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Cooling problems with my Q6600!

N

NoVFishbulb

n00b
Joined
Jun 20, 2009
Messages
3
Heya everyone! Hows it goin? ^_^

I was referred to this community by a good friend of mine when I told him about a problem I was having, and I must say, it's a pretty awesome place :p

Hopefully yousguyses can give me a hand!

Basically, I've been having some really annoying cooling problems with my Q6600.. Which is weird, because its a really cool-running cpu! I know its not the CPU though, because I DID have it running at acceptable temperatures before. Before the problem REALLY started, I had idle temperatures around 35-38 degrees, and load temperatures in the high 40's. Those numbers weren't TOO bad, but I have friends that have idle temps in the low 20's (two other factors play into that: Bigger cases with better airflow compared to mine, and cooler rooms. It can get warm in here) so I wanted to drop my temperatures a few degrees. For a thermal interface material, I was using the gunk that came on the bottom of the stock heatsink, so I assumed that to be the culprit.

My solution? take the heatsink off, clean off the goo with some isopropyl alcohol, and remount with some thermal paste.. and thats what I did! Unfortunately, all I had was some crappy old silicon white goo thermal paste. I lost my tube of arctic silver, so thats all I had to use.. I figured, hey, it would at least be a few degrees cooler than what I had before.. BOY WAS I WRONG. :p

My temperatures after the change were massive. By remounting the heatsink a few times and using a little bit less thermal paste (I kind of used the AS5 thin line technique; but I used a lil' bit more because of this paste's lower viscosity.) I managed to lower the temps by a couple of degrees since then, but I'm still sitting at a stomach-churning ~48 idle and 60+ under load.

I've remounted the heatsink a bunch of times.. I'm next to positive that I'm mounting the heatsink properly (I could definitely see that I had proper contact because the thermal paste spread well.) so I don't think that's the problem..

Every time I remounted, i wiped the old thermal paste off of both my heatsink and CPU and used rubbing alcohol as a solvent to clean any residue that was left. I tried all sorts of different techniques, all with the same effect. I tried a rice-grain amount in the middle, a thin-line laterally, I tried the old smearing on the heatsink with plastic wrap thing.. None of it worked. I think my technique is okay.. I've done it many times before!

So by my logic: It's not ME thats the problem; heatsink is mounted properly, I think my thermal paste technique is okay.. What else could it be?

well..

a) Crappy thermal paste. It was old and stale. I DID mix it up very thoroughly by squeezing it into a clean plastic bag and squishing it around.. It didnt have much effect. Does old white silicon thermal paste get unusable after a certain amount of time? That's my best guess.

b) messed up heat sensors. I don't think this is the problem because it seemed okay before.. Temperatures fluctuate in a very natural way.. hrm

c) help me with C?

lol, thanks in advance for any help you can give me guys. ^_^

My other specs for reference:

Q6600 at stock speed, stock cooling! turrible temperatures. :p
ASUS P5N-E SLI mobo
4gb 800MHz DDR2
nVidia 9800GTX+
600W Thermaltake PSU

and I've been using Core Temp to monitor my temperatures. I know that readings from different software can vary greatly, but more temperature information might just confuse me further :p

EDIT: One more thing to note.. I do have the G0 stepping of the Q6600 and I'm seeing a temperature difference of 3-5 degrees between cores 0 and 1, and cores 2 and 3.
 
1. spend the money and get either AS5 or mx-2 thermal paste.. because what your using is crap..
2. you are doing it correctly so dont worry about that.. just make sure its not to thick..
3. C= Celsius most programs will show F as well but stick with the Celsius readings since thats what we all use..
4. i recommend Realtemp because its designed for intel processors and updated a lot more often..
5. the temps are fine for now.. so dont freak out about having to get the temps lower.. you are no where near the max for that processor.. so if its a matter of not having the money to buy new thermal paste.. you will be perfectly fine..


also the difference in temps is normal.. since the C2Q is actually 2 dual cores on one chip.. so the temps will be different between each set of cores..
 
LOL actually it was mostly about availability. I went to all two computer stores in town, none of them had ANY thermal paste. I might go back and get them to order some ;o

I'll still be surprised if its just the thermal paste though.. I know there's a noticable difference between low-grade thermal paste and the more expensive stuff, but a difference of 20+ degrees? That is ALOT.

Also, I tried realtemp and the temperature readouts are identical to Coretemp's.

I'll get myself some quality thermal paste ASAP, but it might take a week or so. I'm not too worried about the temps, just kind of frustrated/disappointed. I was considering doing the BSEL mod on my Q6600 but it looks like its been pushed back a bit. :p

Thanks kindly for the response! I'll post up my results when I get the paste.

I think the moral of the story here is: NEVER use ultra crappy Nexxtech thermal paste that you get from Radioshack or The Source (in Canada).. It's HORRIBLE, even though they gouge you for $10 :/
 
Last edited:
NoVFishbulb said:
LOL actually it was mostly about availability. I went to all two computer stores in town, none of them had ANY thermal paste. I might go back and get them to order some ;o
Click to expand...


are you in the US or canada? if so.. id just order it on newegg and get a new heatsink as well.. save ya from having to pay 4 bucks in shipping for a 3 dollar tube of thermal grease..
 
LOL I have looked at the thermal paste shootout.

Maybe I should've gone with some cheese instead. It apparently performs alot better than what I'm using.. :p

and yeah, I would've just ordered from newegg if it werent for the shipping cost! I've considered getting a new heatsink/fan but people seem to get fine results from stock.

A better investment for me would probably be a new case; mine is pretty cramped, and the airflow isn't the greatest.
 
I doubt the thermal paste is the problem. I supect you were not getting the correct temps before, had a large change in ambient temps, or have a push pin problem not holding your cooler on properly now. you are not going to see the 20c difference you are looking for by switching thermal compound.

also I call bs on a q6600 idling in the 20s on stock cooling.

you temps are fine for stock cooling, not perfect, bot nowhere near the danger zone. at thispoint you might want to stop mucking with it before you break something. if its really driving you nuts, get a new cooler and thermal compound at the same time.
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i know bestbuy, fry's, microcenter all carry thermal paste.. bestbuy has it locked up in a case in the computer section..
 
You dont have anything to worry about as far as temps go unless you plan on overclocking. If you were going to overclock, you would want something more than stock HSF and paste. If you want it lower just because, the thermal paste is most likely the culprit.
 
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