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common sense maintenance to actual mods; easiest to most difficult/time-consuming. But don't worry, the mods are all fairly easy to do .
Most of this should be known to the vets, so this is more for the n00bers amongst us. But there's something for everyone!
1. Cool Your Air.
Since air cooling and even water cooling won't cool your CPU any lower than the ambient temperature, lower the ambient temperature.
2. Keep Your System Off the Floor.
Dirt goes on the floor.
3. Clean that Beast.
Dust can be a PC killer. Dust is just another layer of material for the heat to move through, so break out the compressed air and go at it.or use a large paint brush-no paint oviusly hehe! Mainly focus on passive heat sinks, chips, fans, and water cooling radiators.
4. Cool Your RAM!
The easiest and cheapest (and one of the most effective) is a simple fan mod,
Here's a couple of pics held on with black twist ties instead of rubber bands:
you can by the proper component but as this is diy this is how to do it cheap.
5. Cool Your MOSFET's.
These are some of the hottest parts on your motherboard, and chances are you don't know what the hell they are. MOSFET stands for "Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor". But what's important: they get very hot. Hot enough to bring your over clocking plans to a brick wall. Even if you don't over clock, they raise your system's ambient temps a considerable amount. Here's what they look like:
black squares
6. !!Fans!!
They may be loud and annoying, but they work! Two fans at 7V usually work better than one fan at 12V, so fill all of your intake and exhaust fan mounts. If they're too loud for you, mod them down to 7V or use a fan controller. The 7V mod is easy also: in a standard 4-pin molex, swap the red wire for the black one next to the yellow.
If that's confusing, here's a pic
Now your 4-pin fan will run at a quieter 7V instead of 12V.
DO NOT DO THIS MOD TO UR CPU FAN!!
7. Blow holes and ........Suckholes.
Ok, I made up "suckholes" out of a lacking of better terminology. But blowholes, that's where it's at for overall system cooling. One 80mm fan in the roof of your case will move almost as much heat as 2 80mm's in the back. Hot air rises, so put the fans in the hot spot. While you're at it, make it a 120mm (or 2 ).
As for suckholes, it's best to have the same amount of air going in and out of your case. This gives you a good, even-pressured volume of air flowing through your case. More of either in or out will restrict your airflow. So make sure your case sucks as much as it blows!
8. Toss Out Those Ugly Ribbon Cables!
Not only are they very ugly, but they can severely restrict the airflow in your case. Not such a big deal if you're water cooling, but if you are, you probably don't have any ribbon cables anyway.
Get some rounded cables (in pic) or round up your own ribbons (they're cheap, so you can mess one up and be okay). In the past, I have simply divided the wires with a razor and wrapped them up with electrical tape (it comes in colors!!!). You can buy some nice cable sleeving, or use heat shrink.
old style ribbon cables can be flattened along the side of your case for wire management and airflow. You can hide them reasonably well like this. But if they're in the open, they're still ugly.
9. Burn-in Your CPU.
People are skeptical about this one, but it works
The basic idea is this: run your CPU at a lower-than-stock voltage, and it becomes more energy-efficient. Then you can get higher overclocks at a higher voltage than you normally could. since Clock gen doesn't give the right options for some processors/motherboards. just search the web-burn in your cpu and it will tell you how to do it
10. Lap Your Heatsinks.
The hardest and most time-consuming mod here, but it gives you a lot of nerd points. "Lapping" is the process of sanding and polishing your heatsink/waterblock to be as smooth as possible. A smoother surface allows for more even heat transfer, lowering temps up to a few degrees.
Try wet sanding (use alcohol, not water), starting at about 600 grit, moving on to 800, 1000, then 1500. This is usually enough for most modders; not me. I lap to 2000 grit, then follow it of with some polishing compound (not buffing compound) to get it mirror-smooth. Remember, you're looking for smooth, not necessarily shiny. Use a hard, flat, even surface (such as glass from a picture frame) under your sandpaper to ensure your job comes out even. Keep the sandpaper wet with rubbing alcohol, so it's not quite so scratchy. Rotate the heatsink a quarter turn every 20 strokes. Try to get out all of the bumps, scratches, nicks, etc. Once it's as smooth as that grit will get it, move up to the next grit. 1500-2000 grit will get you near a mirror finish. I'm not going to explain polishing here.
This can be very time consuming; it takes me about five hours of lapping for one heatsink.
From simple preventive maintenance and cleaning to simple mods, it's not hard to keep your system at a good, hardware-friendly temperature.
Cooling your RAM and MOSFETs will improve your overall system stability and extend your hardware's life expectancy, especially if you are overclocking. Burning in your CPU and lapping your heatsinks also prolong the life of that expensive gaming gear.
