ATI AIW-7500 fan failure. What's a good replacement?

[ShyGuy91284]

The fan on the said video card has been acting very erratic, and not spinning/cooling properly. Artifacts and odd noises have become common. I've taken it off and cleaned it to try to fix it, but didn't work, and idk if ATI would fix it anymore if they can tell I took the fan off. Anyone have any suggestions for alterniate cooling for it? Like maybe a PCI-slot fan or something else?

 

[Sheriff]

Look @ the Vantec Iceberg series

 

[AIWGuru]

The vantec iceberg is not an option since this card doesn't have heatsink mounting peg holes. The heatsink is attached with thermal glue.
This videocard has a fan which is attached to the heatsink using four screws. You can obtain a replacement fan through ATI technical support. You will not have to remove the heatsink to replace the fan.
You can see a picture of the card here
Edit: in the meantime, lift up the ATI sticker and put some oil in the hole beneath.

 

[Sheriff]

Thanks for clearifying as I thought I read articles that Vantec made them in sizes for both Major Vid Manufs...maybe it was for another model ?

 

[AIWGuru]

Originally posted by: Sheriff
Thanks for clearifying as I thought I read articles that Vantec made them in sizes for both Major Vid Manufs...maybe it was for another model ?

ATI also makes cards with the mouting holes. This is an older card.

 

[MDE]

You could probably get away with running it passively if you aren't gaming with the card, and while we're on the passive note, if you are gaming with the card or doing anything else demanding, you could get a decently sized heatsink and stick it on there with some thermal epoxy and run the card noiselessly, hey it's one less fan to start rattling.

 

[AIWGuru]

That might work with a regular late model 7500 but this card has no clearance around the heatsink because of the tuner and AIW cards have special cooling concerns. Also, the current "heatsink" is epoxied down. There is only a marginal chance of removing it without destroying the core.

 

[MDE]

Originally posted by: AIWGuru
That might work with a regular late model 7500 but this card has no clearance around the heatsink because of the tuner and AIW cards have special cooling concerns. Also, the current "heatsink" is epoxied down. There is only a marginal chance of removing it without destroying the core.

I got the heatsink off of my 7200 pretty easily, and it still works, but I didn't think about the clearance issues.

 

[ShyGuy91284]

Cuz of the heatsink stuck on it, my best idea was to get a PCI slot fan (I've got lots of them to spare), take the fan off the heatsink, and just let that fan work. But idk if it will be over the CPU, and I've heard some of those are really really cheap and break pretty fast.

 

[AIWGuru]

Yeah, and they don't work. Hot air rises and that fan below the card doesn't have enough draw to sufficiently cool that card. ESPECIALLY not an AIW card. You can get a replacement fan from ati. It's only held on by screws.

 

[OulOat]

Originally posted by: MonkeyDriveExpress
You could probably get away with running it passively if you aren't gaming with the card, and while we're on the passive note, if you are gaming with the card or doing anything else demanding, you could get a decently sized heatsink and stick it on there with some thermal epoxy and run the card noiselessly, hey it's one less fan to start rattling.

I do this with my Geforce 3 TI200 and an old HP HS. I've even OCed the card a bit and there was no problems. But the best part is, no more whiny little fans!

 

[Zap]

Another alternative is to get one of those Zalman fan brackets (they come with some Zalman heatsinks and can also be purchased separately). You can then mount and standard fan to blow down over your video card. FYI the card probably doesn't need too much cooling. I have two 7500 AIW cards and one has a fan and the other has only a heatsink (larger than the heatsink with fan). I don't know if they run at different core speeds though.