Basically i have a one simple question : i have an intel core i5 3570k and i was wondering with the stock cooler how much can i overclock the cpu?
Turbo boost usually ramps the CPU up to 3.8GHz anyhow, so you wouldn't really see a huge performance boost even if you were able to extend this to 4GHz. I recommend you just keep it at stock clocks until you get a better CPU cooler.
Any reccomendations on a CPU cooler suitable for this CPU and please keep in mind my case is a HAF 12 :D
Not really worth it, the stock cooler is only rated to work at default clocks safely. Sure it can go faster but by the time you get a boost that worth it your stock cooler would of failed ages ago :P
I've got my 3570k runing at 4.1ghz with the stock cooler. I start to see minor instability after 3-4 hour gaming sessions at 4.2, so I stepped it back down to 4.1 until my Hyper 212 comes in the mail. You're not going to see a HUGE increase in performance with something like that, but every CPU is different. Just ramp things up slowly and run prime95 for at LEAST 10 minutes (preferably an hour) and see if there are any issues. Also make sure you have something like speedfan open so you can monitor your temperatures. If you start getting around 90C, ramp it down because you're getting into the iffy area.
The first thing to ask is if you even need to bother. Is your cpu under performing? Are you bottlenecking? Doing some editting? If not, then why bother (aside from just the fun of it)?