Today's Loot..

FACT of the day.. The satisfaction of a guy shopping for computer hardware is larger or equal to a woman shopping for clothes!! FTW

Here goes the story..


.....

....

...

..

.

A random time surfing LYN, suddenly my bro saw a forum member post a question to ask whether to buy this deal (A4tech mouse + webcam) or a Razer mouse @ Rm99.



Details about the product:

A4tech X7 Gaming mouse XL-740K

Official Site

A4tech Stack Up 5MP webcam PK-8MJ

Official Site

VS

Razer Salmosa

Official Site

NOT a bad deal eh? getting a nice mouse + a webcam at such a price is really a good bargain. It is due to their 6th anni celebration. Was tempted but controlled.

TODAY woke up and dig out the thread to read again and I notice this picture here..

SO WHAT IS SO SPECIAL ABOUT THIS PICTURE?

Here goes..

Oh mai~ today is the last day!! After being affected by my computer hormones, my bro and I decided to head to low yat for shopping!! yes.. very random..!!

I drive to low yat and wait my bro in the car while he goes up to hunt for his mouse and my webcam.. He's done after half an hour and we head home happily after tat.. Total damage RM99 + petrol fees..

YET another FILLER (CLICK)

But after testing out, I found out the webcam has some issues with it. I tot I'm too noob dunno how to install.. @#@#$$^#@$*.. but after a few more tries.. I'm sure that the webcam is faulty.. DAMN, it means we need to head back to low yat to get a 1-1 exchange..

After all the hassle, we finally changed to a new one and my bro registered as ALLIT member, collecting his RM30 voucher bcz his bday lies within the celebration of ALLIT.. how good eh?

Anyway, after testing out my webcam, all i can say is, it is awesome. just tat being bottleneck by lousy stimix connection.. duh..

My next wishlist to buy (if possible)

• an external HDD
• AC Ryan UV CCFL
• and many more if possible =P
  

/k/ timez

imma wanna change a new blog title, but wat is suitable? humpz..

o mai~

kthxbye..

Resolution

Been busy and lazy for 4 weeks.. did not update my blog even thou I have many things to write..

This time, I would like to list out my 3rd year resolution..

But no more long list resolution..

Only one..

I WANT TO GRADUATE WITH 1ST CLASS HONOUR!!!

Hell yeah!!

Third Year Commenced..

It has been a busy day today. Tomolo wil be the first day of class for 3rd year. We came back today to clean up and settle down our things after the long summer break.

Luckily the house owner did most of the cleaning part and one of my housemate brought his maid along to help with the cleaning.

I think the dirtiest part in the house will be the kitchen, especially the fridge. Since the house owner turn off the main switch, the fridge has not been operating for quite some time i guess. Molds grew inside the fridge on the plastic holders. Even thou we emptied the fridge before we leave, molds are still able to grow. Creating an unpleasant odour that smell like dead rat (or mayb a dead rat smell like mold?).

The maid helped to clean the fridge and all the cooking utensils. Without her, it will be a disaster for us to clean it. lol.. the picture of the fridge is too harsh to be post public!

After hours of cleaning and mopping, we finally settled down around 5pm and proceed with our personal works. Luckily we are able to online even thou we haven apply for any streamyx account. Apparently the previous jumper was not taken away and the modem is able to connect even thou we are not able to dial out (due to 5 months of tunggakan). We used our own streamyx account and miraculously able to connect and online. We will settle the application as soon as tm net is done with their work. Long story about the stupid streamyx application.




Dinner time is here and 3 of us decided to go for a steamboat dinner. Price wise is ok but the portion is little IMO, and the additional snack charge is quite annoying. The above image shows the portion for 2 pax.


We ordered an additional fried tong fan to fill up the remaining spaces in our stomach. Ouch..

After tat we head back to hostel and continue with our own activities. A new start waiting us ahead tomolo. Better get some rest now. Aw, I'm hungry again..

OC dilemma

After using the setting of 333 x 10.5 for a week, I further proceed my OC to 400 x 9 to obtain FSB:RAM 1:1 ratio..

Let me do a simple comparison between all core clocks I used.

