AM3 air-cooling recommendation?

[NorthboundOcclusive]

TL;DR, i'm looking for a recommendation on a 120mm AM3-compatible aftermarket/non-stock HSF suitable for a AMD Phenom II x4.

with guild wars 2 in the near future, i'm giving serious thought to upgrading my CPU and GPU for more dakka.

what i have is an Athlon II x3 445, looking to upgrade that to Phenom II x4 965BE (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103727)
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/446932/P1010021.jpg
Case: Rosewill Blackbone (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811147023)
PSU: Antec Earthwatts 650w (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371044)
Motherboard: ASRock M3A770DE AM3 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157176)
RAM: 2sets of 2x1gb Cruicial DDR3 1333, potentially upgrading to Gskill ripjaws (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231314)


what im looking for in a fan is
1) cheap. budget/entry-level, figure $25-35 is reasonable. doesnt have to be super-cool or ultra quiet
2) pre-applied thermal interface material. my experience with applying thermal paste/grease is between zero and none.
3) single 120mm fan, similarly single tower fin stack (option to add a second fan would be a bonus, but by no means required)
4) im not terribly concerned about ram clearance, my current ram doesnt have any heatsinks at all to get in the way, and the gskill ripjaws im looking at as an upgrade arent particularly tall either.
tower clearance with the PSU could potentially be an issue. eyeballing the 120mm rear exhaust fan, id say there's about 1cm of clearance between the where a tower HSF would fit and bottom of PSU, plus the cpu power tail is also running thru the same space

ive looked at the Xigmatech Gaia (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835233082) and Cooler Master Hyper 212 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065), both seem solid choice, and in my price range, but being a TIM newbie, im wary of putting too much/too little on, or simply doing it wrong.

 

[Faethon]

In case you are wondering why nobody replies, it is , i think, because you 've put some difficult to satisfy requirements.

From what i remember, if you want pre-applied TIM, you should look at Arctic Cooling heatsinks (13 Pro, i30 etc). But they cost more than your price range and frankly it's not worth the extra money just to get pre-applied TIM... Also usually in Arctic heatsinks, you can't change the fan if needed, they have unique fan and retention mechanism. So i don't like them.

Honestly applying TIM is easy, there are many videos on youtube and photos in web articles you can consult. Besides, installing backplates is more complicated than TIMs.

Apart that, both the Gaia and 212 should be good. The 212 probably a bit better, since it's heavier.

 

[Lord of Shadows]

I bought the cooler master a while ago, really quiet when folding 24/7. Applying thermal paste is so easy a caveman can do it.

 

[shumoco]

My friend just upgraded to an i7 and got the gaia, then later upgraded to the coolermaster. The CM is a better cooler in my opinion, it also has 4 heatpipes whereas the gaia has 3. We mounted the gaia first and saw several degree drop when we installed the coolermaster. He had both set up with a push/pull fan configuration. Both come with additional clips and brackets that allow you to upgrade to push/pull for the cost of a 120mm fan, and the extra fan does make a 2 to 3 degree difference at idle.

For the money I would get the coolermaster and then get an additional fan as your budget allows.

For what it's worth, I'm running the Gaia on my 965 BE, with push/pull and it does an excellent job, with idle temps around 30 C, depending on room temp. However, I would buy the coolermaster if I had it to do over again.

 

[NorthboundOcclusive]

thanks guys