H60 Temps with Core i7 2600k

Hi everyone,

This is my first post on these forums.

I just finished my new build late last week, and am now testing out my temps and system stability. I'm running a, i7 2600k on an Asus p8p67 WS Revolution and am planning to try overclocking to 4.5 ghz without increasing the voltage. I've been reading once you go past this speed you need to start giving extra voltage to the CPU, but I'm mainly concerned with a nice stable overclock.

Before I start overclocking though, I really want to make sure my H60 is properly seated and cooling optimally. I ran prime95 using small FFTs for about 3 hours last night. My ambient room temperature was at 23 °C when I ran the test. Here are the temps I got at the default speed of 3.4 ghz:

Idle temp: 38 °C

Temp after 3 hours of Prime95: 60 °C

This seems like a decent result to me, but most of the review sites are claiming much lower idle temps. I'm also a little concerned what my temps will be like when I overclock the CPU.

CPU cores 0 and 1 were running at 59 and 60 °C respectively, and cores 2 and 3 were running about 7 or 8 °C cooler. Could this indicate that the cooler block isn't seated evenly?

Also forgot to mention that I installed the H60 in the top of my case in a push pull configuration. It's pulling air from inside the case, through the rad then out the top. I know it's optimal to blow cooler air through the rad, and into the case, but I don't like the idea of venting the hot air inside the case. Could this be the reason my idle temps are a bit high? Has anyone else had any success with a top mounted configuration?

I am using Arctic Silver 5 instead of the stock compound since I had a little accident during installation and had to re-apply. I used a very small amount and spread it evenly over the surface of the CPU heat-spreader. I've been reading a few posts and there seems to be many different ideologies on applying compound. Some people spread it out themselves, others make a line, a dot or an "x" and let the cooler block spread it out. Which way is the best way to ensure good thermal contact?

Any help is greatly appreciated!