"it's getting hot" said, the cpu

[dani82]

a little over 2 months ago, i notice my cpu temp went from a constant 35C to an amazing 45-52C, with summer coming around, i'd purchased some arctic silver 5 to help lower the temp, it amazingly lower my neighbor's computer from 50C -> 38C, for me, no change what-so-ever

any hints, anybody? without purchasing a new hsf

[Mnl]

Probably your neighbour had not applied thermal paste correctly in the first place - 12 degrees celsius is quite a bit - normally you don't gain more than a couple of degrees by changing to high performance thermal paste.

With regard to your situation: what are your system specs and how many case fans do you have installed.

[dani82]

ok, that makes no sense, applying it wrong will lower it; and i'd apply it myslef to both our computers

athlon 2200+ (OC makes no differences in temperature), 2 fans blowing directly into the hsf, 1 on the side blowing out, 1 blowing directly into 2 120gb HD (currently un-plugged), 8mb video card, 1 cdr/dvd/dvdr-rom, everything else intergrated

[Mnl]

I'm sorry, maybe I misunderstood what you said. I thought that what you said was that changing the old thermal paste for new, high performance thermal paste lowered the CPU temp 12 degrees for your neighbor’s CPU, while it had no effect at all for your CPU.

What I meant to reply was that probably the old thermal paste was applied wrong on your neighbor’s CPU, as a gain of 12 degrees is more than you can expect from using better thermal paste.

The fact that you didn't gain anything from using better thermal paste indicates that the old thermal paste was applied correctly on your CPU - actually it is my experience that the difference between high performance thermal paste and ordinary silicone based paste is rather small.

Regarding your CPU temperature I don't really know whether there is anything you can do (besides changing the heat sink:)) as it seems like you already have ample case ventilation.

One way to check whether or not it would help to install some extra case fans would be to try taking the side off your case and check whether or not this lowers the CPU temperature.

hth, Mnl

[Joe Fenton]

Is your CPU actually getting hot? Old HSFs can give wrong temperatures. Maybe your HSF has finally bought the farm. If you have another, replace it and see if your temperature reads okay. Borrow your friend's. :D

[dani82]

the side been remove for weeks

@Joe Fenton

that's somewhat the purpose of this thread; since the cpu is still under a extend warranty, i'd wait until it burns out, and then buy a new hsf*, for now, i will apply the paste once again for hope, and rise the fan to 2200rpm (from 1800)

*or whenever i feel like it

[Mnl]

When you remove the heat sink to apply new thermal paste it would be a good idea to clean the heat sink. Dust trapped between the fins can cause the performance of the cooler to deteriorate quite a bit. The best way to clean it probably is to unscrew the fan from the heat sink and give the heat sink a good scrubbing with a brush.