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[Sethos]

So how did you guys apply thermal paste for your cooler master hyper 212+ and sandy bridge cpu's? Any tips? Mine should arrive tomorrow!

Would be good to know as well, haven't applied thermal paste in ages. Can't remember the golden rule, dot in the middle, an X or whatever is best. I remember the good old days when thermal paste was like tooth paste, I used a CC to scrape it over the CPU in a very thin layer. Now it's like a liquid that spreads itself - Scares an old PC builder like me.

 

[mkenyon]

Okay, thanks for the input guys and sorry for being bit speedy with it all - Wanted it ordered right about now, so I'll have it by Friday.

Final list looks like this;

Case: COOLER MASTER MIDITOWER CM 690 II ADVANCED

Cooler: COOLER MASTER HYPER 212 PLUS

Paste: AC MX-4

RAM: Kingston 8GB DDR3 1600MHz (2x4) HyperX

RAM: Intel Core i7 2600K Sandy Bridge

HDD: Western Digital 1000GB Black 64 MB SATA6

Mobo: Asus SABERTOOTH P67 REV3 Ultimate Stability

Can't wait to finally render videos without my CPU crapping out.

Why get a new cooler when you already have a Noctua?

Would be good to know as well, haven't applied thermal paste in ages. Can't remember the golden rule, dot in the middle, an X or whatever is best. I remember the good old days when thermal paste was like tooth paste, I used a CC to scrape it over the CPU in a very thin layer. Now it's like a liquid that spreads itself - Scares an old PC builder like me.

Place it along the copper pipes. Someone has a link to the image I'm sure.

 

[Sethos]

Why get a new cooler when you already have a Noctua?

Because it's rubbish, worst cooler I've had in years - New coolers are cheap, might as well get rid of it.

 

[mkenyon]

Because it's rubbish, worst cooler I've had in years - New coolers are cheap, might as well get rid of it.

I think you're doing it wrong.

 

[Sethos]

I think you're doing it wrong.

To your surprise, I actually have a little knowledge building and testing PCs and I have tested the cooler extensively in various environment outside of my own, re-applied it several times in various airflow conditions and tried to get close to some of the review benchmarks done on it and the only way I could get close was by having two fans on it, despite the review only using one - and notice I said close, not once did it reach target temperatures on identical CPUs plus with the extra fan it would start interfering with the closest DIMM Slot on some motherboards.

We actually did manage to reach target temps, even go below it with a better thermal paste than the one used in a review we looked at.

I have bad experiences with it and have just been running it because I couldn't be arsed replacing it.

So I'd appreciate it if you kept those remarks to yourself.

 

[Tashi]

That Hyper 212 plus comes with paste already. I don't really know if there's a difference though (between the CM paste and the one you have on the list). Also, I put a dot in the middle of my CPU and it works fine.

 

[mkenyon]

Fair enough, was just a bit taken back by calling it rubbish considering those generally perform a lot better than the 212+. Sounds like a defect, which is rare for Noctua.

 

[Maaseru]

Im gonna rebuild my rig and well would like to know your opinion.

I already have an nvidia gtx 560ti. But with the 700-800 budget I have know I wanted to upgrade the rest.
intel i7 2600k 3.4ghz(3.8ghz max boost)
asus P8P67 Pro B3 Intel P67 Motherboard
kingston 1600mhz 8gb ram
Ultra U12-40656 Carbon X7 Multi-Socket CPU Cooler

I lready have my old case and evrything else. SO What are your thoughts? is this future proof enought. I'm doing my BA on software eng. and whant to learn a couple of programs too like maya, cinema4d and such. I want to also run Skyrim and Battlefield 3 as best as I can, thats a must. So is it a good build for the 730 buck I have to get, still 200 short. Should I wait for proces to drop when the bulldozers come out or at lest unil early september when I should get the complete amount? Thoughts?

 

[Flying_Phoenix]

So yeah:

I'm wanting to ask about this, too. I got my new 120GB Corsair Force 3 today, and I didn't know the difference between Force GT and 3, so I was a bit let down when I found out the difference of speed.