Processor: Intel C2D E7400 E0 (stock 2.8Ghz, 266Mhz FSB, 1.20Vcore)
Mobo: Gigabyte EP45-UD3L
Ram: KVR-PC6400 CL5 2Gb x 2 (800Mhz)


1st setting - 300 x 10.5
Clock: 3.15Ghz
Vcore: Auto (stock)
LLC: disabled

2nd setting - 333 x 10.5
Clock: 3.5Ghz
Vcore: 1.28750V (bios)
Vcore: 1.232 ~ 1.252V (cpu-z)
LLC: disbabled

3rd setting - 333 x 10.5
Clock: 3.5Ghz
Vcore: 1.26875V (bios)
Vcore: 1.232V (cpu-z)
LLC: enabled

4th setting - 400 x 9
Clock: 3.6Ghz
Vcore: 1.310xV (bios)
Vcore: 1.264V (cpu-z)
LLC: enabled

Tried 400 x 9.5 @ 3.8Ghz but failed to boot using 4th profile's setting, I refuse to raise my Vcore furthermore as 3.6Ghz is more than enough for my daily usage. I will further OC for benchmark and self satisfaction purpose only. As for 24/7 usage, I will prefer 3rd or 4th profile settings.

However, the performance difference between 333x10.5 and 400x9 is insignificant. After running Everest quick benchmark, the only advantage gained from the higher FSB is higher ram performance.

RAM: increased about 6~9%
CPU: increased about 2~4%
Vcore increased about 0.04125V in bios, 0.032V in cpu-z.
Temperature increased about 5~6°C on 100% load LinX stress.

So, the question is, is it worth for me to run 400x9 at higher temperature and Vcore or play safe at 333x10.5? the difference in performance is minimum unless I go for 3.8Ghz or higher.. Hmm..

心情日记（一）

夜深人静了。肚子不是很饿，但还是习惯性地泡了一杯茶，饮了…

突然心血来潮，想要把我的心情点滴，一一记录下来，写成心情日记。至于这个心情系列，会写到多少篇，那就不懂啦…今天就开始第一篇吧。

嗯…

最近的我怎么了？变得懒散了，不积极了。嗯，也许是吧。

但，为什么呢？人生有何乐趣？家里每天大吵大闹的，关心我的人，屈指可数；了解我的人，更寥寥无几。

也许是习惯了一个人，知己朋友一个都没有。有什么事，都是一个人做，一个人解决。不开心，也咽下肚子拍拍没事。日子一久，就习惯啦…

古人说：人生，不如意事常八九，我说我的常九十！开心的日子是什么？何谓开心呢？回想这几年来，令我真正开心的事不多，伤心的可一箩箩。

谁不想开心一辈子？谁不想把烦恼忘掉？但偏偏就是事与愿违；渴望得到的，就往往得不到。看到我那么沮丧，是不是怕我乱想？呵呵，可没那么容易…

为什么我变得懒散？因为我已经厌倦了，无论做多好，还是有人会批评，你做了九十九件好事，但别人只记得你做过的一件坏事。好人难做，坏人易当，干脆就不做。反正做了也是会给人骂，给人讲。我最讨厌人家每天以这种想法想我，好的不想，偏偏想坏的。我那么坏吗？就坏给你看。要骂要说，谁你的便！

为什么你们的脑子都要往坏的方面想？明明知道不是，却要说好像是真的一样。真的搞不懂你们。

烦了…

不说了，下次继续…

Factory fire @ Kepong

Unlucky Merdeka Fire

When I was on the way back from my gf's house 6pm last Monday, which is 31st of August, Hari Merdeka. I saw thick black smoke filling the blue sky. The source of the smoke is somewhere nearby, so I decided to follow the smoke and see where it leads me to.



Just after the corner I found the source of fire. Many people stopped by the roadside to join the crowd. The fire is engulfing the skl warehouse, beside the Giamax factory, opposite of Sai Gong restaurant. I manage to snap some picture when driving before continue my journey back home.



On the way home, I saw the fire engine rushing from Jinjang to the scene I guess around 6:10pm.

I pass by the scene the next day and saw the warehouse was totally burned down. The owner sure suffer some big amount of lost to that fire.

Book Fest 2009 @ KLCC

Last Sunday, my mum suggested to go for the book fest at KLCC. We actually wanna go there earlier but we delayed it because my relatives came by awhile. We head to KLCC around 4pm after my relatives left.

