System heating up, need help

First post, longtime lurker here.

Just put my value driven system together tonite. No problems with assembly, setting up bios, or installing drivers. The only problem was that the system crept up to high temps in both the bios and in the software temp monitor. It was pretty hot in the 3rd floor apartment, but the temps still rose from presumably normal AMD temps, to near 70C!!

Fans in my system: stock retail AMD heatsink and fan on CPU(which is properly attached for sure), fan on geforce, double fans on hard drive, heat spreaders on ram (not that they do much :P), generic 99 cent fan on front (which is blocked by exterior of case, but sucks through the usb ports), generic intake LED on the side (came with case, and yes, i know the side disrupts flow....its weak as hell anyway), and a massive exaust fan on the back (tornado 81.1CFM).

The case, while nice on the outside complete with handles for easy LAN gaming, sucks for fan positioning. The inner shell and outer shell of the case don't line up, i.e. the spot for a top blowhole on the outer shell is completely covered by the inner shell, likewise in the front (although minor air can be sucked through USB ports). I originally wanted to put the the massive fan in the front, to pull as much air as possible and get the air moving to the back, but the cords didn't reach the mobo. Also didn't wanna blow all that air right onto the mobo/cpu from the side to intefere with the cpu fan. ::sigh:: Last time I buy something from a computer show, even if it is right across the street :P

Anyway, is there any chance that when the temp is checked the heat increases because the temp gaugeing process runs it up? Or is it more likely that its just adjusting to the correct temps over time. Over a period of 5 mins from boot it rose from 120-130F to 170F. But, when left alone for a bit, and then checked again, the temps went from lower to higher once more. Shouldn't be happening. Its still a work in progress, as I'm still working with some hand-me-down parts from my old comp. Once I install some more cpu intensive programs, I'll have some more results. I know the obvious answer from most would be to get a volcano fan, and some better case fans, which is what im prolly gonna get to anyway since noise is not a problem. Still shouldn't be this high. Any info or comments, such as average AMD temps for 2600 or comparable, or known conflicts in bios or hardware would help. My specs are in the sig. Thanks for suffering through the long post :P

Have you tried running it with the side off.

Nope, not yet, I think I'm done fooling around with it for the night, since the biggie fan is keeping my mom awake upstairs :P Will try it tomorrow though. Gonna update my bios and all drivers to current as well.

EDIT: must also be noted that the side has a ton of little holes on it, prolly not as efficient as having the side off, but somewhat comparable.

Take off your side panel...if your temps don't go down to where they should be then reseat your heatsink. Are you using anything like AS3?

its possible that your HS/F could be mounted wrong or something like that, I've had it happen. reapplying some type of thermal compound should drop you a few Cs. and heres a suggestion. For some good cooling, try the tornado on the side if thats possible, and drill a nice blowhole with a new fan on the top. you've got intake right onto your vid card, chipset, and cpu, and exhaust from the cpu too. Thats the way my case is set up, and i dropped my temps from (stock) idle at 55-56 to (overclocked) idle to 41-42.

your temps should not be that high. with retail cooler, a 2200+ (the hottest proc) only got to 50c under load for me.

make sure the heatsink is on properly. nobody tells new builders this, but they can be put on backwards. if you got that right, then just try reseating it, applying thin layer of thermal compound.

to make sure the HSF is on correctly, look at the bottom of the heatsink, there should be about 1/8th of the base that is raised. this side needs to go over the part of the socket that is also raised. where it says socket A or whatever.

That 80CFM tornado in the back is more than need for case exhaust. If its the CPU thats reacing 70C its definitly a HS problem.

If the HS is also about 70C then the fan is too small(which it is but not that bad). IF the HS is cooler then its not touching the CPU properly.

The HS only fits one way. The recess should be at the end where the CPU lever pivots.
You took the plastic film off the thermal pad right?

ew yeah, thermal pad. you might try scraping it off if you have one and putting on some compound. thatll help too