Temperatures on core i7 930@ 4.0

[jednx01]

I recently bought a core i7 930 and have tried overclocking. I have tested on prime 95 for almost 10 hours now and there have been no errors. I am unsure if the temperatures are a little bit high though. I had a zalman 9900 and was getting load temps of 80 degrees at 4.0 ghz with 1.256 core voltage. I replaced the zalman 9900 with a Prolimatech Megahalems and was able to drop my temperatures by 8 degrees celcius to 72 degrees C for the hottest temperature on my hottest core in Realtemp. The highest temps for each core are: 73/73/71/68. My core voltage is measured by CPU-z 1.53.1. My temps are measured through Realtemp 3.46. Do my temps seem too high considering the voltage and the cpu cooler that I am using? I want to try overclocking more, but I don't want to push the temperatures too high... Also, do you think it is better to have the more powerful fan pushing or pulling? I have the Heatsink aimed towards the top of the case. (horizontal orientation) The temps are slightly cooler when in the horizontal orientation. I have tried both Here are my relevent specs:

core i7 930 @4.004 Ghz @ 1.256v core voltage
prolimatech megahalems rev. B cooled with push/pull setup. (pull fan = 1750rpm, push fan = 1450)
antec 1200 case
sli gtx 260's core 192
1000w psu
asus p6x58d premium mobo
6 gb corasair xms3 1600mhz ram

Also, the fins on the megahalem do not feel hot to the touch even under prime95 testing. Should I be able to feel heat on the fins? (the barely feel warm at all actually) I did NOT try feeling the cooling pipes while the computer was running.... The megahalem seems to have a very secure mounting system so I don't think that is the problem. I put a razor on the bottom of the heatsink to see if it was completely flat and found that it was not. I tried placing thermal paste on the bottom of the heatsink and then put it on top of the cpu to see if the two were completely flush. The cpu was not entirely covered in the thermal paste; therefore, I think the two were not completely touching. Prolimatech specifically states that lapping is a bad idea and can degrade performance. What do you think? Any help you could give would be greatly appreciated. Ambient room temp is about 75 degrees F. (23.9 degrees C)

 

[RJR]

I think your temps are great for a 4.0GHz OC on an i7 930. The i7's are the hottest running processors out there. The thermal spec from Intel is 67.9c (tcase) and the widely accepted conversion from tcase to core temp is roughly +/- 5c so you are right at the thermal limit now. Yeah, there are those out there that will argue that you will never see your cores peaked at 100% like Prime95 does, and that's true, but what if one of your programs did go into a loop or had a problem and it did spike all your cores at 100%, I know I'd feel better knowing it wouldn't kill or seriously degrade my processor. But that's up to each individual overclocker to know the risks and assume the risks they are comfortable with.

I love the mounting from Prolimatech too, it's a great system that really holds the cooler tight and it's easy to install.

So, as for the fans, you can just switch the two and see if it makes any difference and for the lapping of the base, that one's up to you, but seeing that your in good shape now and it is an expensive cooler I wouldn't without a lot of confirmation from others that have lapped this exact cooler. You can try Googling to see if you can find others that have lapped their Megahalems and what the results were.

 

[jednx01]

Alrighty. I was hoping to get a little bit better cooling out of the megahalem, but I guess I can settle for this. 4.0 is a ton better than I got out of my old cpu.

 

[RJR]

Well, if you don't need all 8 threads, you can always turn off HT and your temps will drop approx 10c.

 

[jednx01]

If I turn off hyperthreading, I probably wouldn't get quite as good performance as I have now. Besides, my temperatures are fine right now, so I don't really think I need to obsess over it. 4.0 Ghz is able to do everything I want it to. Under normal conditions (like gaming, etc) the highest I've seen it get to was 62

 

[solidnickel]

Why do you wanna hit 4.0ghz other then benching?

I could pump my i7 960 up to 4ghz but @ 3.7 the temps are in the 30's and 40's and a 4ghz OC performance increase just does not make any sense unless I were benching.

 

[RJR]

That's the great thing with freedom of choice, you don't have to be like everyone else if you don't want to.

Can you image if everyone was forced to drive a YUGO, and all the same color.