The book fest was organized by Popular and Sin Chew, together with some other co-sponsors. Venue was at KL Convention Center, time is 10am to 10pm. Entrance fee of RM2 per person for a day or RM10 for a 10-days seasonal pass. Students under 18 and senior resident above 60 will get free admission.


They divide the hall into sections according to country and vendor. There are books from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Malaysia. Hall 1 and Hall 2 is full of books. Hall 3, 4 and 5 is more to booth where you can see some other non-book related booth selling camera, electronic dictionary, stationery and bank booth.


After paying for our ticket, we enter the book fest via Hall 1. The hall was full of people with different age, everyone was busy reading and choosing books. We took our our mask and wore it because of the flu. There were a lot of books that caught my interest, however time and money is the factor preventing me from buying it.


My mum bought a few cook book and we proceed to the next hall. On our way, there's a stage with performance going on. Singing, dancing, talks and quiz are held on this stage. In Hall 4, there were less books and more of other merchandise for sale and display which includes computer parts, speakers, stationery and camera.



The camera booth caught my mum's attention as she was intended to buy a camera. After some survey and consideration, we decided to get a camera here. We continue walking before coming back to the fotokem booth. The Popular booth is located almost the end of the hallway and the crowd is getting less because it's 8pm+ already.

After finish shopping stationery and other stuff, we head back to the camera booth to choose a camera. There are a few models within my mum's budget and having promotion. At last, we decided to get the Sony DSC-W190 model at a price tag of RM749 with a bunch of free gifts which include a sony mp3 player (2GB), a camera pouch, a travel bag, 4GB memory card, photo album and camera strap.




It's just a normal 12.1MP camera with simple design. Suitable for my mum to use it as she dislike complicated stuff. The specs are as followed, source from google..


We head home after that and took a picture of KLCC in night view (with my phone!) ops.. My watch show 9pm+, and we haven have our dinner. Time for dinner..

Project: Reinforcement

Continuation from last week's work, I decided to further improve the performance of the cooler and the air flow inside my casing. I've arranged another COD with the forumer I last bought my Xigmatek Red Scorpion to get another fan and the tuniq tx-2.

At first, I wanna get another orange blade Xigmatek 120mm LED fan as it suits the colour of the Red Scorpion fan. However, due to short in stock, I decided to opt for another fan, which is the Cooler Master 90cfm 9 blades Blue LED fan. Compare to Xiggy 120mm fan, this CM fan should perform better than the Xigmatek fan. But the reason I wanna used Xigmatek fan before this is due to the build quality. I'd read comments on how fast the LED of the CM fans spoil after just days of used. Even thou the cfm rating is a lot higher than the Xigmatek fans, some claimed it is just a market gimmick to attract more customers.



CM 120mm Blue LED fan = 90cfm
Xigmatek 120mm XLF LED fan = 61cfm

(cfm = cubic feet per minute, higher the better)

Anyway, I do like the Blue colour LED, and the higher cfm it gave. The only reason holding me back is the LED quality. I hope mine will last long and never fail on me. Otherwise, this CM fan will be a fantastic fan to add on into my casing. Pictures will be added at the end of this post.

From my last post, I suggested a few ways to improve the temperature readings and upgrades that I might do. Click the spoiler below for more information.

====================================================================

Last week's proposal

Improvements planned for future upgrade:

1. get another 120mm fan and Tuniq TX-2
2. mod the casing to accommodate the additional fan (current casing only allow 2 max)
3. improve casing air flow
4. further modding if got time and cash

The words highlighted in green is what I've done for this time.

====================================================================

I start my PC operation after my dinner. As usual, I opened up a table as my operation table and prepare the tools and hardware that I will use in this operation. My brother decides to join in as well as he is eyeing on my new thermal paste. Anyway, it is time to clean the HSF of the old PC and reapply the thermal paste.

My brother will conduct his "operation" for the old PC under my guidance, while I will perform my own "operation" for my PC. We prepared the platform and simple tools needed.

====================================================================

TOOLS

• brush
• screwdrivers
• tissue paper
• cotton bud
• some sponge/foam
• scissors
  
• torchlight
• dry cloth
• receipt stand
• cable tie
• bamboo stick a.k.a satay stick
  

====================================================================

First of all, I removed the orange fan from my RS. It's kinda hard to remove the fan from the cooler itself because it was attached using the anti-vibrational rubber screw. I used a long and small metal to push out the rubber screw embedded inside the cooler's metal fins. After one side is remove, the other side will be easier to remove. The rubber screws were slightly twisted due to the slight force I used when removing the fan. But it wont do any harm as it is expected because it's rubber.


