Q6600 CPU Cooler needed... - Tech Support Forums

ShyguyXPC · July 26th, 2008, 04:36 AM

Been out of it for a while as far as CPU cooling goes, past couple years stock cooling has been fine for me.

so need some new suggestions... finally have enough to grab my 2 new extra HDD's for my game rig, as well as pick up a new CPU cooler to use other than the stock one that comes with my Q6600 Quad...

I have a Coolermaster Gemin II (still in box), was originally planning on using it, but now, not sure.

its so large, hard to get at things if I installed it, has no backplate for the cooler, & requires me to take out the whole systems internals to install...

what I'm looking for is a new Cooler, that uses the stock Socket 775 pushpin design, something that will be "easier" to install with stock design...

but as for price range, looking for something between $20-$40 tops (not including shipping)...

I know the AC Freezer 64 or whatever it goes by now has been suggested many times, but wanting some other choices as well.

this will be for the Q6600 at stock speeds for now, but should I want to OC down the road, I want it to be adequate for that as well. I know of Thermalrights coolers, but thats the other thing, I don't want a massively tall cooler sticking 110 stories out from the mobo... but then again, something with a nice 90/92mm or larger fan would be nice too...

the motherboard is a MSI P6N SLI Platinum, so if anyone needs to know that for CPU socket clearance issues, using all 4 RAM Slots as well. Case is a Thermaltake Armor case, so plenty of depth in the case.

basically suggestions for some of the best coolers, that should somewhat fit in my criteria I need (with in Price range, uses pushpin design, excellent at stock speed cooling for Q6600, but average or above for OCing down road, preferably not a massively tall cooler but willing to fore go that one if all the others are met)

TIA!

DC4man · July 26th, 2008, 09:08 AM

I was also curious on what to use to cool my Q6600. I wanna OC it a lot though.

pullmyfoot · July 26th, 2008, 10:04 AM

this Artic Coling one is aweomse. I have them in all my systems. And 2k plus reviews and full eggs is self explanitory. Best part is that it only costs $31

Newegg.com - ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler - CPU Fans & Heatsinks

If not you could try Zalman I guess.
Tall one: Newegg.com - ZALMAN 9500A 92mm 2 Ball CPU Cooler - CPU Fans & Heatsinks
Wide one: Newegg.com - ZALMAN CNPS7700-CU 120mm 2 Ball Cooling Fan - CPU Fans & Heatsinks

And dont forget the Artic Silver 5

: Newegg.com - Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound - Thermal Compound / Grease

KarmaKiller · July 26th, 2008, 11:01 AM

The GeminII would actually work pretty well if you didn't mind the size. I lapped mine to get it to cool well though, you would probably have to do the same thing. It's on my dual core, and temps never get over 50° with both the fans on high. It is a touch loud though.
As far as the freezer pro, that's what I currently use on my Quad. But again, I lapped it and added another 80mm fan to the backside, it does the job pretty well now. The worse thing about that is it uses push pins, which I hate!
Have you considered a Tuniq Tower? They are supposed to be really good air coolers also. Themalright Ultra 120 is about the best you can get though. Put 2x 120mm fans on there and it can't be beat.
Zerotherm also makes another pretty good cooler, the BTF90 works pretty well.
Or the OCZ Vendetta works well too, but again, push pins.

ShyguyXPC · July 26th, 2008, 12:42 PM

main thing with the push pins is I really don't want to gut the whole case & have to mount the cooler through the board & all that, just want something thats easier to mount on it. but then again S775 push pin coolers are a real bitch to mount & dismount too.

with the tall coolers one thing I do have to watch out for, is though I have an Tt Armor case, I also have the 250mm fan side panel as well, so that takes an extra inch or more of clearance away as well.

KarmaKiller · July 26th, 2008, 12:46 PM

Hmm.. then the Freezer Pro or Vendetta is probably your best choice. Both of those coolers are shorter then the other one's mentioned, and they do have push pins.
The Tuniq might also fit, but IDK really about that. Those are pretty large HSF's.
I think all the other one's mentioned your gonna have to take your board out of your case.

RamonGTP · July 26th, 2008, 04:10 PM

I just build a Q6600 based system for my buddy and used a AC Freezer Pro and it's been doing the job quite well. A lot better than my Zalman CNPS9500

ShyguyXPC · August 1st, 2008, 01:06 AM

well I finally decided, for now I will be going with the AC Freezer Pro for the 775 socket...

but won't order that till next paycheck next week.

just spent $75 on a new WD 500GB HDD, going to order a decent eSATA external kit or a Hot swappable SATA drive kit tomorrow evening, so I can start to back up my data off my main rig on to the 500GB (it was only $10 more for the 500 gig over the WD 320GB I originally had selected, well worth the $10

)

but next week when I order the CPU Cooler, will be ordering my extra 250GB drive as well.

upon my looking around over at Newegg, my new 8800GTS may be one of the shortest lived video card upgrades in about 8-10 years LOL... just found out MSI has a GTX 260 on there for $270... after I sell the old G80 8800GTS & C2D E6400, a mere $70 or so more I can move up a bit higher yet, integrated PhysX abilities (was thinking of grabbing one of the Asus Open Box PCI-E 1x PhysX cards they have over at newegg for $70, since my newer 8800GTS doesn't have that, but now seeing that GTX 260... maybe not LOL).

but as to the CPU cooler, yeah, pretty much decided on the AC Freezer Pro then, its cheap enough, have owned a couple other Various AC CPU & GPU coolers over the years, as well as Cooling fans, & they do run quiet & cool reasonably well. not too tall in size, & uses the "easier" push pin design for the cooler, with out having to gut the entire case.

ShyguyXPC · August 13th, 2008, 06:32 AM

just ordered the Arctic Cooling Cooler, so should be here hopefully by Friday, if not Monday & then over weekend/beginning of next week, start working on doing the CPU upgrade to the system.

have 5 new drive cables picked out over at FrozenCPU, so I can replace all my current ones, with longer, easier to manage cables for the SATA drives (2x 36" cables for the rear mounted drives, 2x 18" shielded round SATAII Cables for front mounted drives, & then 1x AC Ryan EIDE/PATA 24" one with the two end pieces designed for two drives to be stacked one above the other, for my 2 DVD Burners), so should help clear up some cable clutter in the case, allowing me to better route the damn things around stuff, rather than how its currently in there with cables crossing over each other & too close to CPU fan blades. But these cables will have to wait for next weeks paycheck.

RamonGTP · August 13th, 2008, 02:31 PM

That cooler should do the trick. I just upgraded my CNPS9500 to an OCZ Vendetta 2 which has a similar design and it decreased my load temps by about 8C. Not to shabby, though I need better case ventellation. I got an additional 5C drop just by removing the side panel.

5 hard drives, 2 optical drives, 8GB of ram, OCed Q6600 and a HD4850 adds a LOT of heat to the case and my low RPM 120mm case fans (1 intake, 1 exhaust) aren't cutting the mustard anymore. Especially since my hard drives sit right in front of the exhasut fan so the air coming in is being heated up as soon as it enters. I don't have room for more fans so I think I'll replace the exhasut fan with a higher CFM one and take it from there.