@ snowsniper2 - Well it can still chew anything I throw at it at stock, with a lil drop in FPS however I game on my offtime(with as high a settings as I can get-which is everything maxed)). Rendering and photoshop duties are what I usually do professionally
3.2Ghz made it fly...and I can still go more.
I'm in the midst of lowering my vcore to the absolute minimum while holding stable on that 3.4GHz and so far, 12hr P95 test all cores pass. Heat is tamed by my AMS and to say the least, that H50 was really bad even with a dual rad mod but now I know cooling isn't going to hold me back.
^all updates/progress are on my AMS build log - this is a gallery thread
I'm finding it a really funny situation when so many people are amazed by seeing my Q9550 - last I checked this isn't OCN where we prescribe expensive hardware just to stay in the same pack of alpha males. Similarly this isn't 2001 where everything inside case was power hungry and you'd need a ~1KW psu, everything can be run off a 450W~550W gold rated PSU. I can't find the link but a realistic test was produced to show how much power we really need off of a high ended single GPU system with the best of overclocks - so 750+W's of power, a lil too much for my taste.
Starting with vintage case mod, I'm shooting for a really low power consumption on an overclock too.
*on the cpu hierarchy chart my cpu is still top notch
**this is a member gallery mate, post and maybe ask people to rate your effort/rig
@ knotman - I once liked the Noctua fans about 3 years back but now the noiseblockers are the next best thing to the noctuas, silent and they come in black with ice black blades - awesome for any case with any color interior.
Snip those cable ties at the bottom, remove side panel case fan as that wire is def dangling inside case when case panel is shut and lastly tidy up the bunch of wires going to the top of the drive bays. Manage wires that run to your coolers and fans - they can be much more stealthier.
One of my favorite cases is the 550D
If you hadn't mentioned you're from Norway, I'd have guessed you were a person with English as a first language.