I found this conclusion:
"The same scenarios can be drawn out by those using SSDs for video editing but suffice it to say that if you are looking for a SSD for everyday use, the Force 3 is an excellent choice. If, however, you are using the drive to regularly move large incompressible files, the Force GT is your best choice."


So the big question now is "what is moving large incompressible files"? When I open up my music editing program and load 5 GB of samples for one piano, is that considered compressible or incompressible?

Noone?

EDIT - Finally found my answer.

 

[Karmum]

Thinking of going from this motherboard to say...this motherboard. Should I stick with my first choice? Is there anything better around that price range?

Case wise, I'm going with the HAF 912. Need something that can make my build was quiet as possible, though. Will that work pretty well?

 

[Septimius]

Noone?

EDIT - Finally found my answer.

So the final scoop is that already compressed data (easy mention being video-files?), if you read that, you'll get slower read on the SSDs we have now, compared to the likes of the Force GT, I guess? Guess I'm in the clear, then, as none of my samples are compressed. I guess we can both be satisfied with the fact that there are so many other factors with normal workload on a drive that we likely aren't going to notice any different.

 

[childplease]

Just nabbed a 6950 for 150 bucks.

How do you think it will fair against bf3 ? Should I try and find a 2nd for crossfire just in case.

 

[Flying_Phoenix]

So the final scoop is that already compressed data (easy mention being video-files?), if you read that, you'll get slower read on the SSDs we have now, compared to the likes of the Force GT, I guess? Guess I'm in the clear, then, as none of my samples are compressed. I guess we can both be satisfied with the fact that there are so many other factors with normal workload on a drive that we likely aren't going to notice any different.

I really can't wait until I get my next SSD 3 or 4 years from now when all this goofy stuff is sorted out.

 

[childplease]

I really can't wait until I get my next SSD 3 or 4 years from now when all this goofy stuff is sorted out.

Same here. I took the advice from someone here and canceled my SSD purchase and instead bought another spinpoint hard drive so I can run them in Raid 0.

 

[knitoe]

Just nabbed a 6950 for 150 bucks.

How do you think it will fair against bf3 ? Should I try and find a 2nd for crossfire just in case.

I would get another one for CF. The BF3 beta had graphic option turn down or disable so nobody knows how the game really runs. I would assume you need highend SLI / CF for max settings, lock 60fps and 1080p.

Same here. I took the advice from someone here and canceled my SSD purchase and instead bought another spinpoint hard drive so I can run them in Raid 0.

That's some bad advice. Raid 0 HDD may offer same write / read speeds, not the top end 6GB sata SSD with sync nand, but it's access time sucks comparable. It's going to feel way more "sluggish".

 

[MisterNoisy]

Thinking of going from this motherboard to say...this motherboard. Should I stick with my first choice? Is there anything better around that price range?

Case wise, I'm going with the HAF 912. Need something that can make my build was quiet as possible, though. Will that work pretty well?

I like the ASUS P8P67 PRO, though it's almost $40 more - it's pretty much the 'benchmark' for P67 boards in my opinion - it strikes a nice balance between features and cost.

The HAF 912 is an outstanding chassis at that price point, but if you're looking for quieter operation, check out the Bitfenix Shinobi from the OP. For a little bit more, the Fractal R3 in the OP and the NZXT H2 look really nice, too - the H2 is practically a clone of the R3 but with a slightly cheaper price tag.

 

[Karmum]

I like the ASUS P8P67 PRO, though it's almost $40 more - it's pretty much the 'benchmark' for P67 boards in my opinion - it strikes a nice balance between features and cost.

The HAF 912 is an outstanding chassis at that price point, but if you're looking for quieter operation, check out the Bitfenix Shinobi from the OP. For a little bit more, the Fractal R3 in the OP and the NZXT H2 look really nice, too - the H2 is practically a clone of the R3 but with a slightly cheaper price tag.

Thanks for the suggestions, dunno if I want to spend $40 on a motherboard though.

 

[Septimius]

I really can't wait until I get my next SSD 3 or 4 years from now when all this goofy stuff is sorted out.

I really think we'll be getting incredibly much better performance out of this. I dunno about RAID0 and those 4k reads, but that's really what we're getting it for. Random access time is incredible, and this asynchronus buffer won't change that. At the end of the day, our SSDs rock, but apparently could've been better. How much we'd see of that seems to be rather little - but yes, I am looking forward to my next SSD years from now that'll probably 4 times as big and fast, and at the same price!