As you can see from the picture, there's thin layer of dust even after just a week of use. Looks like the filters in the front panel is not enough to filter off all the dust. Such amount of dust is acceptable due to the dusty environment my PC is placed now. And the filters did a good job of blocking most of the dust entering. After half a year of operating and the hardware is still as clean as new (except for the graphic card which is harder to clean, but still consider clean).

After that, I remove the CM stock fan at the rear of the casing because it's blocking my way to dismantle the push pins. The pushpins are easy to detach, a screwdriver will do the job. Pull up the cooler with a little force and as I suspected earlier, I applied too much thermal paste last time when I install the RS. This can be determined by observing the excess thermal paste around the processor esp on the cooler's copper base.


Carefully I used the cotton bud to wipe off the excess thermal paste at the side of the processor and cleaned the remaining with tissue paper. I'm not too particular to clean it with thermal paste remover because I do not have any of it. So I will just let it be and read up and see if there's any side effects of not using it.

Using tissue paper and cotton buds itself is not enough to remove the thermal paste completely, so I took out the processor to clean it thoroughly. This is the first time I remove my E7400 from its socket.

On the other hand, my bro also finish dismantle the Intel HSF from the old E6420, and the scene is horrible.. eww.. details will be added later as a filler. =P

After cleaning the processor, I placed it back to the socket and secure it before proceeding to other task. The next thing to do is remove the front casing fan to reallocate the location for each fan. This time my planning is to used the CM 90cfm fan as the main intake at the bottom, the xigmatek black fan as the rear exhaust. While the CM stock fan will be used as an additional intake fan at the top part. To do this, I will have to do some minor modifications to make space for the fan. Before this, the stock fan was used as exhaust and the xigmatek fan was used as the main intake. The diagram below will explain everything.

My planning is to open up the metal plates of the ROM bays to allow air flow and attach the fan there. What I had in mind is to cut a curved opening at the first and last plate and remove the plate in the middle. But unfortunately, I do not have the proper tools to do so, so I just remove the middle plate temporarily and see how it goes before doing further modding.

So after removing the middle plate, I attach the CM stock 120mm fan into it. Using a piece of soft thick foam, I cover the sides of the fan that has contact with the casing to eliminate any vibrations. Besides that, I also cut some of the thick foam into coin shape, for me to use it when screwing the other fans to the casing.

First I attach the CM stock 120mm fan to the metal plates. Then using a bamboo stick, I secure the fan to the casing. This is what I came up with at the moment, if this setup doesn't work or fit, I will come up with other solution. I slot in the bamboo stick at the both side of the casing holes and push it towards the fan, then I use cable ties to tie both ends of the bamboo stick and secure them with tape. Everything looks nice and the last thing to do is to connect the 3-pin to molex. Will give a test later to see if the cfm and noise level is acceptable.



Using a pair of scissors, I asked my sis to help me cut 8 pieces of coin shaped foam. 4 pieces for each fan, I have 2 fans that need to be screw. Using a receipt stand to make holes in the middle of the foam, I then screw the fan together with the foam onto the casing. From the picture below you can see that the foam is placed at the screw holes and act as a vibration-insulator between the casing and the fan itself.

After screwing the CM 90cfm fan properly, I double check the fan and connect the power source for it. Referring to the picture below you will see how the foam fits in between the casing and the fan.

After installing the CM 90cfm blue LED fan, I proceed to the next task, which is installing the RS with Tuniq TX-2 applied on my processor. Having experience for last time, I carefully squeeze an adequate amount of thermal paste and mount my cooler base on it carefully. Before this, I do clean the base of the cooler as there is residue of the white thermal paste. According to some article on the internet, the white thermal paste provided by xigmatek might corrode the copper base of the cooler. I'm not sure how reliable is this information but I'm going to use TX-2 on my processor anyway. TX-2 has got many good reviews about it and is one of the best thermal paste on the market with affordable price.

Specification of TX-2 please click on the spoiler below and also refer to the official website.

