52 c too high for a zalman 7000 on an athlon 64?
I'm running an athlon 64 3200 with a zalman 7000 using Arctic Silver 5 and i'm getting all the way up to 52 c with a full cpu load. This seems a bit high to me. This is with the fan up all the way and the case open. The thing is it doesn't seem like much heat is getting to the heat sink so i'm wondering if i put too much as5 on it. I tried to get the layer as thin as possible but with the huge surface area of the 64's its a bit hard. I spread it around with a credit card but it still looked a little bit like cake icing in the end. Anyone got any good suggestions for getting the layer really thin on an athlon 64?
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Might try redoing that AS5
Apply AS5 along one edge, maybe 1\8" in from edge. You are going to spread across face of core heatspreader to opposite parallel edge.
Usea razor blade, and hold blade at a 30-45 degree angle from horizontal. Or, use a nylon pot scraper at same angle.
If you can only get it halfway across as might happen with a situation where you put too little on, then put a thin bead where you see surface bare and drag across remaining bare area.
Also, since AS5 is part Ceramic, expect effectiveness to increase over a week of runtime. Ceramic as used by AS is slower cure than their silver products. I used Ceramique on 10-12 boxes, it took 200-250 hours of run time to reach full effectiveness and the temps seemed edgy at first and went down 6-7 C over time. After between three and 4 weeks of run time with Ceramique on a Barton, full load temps were down to about 13 C above case ambient on average (yes, it has gotten better since I posted in other threads about it).
I will not ask if you took off the plastic face protector sheet that comes with heatsinks these days, I figure you did. If not, the HS needs to be taken off, the HS compund removed, and the plastic dissolved off chemically. That protector sheet is to keep the contact face of the HS from being scratched while being handled and shipped, it needs to come off before HS is put on.
Right now your CPU is not at critical temp, but watch temps with MBM 5 and if they go up instead of GRADUALLY down over days and weeks by 15% or more, then you need to redo HS compound aftr taking the old semi-hardened sludge off. The trick is to drag as far as can and as evenly as you can, pressure from HS will level a little bit of unevenness as it cures, and slower cure allows for it to level itself out some.
John D.
Use little bits, use Alcohol to clean up razor blade carefully between beads of AS5 as it likes to stick to itself.
Are you reading a die temp or the external temp? If that is a die temp, then you are fine. If it is a surface/socket/external temp, it is a bit high.
My Soyo KT400 reads 41C external and 46C die on a Barton running at 2083@1.75V. My NF7-S reads external 45C on a Barton running at 2315@1.75V. You can't display the die temp (although it does use the die temp in the system shutdown option in the BIOS). Both of these temps are from a folding load. From what I've seen the difference between the die and the external temp is usually about 5-7C different.
Try to find someone else with the same systemboard and compare results. Comparing temps from different systems can often be worthless as the manufacturers can calibrate the sensors differently. Even revisions of a system's BIOS can vary widely in the temps they display.
I personally don't think your temp is too high, although others may disagree. Do you have any signs of heat related stability problems?
It's about the wattage it produces. Which i'm not sure of since i haven't read the specsheet from Amd. But i would suspect that it produces slightly more heat than the Bartons. But i agree, 52C sounds a tad high.
So yeah, 52 is higher than I'd expect. Try pulling the heatsink, cleaning up the AS5, reapplying, and see what happens.
I've done it once or twice with a plastic bag over my finger. Made no difference.