 

[Kadey]

I'm amazed by an SSD. It doesn't even matter which one you have, still faster than a regular hard drive. I love my pictures and stuff loading instantly.

 

[Advance_Alarm]

upgraded my case to a Cooler Master Storm Scout I won from a Gaffer, while everything was out I upgraded the CPU cooler to a Noctua NH-C12. Temps under load went down from 65C to 37C. There isn't a wall of heat anymore when you walk into the room and the FPS on my total war games doesn't drop anymore after 30 minutes or so of crazy heat.

 

[knitoe]

upgraded my case to a Cooler Master Storm Scout I won from a Gaffer, while everything was out I upgraded the CPU cooler to a Noctua NH-C12. Temps under load went down from 65C to 37C. There isn't a wall of heat anymore when you walk into the room and the FPS on my total war games doesn't drop anymore after 30 minutes or so of crazy heat.

That's a big temp drop. Were you using the stock cooler before? What's the temp running Prime95 with small fft?

 

[TheExodu5]

To your surprise, I actually have a little knowledge building and testing PCs and I have tested the cooler extensively in various environment outside of my own, re-applied it several times in various airflow conditions and tried to get close to some of the review benchmarks done on it and the only way I could get close was by having two fans on it, despite the review only using one - and notice I said close, not once did it reach target temperatures on identical CPUs plus with the extra fan it would start interfering with the closest DIMM Slot on some motherboards.

We actually did manage to reach target temps, even go below it with a better thermal paste than the one used in a review we looked at.

I have bad experiences with it and have just been running it because I couldn't be arsed replacing it.

So I'd appreciate it if you kept those remarks to yourself.

It might be the CPU. I've had a similar experience with my E6600. No matter what, my E6600 ran ridiculous hot. I had a Zalman 9700LED on the thing, and it was running @ 70C at stock clocks! I went through 3 coolers and I was far hotter than any review indicated I should be. I figured either the temp sensors on the CPU were completely off, or the casing wasn't very square. I switched to a Q8300 and my temps went down by over 20C, even when overclocked.

I wouldn't expect much difference going from the Noctua to the Hyper 212+...they're nearly identical coolers (though the Noctua fan might be slower). I would wait on the cooler and try your Noctua on your new CPU, if you're still decided on upgrading.

 

[SnakeSlashRO]

GAF! I think I have everything I need....

Besides a diffrent heatsink or fan besides the default one I get when I buy a processor...

http://a2.sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hpho...182683281183_1069985230_2574251_4857078_n.jpg

I have a 550 watt PSU and a GTX 570 Card... With DDR3 8GB. Im wondering how many fans I should have....


Also how does liquid cooling work? Should I get something else for the CPU or will I be fine? I wanna get started ASAP!!!

 

[Flying_Phoenix]

I really think we'll be getting incredibly much better performance out of this. I dunno about RAID0 and those 4k reads, but that's really what we're getting it for. Random access time is incredible, and this asynchronus buffer won't change that. At the end of the day, our SSDs rock, but apparently could've been better. How much we'd see of that seems to be rather little - but yes, I am looking forward to my next SSD years from now that'll probably 4 times as big and fast, and at the same price!

Its insane how much cheaper and bigger SSD got. It seems like only yesterday when way back when it was $200 for a 64GB SSD and $500 for a 128 GB SSD. Oh wait it was only 2 years ago...

I would get another one for CF. The BF3 beta had graphic option turn down or disable so nobody knows how the game really runs. I would assume you need highend SLI / CF for max settings, lock 60fps and 1080p.

That's some bad advice. Raid 0 HDD may offer same write / read speeds, not the top end 6GB sata SSD with sync nand, but it's access time sucks comparable. It's going to feel way more "sluggish".

What?

