3DMark06

The only processor that shut down the test system while running the 3DMark06 CPU Benchmark was AMD’s Athlon 64 X2 6000+, which again became extremely hot once the fan was disconnected to simulate failure. The Core 2 Duo was capable of finishing this benchmark at slightly reduced performance levels. The two low-cost CPUs - AMD’s Athlon X2 BE-2350 and the Intel Pentium Dual Core E2160 - completed this run almost without performance penalties due to the insufficient cooling.

The same result applied to the graphics benchmark of the 3DMark06: AMD’s high-end Athlon 64 X2 6000+ shut down before the benchmark could complete, while all the other processors made it through the benchmark, even though the processor fan was disconnected.
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Potential fan failure is a good reason to use a push/pull fan set up on a tower CPU cooler.
I've yet to have a CPU fan fail as I've always bought quality fans with ball bearings, but if you use sleeve bearing fans, or have a problem with dust then the fans is a lot more likely to fail.
This is very interesting. I am suprised that the Athlon BE series does not run cooler than the Pentium DC.
All of this begs the question - If I want to build a system with decent performance (read: modern dual core CPU), but I want it completely silent, which CPU, and which heatsink would I have to buy?
I am presuming that a 3rd party heatsink might provide enough cooling to enable some of these CPUs to run without a fan without throttling.