Tuniq TX-2 specification

Official website: here

Specifications:

Appearance	Grey
Viscosity	285000 cP
Thermal conductivity	4.5W/mK
Operating temperature	-45°C ~ 200°C
Specific Gravity	3.96 @ 25°C
Volume	1ml (3.5g)

Looking the base of the cooler, it is not actually smooth in my opinion. I'm so tempted to lap it but just don't have the proper knowledge and sand paper now. I will do so if I think I wanna squeeze more performance out of this RS.

After mounting the cooler, securing the push pins and attach the fan back to its position. I'm almost done with it. The last thing to do is to install the Xigmatek Black 120mm LED fan at the rear of the casing as exhaust. Doing the same to the Xiggy fan, I used 4 pieces of foam as an vibration insulator and screw them to the rear of the casing. Connect the 3-pin power to the motherboard and I'm done!!

The last thing to do now is to install my graphic card back to its position and I can start my PC. But wait a minute, since I have extra TX-2, y not I just use some of it on my graphic card chipset? I decided to give it try and grab some screwdrivers and start my minor side operation on my graphic card.

====================================================================

Applying Tuniq TX-2 on my HIS IceQ4 4850 TurboX

My graphic card itself has a decent cooler installed, which is the IceQ4 version of graphic cooler. My model: HIS ATI IceQ 4 4850 TurboX, is one of the fastest 4850 at its time. With the newer graphic cards now replacing this, the price has gone down pretty much compare to last time. First, I unscrew 3 big screws at the back of the PCB. Then switching to a smaller screwdriver, I unscrew the remaining 4 screws which are on the back plate of the chip set. Carefully not to bend the back plate and lost the small screws with springs, I placed the back plate aside and continue dismantling the cooler.

Exposing the copper heatsink inside, we can see the ram chips and the chipset are cooled separately. The thermal paste applied on the chipset has the same texture and colour as the TX-2. Carefully cleaning the paste, revealing the 4850 chipset, showing its made in taiwan. I squeeze a small drop of TX-2 on it and spread it evenly across the chip before covering the heatsink back to its position. Securing the back plate and screw all the screws back into their position, I'm done with the graphic card and almost done with the reinforcement process.

====================================================================

Connect and double check all the power cables. I'm ready to give it a test run. Before that, let me summarize on what I've done today for the reinforcement project.

1. Applied Tuniq TX-2 on E7400
2. Applied Tuniq TX-2 on HIS 4850
3. Add another casing fan i.e. CM 120mm 90cfm Blue LED fan
4. Relocate the fan location to allow maximum air flow
5. Simple modding at the 5" bay to accommodate a 120mm CM stock fan

With a total of 5 fans in the casing (including the PSU fan), I should have a good air flow to maintain good temperatures within the casing. A diagram is attached to show how the air flow in the casing in this new setup.
Obviously I have a stronger air flow now compare to last time, but this also means more dust. I must clean my filter once every month at least to keep the internal dust free. Cleaning the filter is much easier and safer than cleaning the hardware.

Giving a test run after everything shows that my rig is no longer as silent as before due to the 90cfm fan as the main intake. The anti-vibration foams are working great, no vibration sound were detected. However, the noise came from the friction of air with the holes. The fan itself is silent, but when the air passes through the casing holes, friction between the air and the metal creates noise, similar to vacuum cleaner, but not as loud. This is the sacrifice I had to bare in order to have good air flow. Basically the sound is only noticable during late quiet nights.



The blue LED really makes my rig look cool and nice. I shall use a better camera to take the effects in dark, as my phone camera's quality has drop over time.



OK, as for the results.

====================================================================

Summary of temperatures: (E7400 @ 3.2Ghz stock Vcore)
Latest
Idle: 30-31°C
Load: 55-58°C (Using LinX stress test)

Before
Idle: 33-35°C
Load: 58-60°C

Before installing RS
Idle: 39-40°C
Load: 68-70°C

Other temperatures such as GC, HDD and motherboard has some changes too

Graphic Card
Idle: 49°C (Cold weather) 55°C (Hot weather)
Load: 68°C (Crysis @ 99% GPU load)

Hard disk
Idle: 34°C (Cold weather) 40°C (Hot weather)

Motherboard
Idle: 27°C (Cold weather) 42°C (Hot weather)

Summary of temperatures: (E7400 @ 3.6Ghz Vcore 1.23~1.25V)
Latest
Idle: 30-32°C (Cold weather)
Load: 60-62°C (Using LinX stress test)

====================================================================

FILLER

So what happen to my old rig which has a E6420 on it? Well, Basically we did not clean the HSF for more than 2 years. We decided to give it a clean since we are going to change the thermal paste of it as well. After taking the dusty Intel stock HSF out of the E6420, to our surprise, it's a copper based HSF.