 

[gokieks]

Does anyone have any recommendations for a cheap and quiet HSF that will fit in a 4U chassis? I'm going to upgrade my ZFS file server by switching it over to my Phenom II X3 720BE machine, and I'm planning on putting it in a Norco RPC-450. It's has 10 3.5" HDD bays, and with a 4-in-3 in the 5.25" bays I can install 4 more, and is only $85 shipped, so in terms of cost and expandability it seems perfect. But the Xigmatek S-1283 that I'm currently using (which works great), being 16cm tall, won't fit. Now, when I switch it over to to the file server I won't have it overclocked anymore (might actually underclock it to see if I can lower power/heat without impacting performance), so cooling performance is as much of a concern as noise. In fact, I could just use the stock HSF and it'll almost certainly be fine, but if I can get something better (quieter) for fairly cheap, I'd prefer to go that route.

 

[childplease]

Anyone here have their PC hooked up to display to both their Television and a monitor ?

Is there some way to do on the fly switching so I can quickly change the video card output to my television for playing The witcher 2 on my huge 55 inch tv on a 360 controller ?

 

[Salsa]

Anyone here have their PC hooked up to display to both their Television and a monitor ?

Is there some way to do on the fly switching so I can quickly change the video card output to my television for playing The witcher 2 on my huge 55 inch tv on a 360 controller ?

I sure do, but i use them both all the time as a dual monitor setup.

UltraMon does stuff like that on the fly with keyboard shorcuts (wich could be also mapped to a controller button), like changing wich monitor is your primary one, locking your cursor to just one, etc. Just something to go by, might be what you're looking for.

 

[RumblingRosco]

I'm amazed by an SSD. It doesn't even matter which one you have, still faster than a regular hard drive. I love my pictures and stuff loading instantly.

I'm so, so glad I got a Vertex 2 for my PC. It's only 40 GB, but just having Chrome, W7, and Office on it has been so amazing. I still have about 18 GB free so I may throw a smaller game on it later on, but for now, I'm 2 months into having it and still amazed.

 

[Flying_Phoenix]

Should I enable TRIM for my SSD?

 

[RS4-]

I sure do, but i use them both all the time as a dual monitor setup.

UltraMon does stuff like that on the fly with keyboard shorcuts (wich could be also mapped to a controller button), like changing wich monitor is your primary one, locking your cursor to just one, etc. Just something to go by, might be what you're looking for.

Yeah Ultramon is the best multi monitor program that I've ever used.

 

[coopolon]

Anyone here have their PC hooked up to display to both their Television and a monitor ?

Is there some way to do on the fly switching so I can quickly change the video card output to my television for playing The witcher 2 on my huge 55 inch tv on a 360 controller ?

Catalyst control center allows you to set up profiles that you can link to keyboard shortcuts. Like control alt 1 etc or whatever you want. I imagine nvidia allows you to do the same thing and you don't have to pay for these options.

 

[knitoe]

What?

SSD come in async and sync nand chips. The later offers a huge performance increase. Example, Corsair Force vs Corsair Force GT.

Should I enable TRIM for my SSD?

Yes. You want it for garbage collection, and thus, keeping the SSD speedy.

 

[LaneDS]

Posting from my new machine which has been running stable for a few hours now. Turned on and then immediately off again once I got home from work, but since then I've gotten Windows 7 up and running smoothly after some trouble with the SSD not being detected.

Even without most anything installed (my current display resolution is painful) it is clear what a difference in speed there is, although I suspect that is mostly the wonder of a SATA6Gb SSD at play.

 

[childplease]

Thank you guys. As always you are insanely helpful.

 

[knitoe]

Posting from my new machine which has been running stable for a few hours now. Turned on and then immediately off again once I got home from work, but since then I've gotten Windows 7 up and running smoothly after some trouble with the SSD not being detected.

Even without most anything installed (my current display resolution is painful) it is clear what a difference in speed there is, although I suspect that is mostly the wonder of a SATA6Gb SSD at play.

SSD's incredible fast seek time makes everything very snappy, even on slow read / write one. Once you go SSD, very hard to go back to HDD only.

 

[LaneDS]

SSD's incredible fast seek time makes everything very snappy, even on slow read / write one. Once you go SSD, very hard to go back to HDD only.

I agree completely. Installed a cheaper/older SSD in my aging laptop a few months back and I often wondered why I hadn't given the desktop the same love. Felt like a new computer, which was amazing considering how old some of the laptop components were.

