e6400 and Scythe Ninja B hotter than I'd like

B

bigforearms

Weaksauce
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Apr 10, 2006
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My setup: I have the rig in my signature. I'm currently using a Scythe Ninja Rev. B attached to a e6400 running at stock, with Arctic Silver 5 between them. I have a Yate Loon 120mm running at full speed attached to the Scythe ninja blowing from the front of the case to the back. My back case fan, which is only a few inches away from the Ninja, is a Antec TriCool 120mm that runs at three speeds. The speed of the TriCool doesn't seem to affect the CPU temps. The two fans are push-pull. The only other fans in my case are the PSU and GPU's stock coolers. It's about 80 fahrenheit in my room.

The symptoms: My e6400, running at stock, idles immediately after start-up around 35 C. If I run Intel's Thermal Analysis Tool (constant 100% CPU utilization for both cores) it peaks around 60-62 C core temp after a few minutes. Asus's PC monitor reports it in the mid 50s C at the same time. Idle after I run TAT for several minutes becomes about 40 C.

The problem: This seems extremely high, especially considering I have a huge tower cooler attached to a full-speed 120mm fan. I had also hoped to overclock, but I don't think I have the leeway to overclock at those temps.

Attempted solution: So far, I've removed the Ninja, cleaned it and the proc's heat spreader with Arctic Clean, then re-applied less Arctic Silver 5 to the CPU core and remounted. It didn't help much, even though I'd clearly over-applied the first time. I'm assuming that when I put the thin line in the middle, it shouldn't spread all the way to the edges of the heat spreader.

I'm considering cleaning and remounting again and putting less Arctic Silver on, but I thought I'd see what others thought before I went through the rather difficult process of remounting my Ninja.
 
1. Make sure your fans aren't fighting each other--airflow all in one direction
2. Lap your CPU and heatsink
3. Clear out case clutter

Those temps aren't horrible but definitely not overclockable if you're hitting 60C at stock with a full load.

I would make very sure your fans are all pushing air in the same direction and also make sure your heatsink is not sitting on a capacitor or the northbridge heatsink, which would make it not have full contact.
 
I have almost the exact same setup, E6400 & Ninja Rev B. The way in I differ is that I have a 120mm fan at the front and an 80mm at te side sucking air in as well. At stock speeds I idle at around the same as you: 33 - 35C, however under load I only increase to around 45C. @3200 MHz it idles at 40-45 and loads at 60-65C in intel TAT.

Some things you could look at - can you fit an inlet fan somewhere? Front, side, top, doesn't matter where, you have fans pushing air out but where is it coming from? An easy check is to run your pc with the case open. If you get lower temps chances are you need an inlet somewhere.

If you are going to be re-seating you heatsink again, i'd also have a look at both the base of it and the top of your chip. The copper base should be shiny with little or no machine marks present and be absolutely flat. Check the reflection of a piece of graph paper to test this: http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/image.html?image=MTE2NTYxNDg5M29WNGpFUzJaTUFfMl81X2wuanBn
Also try pressing down on the top of your ninja, if your temps go down it indicates a seating issue.
 
I reseated the heatsink again (3rd time), this time with almost no paste (extremely thin line down the middle where the chips would be). I just ran TAT for 20 minutes. After a few minutes it got up to 55 C with my case open, then I closed the case and it got as high as 62C, let it run like that for 10 minutes, then took the case door off for 5 minutes and it restabilized at 55C. I also applied additional pressure to the Ninja but that did absolutely nothing to my temps, so I guess it's seated alright. I can't imagine putting less paste would help either.

My next step is to swap the Antec Tri-cool out for a YateLoon I have sitting around, and install the Scythe 120mm that came with my Ninja in the front. Then I'll have three 120 mm fans blowing all from front to back (third is a Yate Loon on the Ninja). Unfortunately, neither Fry's nor I have the little rubber connector things used to attach case fans to the Sonata2, so it may be a few days until I figure out where I can get 'em. There are no other case mounts for additional fans.

If I manage to get my temps with the case closed down to case open temps, and I let the AS5 set for a week or so, should I get temps of about 50 with full load under TAT? That should at least be modestly overclockable, right (assuming I need to stay at or under 65C per core under TAT to remain stable)? I'm tempted to try the stock cooler with its stock gummy crap on the heatsink to see how it performs against this Ninja, because I'm not impressed with the cooling performance of the Ninja so far. Then again, I understand AS5 may drop temps up to 5C after you let it set for a while.

Off to WalMart to buy some sandpaper, because the next time I reseat this Ninja (if there is a next time) I'm lapping it.

I'l
 
Don't even think about overclocking yet. Your temps are still way too high, in my opinion. The Antec Sonatas (I have one) are notoriously bad for airflow, so make sure you have a fan in the front and a fan in the back. Again, make sure your heatsink fan is not touching the northbridge heatsink.

Arctic Silver will drop 5 degrees on the high end, most people I've heard only get a 2C drop or so, so don't count on that.

I had this same problem you're having in my Sonata and managed to fix it by adding another 120mm fan realizing my Arctic Freezer was blowing air in the wrong direction. Go over the case one more time, sometimes it's something incredibly obvious.

Also, running 10 minutes is not long enough to find out what your max temps are going to be. If you start adding voltage and OCing, I guarantee you'll jump up into the 70s under load.
 
New update: Put the stock heatsink and fan on the cleaned (arcticclean) processor to see what it would do. I'm idling at 42-45 according to TAT, and under 100% load on both processors they each top out at about 62 C after a few minutes. This is all with my case open and rather cool inside temperature (probably 65F right now.

So it looks like it's not a seating issue, or an issue with the Ninja hitting the capacitors. So I guess I'm left with it either being a semi-dud that operates just within prescribed operating limits so I can't RMA it, or I need to lap the surface of the C2D.

I'm going to hold off on the lapping for a couple of weeks so I don't forfeit my warranty only to find out this is a dud for some reason other than the heat spreader. Besides, at stock it's still usable and doesn't technically overheat.

I almost wish it was DOA so I could just send it back to NewEgg.

On an unrelated note, the stock hs fan is quieter than I expected. Not silent by any means, but not godawful.
 
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