Removing the fan, we can see that the copper base is actually in a cup-shaped copper with aluminium fins around in. Inside the "cup", we found a lot of dust sticking on it. After some simple cleaning, the heat sink looks like this.

After finish cleaning and brushing away the dust, my brother cleaned the thermal paste on the base and the surface of the processor. To our disgust, the surface of the processor which is not covered by thermal paste was oxidised, in other words, rusted. It's such a waste to have a rusty processor surface, because it affects the beauty and the heat transfer of the processor too.

As you can see from the picture above, the thermal paste applied area is normal while the area which are not covered with thermal paste is rusted. Same goes to the push pin bracket of the heat sink. After cleaning the mother board are around the socket, it is time to apply the thermal paste and mount the HSF back to its position.

After a test run, the temperature of this hot E6420 drop tremendously to an idle of onli 32-33°C in cold weather!! But the temperature soon rose after the processor is stressed and the stock HSF cannot sustain the heat produced by the processor. On idle, the stock cooler is almost on par with the aftermarket coolers, the only thing limiting will be the surrounding temperature or the ambient temperature. If the ambient temperature can go lower, an aftermarket cooler will definitely leave the stock cooler behind. On load, the aftermarket cooler will pawn stock cooler with no sweat.

Busy Day

Been busy the whole day doing different things. Feels so sleepy now. The cold raining weather now means I'll have a good night sleep later.

Woke up in the morning today and had some simple breakfast. Then I continue my work on cleaning and setting up my home theater speakers which I spent whole night to clean. It has been some time since we last use the speakers. I knew we had a good set of surround speakers but never really utilise it. So I decided to start cleaning it and make good use of it. Rather than just sitting there collecting dust.



What I did first was getting the proper equipments like cloth, pail of water, screwdrivers and soap. Then I start to disconnect all the audio cables from the amplifier and players. Removing the DVD player 1st, followed by the Astro decoder, then the karaoke mixer. I placed everything aside and clean them 1 by 1. Finally, it came to the old yet powerful, big and heavy dusty amplifier.



The platform under it was covered with thick dust and the internal parts as well. Took the screwdriver and open the case up. Did not care bout the warranty void sticker as it ends long time ago. After opening the casing, to my horror, is a thick layer of dust covering all the circuit board and capacitors. Pictures can tell a better story.

All the cables are covered in dust and gray in colour. I took a brush, cotton buds and start cleaning around. Clean all possible areas that my equipments can reach. This is the result of leaving a amplifier un-touch for more than 10 years? I think..



After some time of cleaning the circuit board etc etc of the amplifier. I then clean the speakers as well. The speakers have been hibernating for years and never been used. It is time for me to giv it a test, but it's quite late when I finish cleaning everything. I decided to do it the next day, which is today.


This morning after my breakfast, I start to assemble all the 5 speakers around my PC and connect to the amplifier. I connect the amp to my PC and changed my PC audio settings to 5.1 surround system. After the cable fixing and testing, I found out that the right port for the front speakers is too soft. Even I tried the balancing thing and change to other port, the result is still the same. The speaker is fine but the port is not. Same goes to the 2 more rear speakers. The sound was too soft even i tried changing settings.

So I end up connecting the both front speakers to the same Left port and just use it as it is. The center speaker seems fine and the rear speakers I wont really bother much. After tat, I arrange everything back to its original place and connect the audio cables back to the player and TV. Then I gave it a try and the sound produced is wonderful, even thou it is not as good as before, but the bass is good enuf to shake the whole house even with just a quarter on.

After arranging the speakers and connecting everything back. I then clean the ceiling fans in my house. No one is free to do so and the fan blades are clogged with dust. My work doesn't end here, I continue filling my noon with other work, under the heat, full of sweat. Tidy up the mess around the TV, arranging the shoes and rack with the help of my sister. I then sweep and mop the living room twice to clear all the dust.