Time to run through all the SSD configuration/optimization, woo.

 

[AwesomeSauce]

So how did you guys apply thermal paste for your cooler master hyper 212+ and sandy bridge cpu's? Any tips? Mine should arrive tomorrow!

Would be good to know as well, haven't applied thermal paste in ages. Can't remember the golden rule, dot in the middle, an X or whatever is best. I remember the good old days when thermal paste was like tooth paste, I used a CC to scrape it over the CPU in a very thin layer. Now it's like a liquid that spreads itself - Scares an old PC builder like me.

The heatsink spreads differently and not as smooth as stock coolers due to the heat pipe design.

Just follow the picture and you should be golden.

Quoting myself from earlier about how to apply thermal paste with a hyper 212+

 

[drakesfortune]

Okay, I'm about to pull the trigger now. This is what I settled on. If someone with more experience than me would be so kind as to look this over for me to make sure I don't have anything that's not compatible or something, I'd really be appreciative.

Here's what I'm about to buy:

Case: $59.99 plus shipping

BitFenix Shinobi

Power Supply: $69.99

XFX Core Edition PRO550W (P1-550S-XXB9) 550W ATX12V 2.2 & ESP12V 2.91 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS BRONZE

Mother Board - $149.99

ASRock P67 EXTREME4 (B3) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Item #: N82E16813157229

Processor - $219.99

Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52500K
Item #: N82E16819115072

RAM - $59.99

G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model F3 1.5v


DVD Drive - $20.99

ASUS DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS Black SATA 24X DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM
Item #: N82E16827135204

Hard Drive - $59.99

I downsized this to a 7200 rpm 1TB drive. I figured the faster drive meant more to me than anything. I have a 1TB drive right now and it's not even half full, so I should be good with 1TB for awhile. Mistake?

SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

GPU - $369.99

GIGABYTE Super Overclock Series GV-N570SO-13I GeForce GTX 570 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready ...
Item #: N82E16814125382


Fan - $27.99

COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus RR-B10-212P-G1 "Heatpipe Direct Contact" Long Life Sleeve 120mm CPU Cooler Compatible Intel ...
Item #: N82E16835103065

 

[RumblingRosco]

Okay, I'm about to pull the trigger now. This is what I settled on. If someone with more experience than me would be so kind as to look this over for me to make sure I don't have anything that's not compatible or something, I'd really be appreciative.

Here's what I'm about to buy:

Case: $59.99 plus shipping

BitFenix Shinobi

Power Supply: $69.99

XFX Core Edition PRO550W (P1-550S-XXB9) 550W ATX12V 2.2 & ESP12V 2.91 SLI Ready CrossFire Ready 80 PLUS BRONZE

Mother Board - $149.99

ASRock P67 EXTREME4 (B3) LGA 1155 Intel P67 SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Item #: N82E16813157229

Processor - $219.99

Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor BX80623I52500K
Item #: N82E16819115072

RAM - $48.99

Kingston HyperX 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) Desktop Memory Model KHX1600C9D3X1K2/8GX
Item #: N82E16820104266


DVD Drive - $20.99

ASUS DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS Black SATA 24X DVD Burner - Bulk - OEM
Item #: N82E16827135204

Hard Drive - $59.99

I downsized this to a 7200 rpm 1TB drive. I figured the faster drive meant more to me than anything. I have a 1TB drive right now and it's not even half full, so I should be good with 1TB for awhile. Mistake?

SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

GPU - $369.99

GIGABYTE Super Overclock Series GV-N570SO-13I GeForce GTX 570 (Fermi) 1280MB 320-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready ...
Item #: N82E16814125382


Fan - $27.99

COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus RR-B10-212P-G1 "Heatpipe Direct Contact" Long Life Sleeve 120mm CPU Cooler Compatible Intel ...
Item #: N82E16835103065

Your RAM is 1.65 V, I'm 99% sure you want to stick to 1.5 V RAM for the 2500k. Otherwise, looks good.

 

[drakesfortune]

Your RAM is 1.65 V, I'm 99% sure you want to stick to 1.5 V RAM for the 2500k. Otherwise, looks good.

Thank you!

I'll go with this RAM then:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231314

Edited my post to reflect the change.

