages are set at:
Vcore 1.0875 (stock 1.2375)
VTT 1.1v (stock 1.2)
MCH 1.1v (stock 1.2)
ram 1.8v (stock 1.9)

So this thing is taking a very small amount of voltage to do 400mhz FSB even compared to other q8200s. I'll bet it would clock very nicely with proper heatsink & PSU.

Ram running 1:1 at 400mhz with stock timings of 5-5-5-5-18.

Temps are better than stock. Load temps are around 62-60-58-59 and this is with auto fan control enabled. One thing in my favor is that it's in a basement, and a thermometer placed near the front of the PC is reading ~63 degrees F (17C).

So that's all I want to do for now, until I shell out some cash for a better PSU and heatsink.

Edit: prime95 finished cleanly:
[Worker #4 Jan 26 22:23] Torture Test ran 24 hours, 51 minutes - 0 errors, 0 warnings.
[Worker #1 Jan 26 22:23] Torture Test ran 24 hours, 51 minutes - 0 errors, 0 warnings.
[Worker #2 Jan 26 22:23] Torture Test ran 24 hours, 51 minutes - 0 errors, 0 warnings.
[Worker #3 Jan 26 22:23] Torture Test ran 24 hours, 51 minutes - 0 errors, 0 warnings.
[Worker #4 Jan 26 22:23] Worker stopped.
[Worker #1 Jan 26 22:23] Worker stopped.
[Worker #2 Jan 26 22:23] Worker stopped.
[Worker #3 Jan 26 22:23] Worker stopped.
[Main thread Jan 26 22:23] Execution halted.