Rain starts to fall around evening and things starts to cool down bit. Everything starts to settle down and things starts to look neat and nice. The speakers are doing fine, producing nice sound for my enjoyment.

Contacted my forum fren to arrange for a COD this evening. He's been busy lately and don't have stock for the fan that I requested. So I just take another brand of fan which is almost the same, but different colour. He's been good for giving me extra discounts after discount for a CM 90cfm fan and tuniq tx-2 thermal paste. He just charged me RM35 for both items as an apology of keeping me waiting for weeks.

COD-ed with him at McD around 7pm+ with my bro and then we head home for dinner. After my dinner, my bro and I started our operation on both PC. My bro took out the Intel stock HSD from the old PC to clean it and re-apply the thermal paste with the TX-2 I just bought. I too, took out my Xigmatek RS to change the thermal paste. I also add in the new fan i just bought and did some simple modding to my casing. Details of this operation will be up tomorrow as I don't have enough time to blog 2 post for today.

After finish everything and give a test run, it's almost 11pm ady. Park my car in and went to bath. My girl fall asleep ady when I finish my bath. Looks like she's pretty tired today. I'm tired as well, guess I'll have to stop here and continue tomorrow.

Red Scorpion activated!!

After a month of purchasing this awesome CPU cooler from a fellow forumer, finally I have my time to install it into my PC and give it a run. I ordered this Xigmatek Red Scorpion together with a 120mm fan. However, he seems to forget about my 120mm fan and end up have to install my RS 1st while waiting for the fan.



I've been busy for the whole month working and have to let this scorpion stayed in its box. Last tuesday evening, I decided to clean my casing and install it. After weeks of sleeping, finally the scorpion has awaken. Before this I thought of waiting for my fan and install them together, however I can wait no longer and tempted to install it right away!

Here goes the procedure. As usual, I will clean the dust in my casing and the filter mesh in the front panel before proceeding to install the cooler. The first step is to remove the front panel. Instructions on how to remove the front panel and metal plates can refer my previous post here.


A few tools that i prepared this time including cloth, old tooth brush, brush, screwdrivers and a pair of pliers.

Using pliers will cause scratch on the metal surface. After experiencing a rust due to the clean up last time, I used a piece of folded paper to protect the metal surface from scratches.

The front metal bay covers are removed and placed aside, waiting to be clean and washed.

Then, using a screwdriver, I slowly open up the metal pins to take out the main filter inside.

After removing the plastic over, walah.. revealing the dirty front panel filter. Without it, all these dust will accumulate inside my casing.

All the filters are collected, washed and left aside to dry while I continue with my other work. The next thing to do is to swap the location of my casing fans. What I planned to do is to use 2 fans as intake and 1 fan as exhaust. But because I have only 2 fans now and waiting for the other one to arrive, I have no choice but to continue my existing layout which is 1 intake 1 exhaust. The problem now is, which fan I should put at the rear and which at the front?



Before this, my stock CM 120mm casing fan is located as the intake and the Xiggy LED fan as the exhaust. I wanna try swapping both fans to see any effect to the case air flow so I decided to use the lower CFM CM fan as the exhaust. This setup will be temporary until I get my new fan. Then I will mod my casing's front bay to accommodate this extra fan. Worklog will update soon after I mod it.

After removing the rear fan, it is time to change my CPU cooler. 1st of all, I have to wake up the sleeping Red Scorpion in the box. It has been sleeping for a month and it is time to wake up!! The package includes an orange 120mm fan, the cooler, push pins, thermal paste, 5 anti-vibration rubber screw (got 1 extra =P), AM2 clip.

Click below for specification

Xigmatek Red Scorpion Simplified Specification

Xigmatek Red Scorpion Features

• H.D.T. (Heat-pipe direct touch) technology
• Anti-vibration rubber design
• Transparent fan with colorful LED lights
• Particular spoiler design
• 3pcs Φ8mm high performance U type heat-pipes
• Light weight
• High performance & easy installation
• 120mm highly efficient PWM fan
• 3 in 1 application: LGA775 push-pin/K8 & AM2 tool-less clip.