I actually had noticed that, but I didn't see much info on it, so I assumed it was not a big deal. That's was assuming does I guess...

 

[RumblingRosco]

Thank you!

I'll go with this RAM then:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231314

I actually had noticed that, but I didn't see much info on it, so I assumed it was not a big deal. That's was assuming does I guess...

No problem. Apparently, it isn't the end of the world to use 1.65 V, but according to Intel, the 2500k/2600k are designed for 1.5 V or less. When I saw your RAM was ~$40 I more or less figured it had to be 1.65 V, for some reason that voltage of RAM is always cheaper by ~$10-20.

 

[LordCanti]

I spent the past two hours getting this internet connection back up and running. In the end, it turns out that the electricity that killed my ethernet switch, and one of my computers, also killed a single port on the back of my modem.

F*ck lightning.

 

[LaneDS]

How long should I run Prime95 with stock settings for before I can be convinced it's stable? Each core is maxing out at around 51C after 20 minutes of use.

 

[drakesfortune]

The thing that bums me out more than anything this build around, is that cases have dropped putting firewire ports on the front. I know, firewire is a crap standard because of the tendency to FRY your gear, but in my business I have to use firewire equipment all the time, and it's literally a plug it in for five minutes and done type thing, so the front port that I have on my coolermaster will be sorely missed.

Hopefully firewire dies a quick death now. It's such a bad design. Any design that fails as often as it does is crap.

 

[MisterNoisy]

upgraded my case to a Cooler Master Storm Scout I won from a Gaffer, while everything was out I upgraded the CPU cooler to a Noctua NH-C12. Temps under load went down from 65C to 37C. There isn't a wall of heat anymore when you walk into the room and the FPS on my total war games doesn't drop anymore after 30 minutes or so of crazy heat.

Glad you're digging the case. Did you leave the 3-bay fan mount in? That was good for a few degrees on the CPU and GPU when I installed it.

 

[LaneDS]

The thing that bums me out more than anything this build around, is that cases have dropped putting firewire ports on the front. I know, firewire is a crap standard because of the tendency to FRY your gear, but in my business I have to use firewire equipment all the time, and it's literally a plug it in for five minutes and done type thing, so the front port that I have on my coolermaster will be sorely missed.

Hopefully firewire dies a quick death now. It's such a bad design. Any design that fails as often as it does is crap.

Some cases still have them though. Not sure what your budget is or how much of a priority it would be, but they're still out there.

 

[drakesfortune]

SSD's incredible fast seek time makes everything very snappy, even on slow read / write one. Once you go SSD, very hard to go back to HDD only.

Is it worth it to throw something like this:

OCZ Vertex Series OCZSSD2-1VTX30GXXX 2.5" 30GB SATA II MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227393

Is it tough to just have Windows 7 sit on the SSD, and direct everything else to go to the other drive? I have no experience with multiple drives/partitions on Windows. I was a Mac guy for too many years.

I love the idea of snappy wake up, snappy on off etc... If it's under $100 to make that happen, and it's easy to manage, I'm in.

 

[knitoe]

How long should I run Prime95 with stock settings for before I can be convinced it's stable? Each core is maxing out at around 51C after 20 minutes of use.

If it's stock speed, no reason to run prime95 longterm other than to get load temps after ~10-15min. Intel/AMD should have already tested their CPU for stability at the stock speed.

 

[LaneDS]

If it's stock speed, no reason to run prime95 longterm other than to get load temps after ~10-15min. Intel/AMD should have already tested their CPU for stability at the stock speed.

Roger that. Figured I should run it at least a little while given all the initial problems I was having, but things are (thankfully) looking stable. Going to try to jump from 3.3GHz to 4.4GHz and see how that goes.

 

[Laurentius]

No problem. Apparently, it isn't the end of the world to use 1.65 V, but according to Intel, the 2500k/2600k are designed for 1.5 V or less. When I saw your RAM was ~$40 I more or less figured it had to be 1.65 V, for some reason that voltage of RAM is always cheaper by ~$10-20.

Hm...didn't know that. I got my RAM awhile ago, and it's 1.65 V, and I'm planning on getting the 2500k. Hopefully it's not a big deal.