I have a GA-X38T-DQ6 motherboard, running a Q6600 and 2GB of DDR3 RAM. I have never overclocked before, and am considering doing so. However, when installing the CPU I also installed the stock cooler with the silver compound supplied by Intel. I'm not sure how much overclocking is possible with the stock cooler.What are the precautions when replacing the stock cooler with a better one? I've heard about the silver compound being hard to clean or remove from the CPU due to the minute contours on the cpu surface.Thanks for any suggestions,Bruce.

This is cooler : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16835109140And here is the paste and instructions: http://www.arcticsilver.com/ins_route_step2intelas5.htmlGoogle "prime 95 for quads" and get that stress tester.Bump up the front side buss until prime runs start loosing cores. Then start bringing up the core voltage. Bump up one, then the other. 1.5 vCore is top volts. With a GO/SLACR, ~1.4 vCore should get you 3.6Ghz. That's about as far as the Q6600 will go for us non-hobbiest simmers.Leave everything else in auto. You'll be at a 400mhz FSB and that is precisely where that X38 was designed to run. Any DDR3 has plenty of headroom so ram speed will not be an issue. Enyoy your brand new Uberbox.Same drill with the factory cooler, 'cept you'll probably only get to 2.8Ghz.

Hi Bruce,I've heard about the silver compound being hard to clean or remove from the CPU due to the minute contours on the cpu surface.A couple years ago on a whim my wife bought me some of this. It works very well, and is non-toxic (to us and computer parts). Clean with one solution, purify with other.Cheers,

I have that board. Before you overclock, make sure you have the latest BIOS (January?). Other advice, stay away from the overclocking utility in Windows that Gigabyte provides, it causes nothing but trouble and commits suicide 9 out of 10 times. Do it from the BIOS only, it will save you much headache.I had no problems going to 500MHz FSB on this X38 DQ6, although I found the chipset didn't quite keep up without wanting to roast on the default heat sinks. I ended up running normal at 400MHz, although 412MHz was a also stable but didn't quite get me the memory sync at 2:1 I wanted to keep for timing reasons (this way I don't skip a sync) and my video card acted fluky. On my QX9650, I've been able to go up to 5GHz for testing, but I didn't want to go over 1.4volts on my chip. I hate to have to purchase another one soon nor do I want to reduce the effective life much. I'm running under normal conditions at 4 to 4.1GHz with a 10x multiplier which is more than enough for what I need to do.Also, I had a big "hole" at FSB 433 to about 480MHz where the board just locked up.There are great overclocking guides on the net that go with the basics. The DQ6 has all the required features in the BIOS, although the memory timings take some getting used to and some of the warnings you get in the BIOS make no sense. For example, I get a big red warning with my memory at 2.1V which is the recommended (and certified) manufacturer's voltage for my Corsair memory at the rate I'm running it.The stock cooler on the Intel chip should work OK for basic overclocking but for optimal results, you may want to place a Thermalright or something along those lines if your case is big enough to handle it.One comment on the board manufacturing is the thermal interface between the north bridge and its cooler isn't always that good. I just stuck a big fan on top of mine (the flex Antec). Some go through the effort of removing it and replacing the compounds on all sinks (there are 6?). Also, the north bridge runs incredibly hot with no overclock, so cranking the FSB up by 100MHz gives it a really hard time.Overall, this is probably the best board I've ever owned and it's rock steady.Cheers,Etienne

Thanks everyone for the great suggestions, I look forward to trying them.Bruce.

Bruce...Here's an article on many different types of thermal compound: http://hardwarelogic.com/news/137/ARTICLE/...2008-03-03.htmlI like using MEK (Methyl Ethyl Ketone... the universal aviation cleaning solvent) to clean off old paste and then finish prepping the surface using the "kit" Greg linked to (the newegg arctic kit). I think one is safe also with straight Acetone (not the fingernail polish remover type). Here's a sticky at ocforums that might be worth a look: http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=515316 Just updated about a week ago.Also the guys at maximumpc (www.maximumpc.com) have done quite a few reviews on heatsinks.Rob O.