Pictures as promised (warning---nerd alert...lol)

[SHRED]

Core 2 Quad Q6600 Kentsfield @ 3.0Ghz
GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L
Zalman 9700 CPU cooler
2GB G.SKILL PC2 6400
Seagate Barracuda 250GB SATA
2 x Seagate Barracuda 80GB SATA
EVGA GeForce 8800GT Superclocked 512MB
Accelero S1 w/Turbo Fans VGA cooler
COOLER MASTER Centurion 5 case
Antec True Power Trio TP3-550w ps
XP Pro


Added an Accelero S1 w/Turbo Fans to my videocard chip. Tight fit!!
Cleaned RAM chips with alcohol and rubbed them with an earaser and the heatsinks still fell off.
Got them to stay by dabbing them with a little Arctic Silver 5 and a few drops of Locktite superglue to fuse them on.
While I was at it I added a 120mm to the front/top of the case (my case has great flow through the entire front panel) and an 80mm to the outside lower/rear.
Not enough room inside under the Accelero.
Also added a twisted IDE cable.

This was my first "serious" system build with so much cooling.
It is surprisingly quiet.

My GPU temps have dropped through the floor!
I didn't do the fan-BIOS update on this EVGA 8800GT and with stock cooling it idled at 56-58c and peaked at 90c or so.
Now it idles around 36-38c and I haven't got it over 47c!!
(3dMark06)

Here are a few pics.
I need to get shorter SATA cables. Do they make ones that are more flexible?



Stock Cooling:



Accelero S1 with fans:



More pics:

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[RoyGBiv]

1. Techno Porn ...

That's a mighty big heat sink ya got there ...

:-)

[hunter]

2. I go for the other extreme.

My system is built from salvaged laptop components with an LCD monitor.

The current setup (which may change tomorrow, knowing me... ) including the monitor, wireless router, DSL modem, hibernating printer, and all the other goodies hanging off it, is drawing about 70 watts today.

I got excited when I noticed Debian Lenny shuts down the USB hub when it isn't active.

My computer is a tricked out three cylinder Geo Metro, but I like it.

I have a faster system out in the garage that I'll use whenever I need to grind video, but it's not nearly so fun as this little computer I'm driving now.

Obviously, I'm not a gamer.

Cool computer you got there, SHRED. :thumbsup:

[CabalPowered]

3. Nice! The VGA cooler looks like it's a

radiator off a compact car. I like the McGyver action with the bottom fan on the back. :D

[SHRED]

4. Like the old saying goes...

..."Necessity is the mother of invention".


That cooler is working out great.
The outside fan draws away any residual heat very nicely and since I don't look back there then ...who cares?
Thank god for little zip-ties!

LOL

[Deja Q]

5. You're daring to do that to the video card...

:wow:

What version BIOS are you on? I'm at F8f (final beta), and F8 has officially come out. Sounds like some people have had config problems so I won't go to F8 just yet...


BTW: After removing dust from my PC and moving it into a cooler area (21C ambient temp), I can o/c to 3.2GHz with virtually no overvolting; 40C idle and 57~58C full load (Prime95 x64 on all 4 cores, 15 mins running, with Flight Sim X too) - w/8GB DDR2 4-4-4-12. :9

I suppose I could try for 3.6GHz, but have read by many that it's not recommended with air cooling.

For the RAM, Corsair did say it has to run at 2.1v -- most Gigabyte board users would add .3 to volts rating. I had to add .4, otherwise the results were sufficiently off to cause stability problems.

I'll keep playing overnight, of course...

I dig your system though; especially the video card cooler... with my stats (55C idle, up to 67C in full use, I am tempted...)

[SHRED]

6. thanks

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It looks like I am running:

BIOS Properties
BIOS Type Award Modular
Award BIOS Type Award Modular BIOS v6.00PG
Award BIOS Message Intel P35 BIOS for P35-DS3L F5
System BIOS Date 09/07/07
Video BIOS Date 11/05/07

BIOS Manufacturer
Company Name Phoenix Technologies Ltd.
Product Information http://www.phoenix.com/en/products/default.htm

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That cooler has been great for me. I would recommend it. Just beware that you will need to add, along with thermal paste (don't use too much) a spot or two of superglue to hold the chip heatsinks on (see pics). The sticky thermal tap sucks that they come, with unless they have changed that.

I am not big on OC'ing but I do have the card and CPU "bumped" a little.

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[Deja Q]

7. Hmmm...

If you can find it, download and install BIOS rev F8f. If not, F8 should be fine -- you'll want to write down your settings, and once the BIOS is applied, reset BIOS settings to 'optimal', reboot, then change them back to how you had them. It's goofy, but it ensures the BIOS is properly re-set and updated. I had to do that once for F7, googled it, and it's common practice to do...

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Support/Motherboard/BIOS_Model.aspx?ProductID=2629
(BIOS revision history; if you ever want to use a 1TB drive, you will need to use F7...)

If your Q6600 is the G0 stepping, you can o/c it to 50% with minimal impact. Google it; I was skeptical but it's true. (I was content with 333Mhz x 9 clock multiplier, but as my RAM is rated for 400MHz, why not try 400x8? Took a while, with SMALL voltage increments, and I cleaned the system of dust, but it seems to be stable now. :party: The bandwidth will come in handy.)

Especially using all 4 RAM modules, it's amazing I only had to o/c the FSB and (G)MCH by 0.1v

Because higher speeds would require water cooling by default, I'm not going there.


http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=q6600+G0+400MHz&btnG=Google+Search
(incidents; ramping the FSB to 400MHz - mostly good ones, but YMMV. Using 333MHz is virtually guaranteed for ANYONE using the G0 chip, without needing to change any voltages. Again, with this mobo in general, it is optimized for 2 modules being used. I'm using all 4 slots, so I had no choice but to up the voltage a tad. Still impressive numbers when every factor is added in.)

[paparush]

8. Does it cool your beer too? :- )

How loud is that rig?