Overclocked Q6600 @ 3.51GHz Idle Temperature = 45 ?

Basher11

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Aug 2, 2008
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I must admit, very much impressed by the overclockability of Q6600 :bounce: Thanks to the P5Q Deluxe which unlocks the mulitpler and allows x6, x7, x8 and x9. Bus Speed is holding at 390MHz gives me a FSB of 1560MHz, RAM is doing 5-5-5-18. The system is completely stable with a single Sapphire HD 3850. Lesson learnt from having a bad power supply so now I have deployed Cosair TX750W which is ATi certified for even a later upgrade to HD 4870 X2.

Playing Battlefield which is my favourite game is so much fun now, I don't need to worry about stuttering and laggy frame rates. Can't believe this game is now doing at 99FPS @ 1024X768 most of the time even on large map. It is a good benchmark game which is both CPU and GPU demanidnn in my own view. Compared to Call of Duty 5 or COD World at War, which is less than 50FPS at 1280X768, I wonder if this game is GPU bounded given Q6600@3.5 is quite a performing CPU. Could anyone suggest any improvement I can do to get more FPS out fo this game?

My major problem right now is the Idle temperature which is holding at 43~46 varies at each core. Is this idle temperature of an overclocked Q6600 normal? I heard that any chipsets which is hearted up to above 45 degree celsius will have its lifespan shorten to 1 year or 1 year and a half at the most, anyone can suggest me with a cooling solution apart from water coolant?

Thanks!
 

howarddavidp

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Jun 1, 2008
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Hello,

I have 2 Q6600's that I overclock, and I can tell you it is all about stepping.

My 1st would only be stable up to 3.4MHz, and idle was in the mid 40's temperature. I could do 3.6MHz if I opened the window(it's winter here), but not for more than a few hours. This was a B0 stepping.

I then purchased a G0 stepping, and now I can do 3.6MHz at 38 degrees idle.

I run a gigabyte UD3P board which also unlocks the multiplier. One thing to note, I think my northbridge runs hotter than my CPU, but I got a bigger cooler for that and things got better.

David

 

Basher11

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According to CPUZ it says my Q6600 is Stepping B, but the revion is G0. Is mine step G0 or step B?

I get you, if you know P5Q Deluxe, you find heat pipe surrounding the CPU socket, it is extremely hot after playing COD for half an hour. At idle time, it is just slightly warm.

So what would you suggest me a solution to cool down the CPU, because at full loading when I played Battlefield 2, it jumped to a high as 62 degree celsius!
 

Basher11

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I am using the stock heat sink yes, but I heard that putting a third party heat sink will considerably reduce the heat by 5 to 6 degrees under load.