Hello all,
Just looking for some expert advice. I built a machine posted below in my signiture. I would like to replace the AMD factory heat-sink and or add an intake fan to my computer. I don't OC and I have it in the man cave in the basement. The ambient temp down here 15 - 16 C. My CPU idles at about 31 C which I'm happy with. At almost full load it jumps up to about 50 C and max about 57 C which doesn't seem too bad.
I'm not planning on OC'ing but would like to run it a little cooler. Also, once it's ready I will move it upstairs in place of my old "main computer". I love the AMD factory lever/clamp system for the heat-sink. Installing it was such a breeze and so much better than my old Pentium 4 with the 4 locking screws (what a pain!). Do any after-market coolers use this same lever/clamp design that would cool better than the stock heat-sink? I would love to utilize the factory clamp system if possible. I will probably install an intake fan, as of right now, it only has a 120 mm exhaust fan. One thing I like and would like to keep is the fact that it is so quiet and would like to keep it that way.
Would a large fan above my CPU make the most sense for cooling the CPU (See picture below). Without out turning my system into the lockheed wind tunnel.
Any and all advice is welcome and appreciated, thanks!
P.S., I have cool n' quiet disabled and the CPU fan and exhaust fan set to turbo in BIOS. Which is weird because the exhaust fan never goes above 900 RPM
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-AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz 6 core
-ASUS MOBO M4A87TD
-EVGA GeForce GTX 460 SE (Fermi)
-Thermaltake V3 Black Edition VL80001W2Z
-Western Digital Caviar Black WD1002FAEX 1TB
-G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
-LITE-ON iHBS212 Blu-Ray burner