So, to anyone who has gotten theirs recently and is actually going to just run it for the hell of it, definitely change out the fan.

I replaced what has to be the worst quality fan I have ever seen today with the Noctua NF-A9x14 and not only is it MUCH quieter (I can barely hear it now - it is really quiet), but it is running 10º C cooler, and I am now getting indicated average speeds of a little over 8Gh, doing nothing more than the fan change.  Previously I was getting max speeds of about 7.4Gh.