CAC-SXHH3-U03 Specifications

• Product Name: Red Scorpion S1283
• Product Number: CAC-SXHH3-U03
• Outside Dimension (W) x (H) x (D) mm 120 x 50 x 159
• Heat Sink Material: Aluminum Alloy
• Fan Dimension (W) x (H) x (D) mm 120 x 120 x 25
• Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) Fan
  • Voltage Rating (V) 12V
  • Speed (R.P.M.) 1000~2200 R.P.M.
  • Bearing Type Rifle Bearing
  • Air Flow (CFM) 72.1~99.6 CFM
  • Air Pressure (mm H2O) 2.6~4.8 mm H2O
  • Life Expectancy (hrs) 50,000 hrs
  • Noise Level (dB) 20~32 dBA
  • Connector 4 Pin with PWM
  • Weight (g) 600g (w/fan)

First of all, remove the stock Intel HSF by turning the push pin using a screwdriver as shown in picture. Remove all the 4 push pins and slowly pull it out with force.


After removing the stock HSF, I can see the thermal paste applied on it. Carefully clean off the thermal paste before applying the new one. I dont have any paste remover or nail polisher so I just clean it with tissue paper. Wanna try and see the effect without using TP remover.


After cleaning the TP, I took the chance to have a shot of my processor, which is a Intel C2D E7400 E0 stepping. Currently OC-ed to 3.2Ghz and will pump it higher after I get everything stabilize..

After cleaning the TP, I have to assemble my cooler into shape by screwing the push pin plates into the main cooler. Then I have to remove the protection sticker at the base of the cooler. The base is not perfectly flat and there's sticky residues from the protection sticker, which disturbs me alot. Tried to clean off the residue but scared to scratch the base. Further lapping is needed to flatten surface to a mirror finish but I dare not do so without further learning. So for the mean time I will just use it temporarily and see how it goes with the temperature.


I applied the TIM provided on the processor because I don't have other thermal paste to use. I realise that this TIM provided by Xigmatek will corrode the copper base slowly, hence I will just use it temporarily until I get myself a Tuniq TX-2. I think I applied too much paste on my proc surface, my bad my bad. After mounting the cooler by pushing all 4 pins, I attached the 120mm orange fan to the cooler with the anti-vibration screws provided.

The HSF fits nicely on my motherboard because my northbridge cooler height is not too tall. Some motherboard are not able to fit such big cooler. Another one I'm worried of is my casing. My casing has about 16cm of extra height to accommodate this cooler. Xigmatek RS itself is almost 159mm high and I'm afraid I'm unable to close my side acrylic panel later on. However, everything's fine after i try to close my casing. The cooler fit just nice in a CM Elite 333 casing.



After finish mounting the mighty scorpion, the next thing to do will be arranging all the messy worms, i.e. the cables, time for cable management. My casing is not meant for doing cable management, but I will try to keep the cables together and allow maximum air flow.

After doing some simple cable management, everything is good to go for a test run later.

After closing the side panel and connecting all the cables. My PC is good to go for the first test run. Results later.

The Red Scorpy looks great in my casing and looks best in dark. Have a look!!

Unfortunately, after having a test run, I found out that one of my core temperature sensor is stuck at 40°C and never go below that. While the other core temperature seems normal to me idling at 33°C. I still wonder y this happen, is it due to the thermal place I applied too much affected the sensor? Anyway, it wont do any harm because I'm still able to read temperatures above 40°C

The temperature at load doesn't seem attractive even thou it has dropped 10°C compared to the stock cooler. I expect something more like maybe below 55°C? I suspect the thermal paste thickness is affecting the efficiency of heat transfer. Besides, using push pins has lower pressure on the processor hence less contact. I think things might improved IF I:-

• lap the copper base
• change the thermal paste to Tuniq TX-2 and apply it evenly and nicely
• use a back mount bracket
• increase the CFM of the fan
• increase the air flow especially the exhaust

I will try to improve the overall performance of this cooler before I continue pumping the speed to 3.6Ghz.

====================================================================

Summary of temperatures:
Latest
Idle: 33-35°C
Load: 58-60°C

Before
Idle: 39-40°C
Load: 68-70°C

Improvements planned for future upgrade:

1. get another 120mm fan and Tuniq TX-2
2. mod the casing to accommodate the additional fan (current casing only allow 2 max)
3. improve casing air flow
4. further modding if got time and cash