My system is as follows; Cooler Master Stacker 830 Evo case with a 1000W Real Power Pro PSU, Q9450, dual 3870's in CF, 4 hard drives in dual RAID, 8 120mm LED fans, Blu-ray player, DVD burner, media card reader with floppy, RAID controller card, 4GB (2x2) DDR2 1066 RAM, Gigabyte X38 Motherboard, HT Omega Claro Plus+ sound card, Logitech WebCam, front panel LCD fan controller, 2 external hard drives, keyboard, mouse, 28" LCD monitor and 42" LCD HDTV. The following is the list of CPU Heatsinks that I have narrowed it down to. 1) Thermalright Ultra-120 CPU Cooling Heatsink - Retail - $60 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835109125 2) Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme - cpu-tri-39 - $74 http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=205121074&listingid=20983864&dcaid=17902 3) ZALMAN CNPS9700 LED 110mm 2 Ball CPU Cooler - Retail - $45 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835118019 4) ZALMAN CNPS 9700 NT 110mm 2 Ball Ultra Quiet CPU Cooler - Retail - $70 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835118020 5) Scythe SCINF-1000 120mm CPU Cooler - Retail - $45 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835185027 6) Scythe SCASM-1000 120mm Sleeve Andy Samurai Master CPU Cooler - Retail - $40 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835185042 7) Scythe SCORC-1000 140mm CPU Cooler - Retail - $70 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835185064 8) ARCTIC COOLING Freezer 7 Pro 92mm CPU Cooler - Retail - $27 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835186134 9) ZEROtherm Nirvana NV120 120mm 2-ball UFO Bearing / Transparent CPU Cooler - Retail - $50 http://www.newegg.com/product/product.aspx?item=N82E16835887011
depends on what you want to do with the cpu, looking at your rig, i wiuld expect you to overclockit, therefore if your going to run air get a thermalright ultra 120 extreme and a good fan, sflex 1200 on mine! if you going to midly clock get a non extreme version, the difference in performance is not that great! if your not going to do a thing to it, and have good case cooling, a freezer 7 is cheep and functional!
I second: Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme with either a Noctua or Scythe fan. As far as what rpm for the fan depends on how loud your rest of your rig is.
The TRUE120 sure is a big investment considering you need to buy a fan as well, but it looks like you've got plenty of money to spend judging by that component list! Looking at the graph here, it may be the second best cooler but that's with a fan at low, with a bit more airflow it would be the champion: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/20/noctua_nh-u12p/4 Bit-tech's review is here: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/01/04/thermalright_120_extreme_zerotherm_nv120/1 Dont worry about the installation, it's easier than the article describes. Practice fitting the fan and clips before you mount it on the motherboard, to get the hang of things. The clips actually go into the holes between each fin, which is a bit easier and more secure, i've never woried about them falling off. You can add a second fan without the need to buy another two clips, just use one clip per fan and put a cable tie through the top corner of the fan and round one of the heatpipes ontop of the cooler. Finally, the backplate and screws are very secure, since your building from scratch just make sure you mount the cooler while the MB is still out of the case and it'll be fine.
Dunno if you can get it over in the USA yet, but Arctic Cooling have just released a new version of their popular Freezer 7 cooler... the Freezer 7 LP (LP = Low Profile): For anyone in the UK who's interested... it's expected to cost around £15 when it becomes available over here
It's only about 5% out, I'm sure it would be fine. There should be a tolerance in there to account for ambient temps, use patterns etc.
That freezer 7 is almost exactly the same as the heatsink that came with my Phenom. Edit: The low profile one.
Consider this option As you select your heatsink, you may consider this option - http://yourmediastop.blogspot.com/2008/11/build-silent-computer-no-processor-fan.html
Thermalright Ultra 120 eXtreme cheesecake! I've got one and it's superb. I don't think he wants to cool his Q9450 passively. First of all, it's not necessary. The other fans in the computer do noise aswell. Second, he propably wants to oveclock and then it's necessary to have a good cooler.
Out of those, the TRUE would be the best choice. I would go for the Xigmatek HDT-S1283 myself though, much cheaper and performs nearly as well.
I'd go with the zerotherm NV120. Lots of cooling capacity, a big fan for low noise, decent price point and it got a "recommended" stamp from Bit-tech when it was reviewed. Just make sure you have a case big enough for it. The thing is huge. Phil
How about the Cooler Master V8? Seems to be a great performer, and bit-tech will be doing a review soon.
I hope not literally I am a little sceptical, most heatsinks that look like that end up being over engineered pieces of computer bling
