Hi, I was building my computer over the weekend and am concerned that I may have damaged my motherboard.
After installing the CPU/heatsink and RAM, I guess I was kind of oblivious to the added weight and I picked the motherboard up by its big heatsink (northbridge heatsink I guess?). Upon lifting, I heard a snap loud enough to make me think the heatsink had popped right off. I let go and it was still on but that snap noise still concerned me as to whether I severed its connection to the motherboard somewhat.
The heatsink seems to be held at two opposing corners by a metal pin with a spring around it and a plastic top piece. After the incident, the spring-pin felt loose enough to compress down somewhat and the heatsink itself felt loose (rocks and slants to a firm touch). Another smaller heatsink located elsewhere on the motherboard has a similar spring-pin setup but when I press these, the pins feel tighter and don't compress much.
The rig started up fine and I haven't had any problems but I'm afraid that later down the road I might see the consequences of this. Idle motherboard temperature reads are 24 degrees Celsius according to PC Probe II (Asus software). My computer has been on for about 15 minutes before this reading has taken place.
Does the underneath of the heatsink have thermal compound on the motherboard? Could it be that I just pulled the heatsink off the thermal compound then put it back on? This should be okay right? Should I be concerned about a potential hotspot due to air bulbbles if this is the case?
Are there any stress tests that I can safely conduct to determine whether my motherboard is damaged? Is there anything I can do?
What do you guys think?
The motherboard is Asus M4A77TD.
Sincerely and sadly,
Chris
After installing the CPU/heatsink and RAM, I guess I was kind of oblivious to the added weight and I picked the motherboard up by its big heatsink (northbridge heatsink I guess?). Upon lifting, I heard a snap loud enough to make me think the heatsink had popped right off. I let go and it was still on but that snap noise still concerned me as to whether I severed its connection to the motherboard somewhat.
The heatsink seems to be held at two opposing corners by a metal pin with a spring around it and a plastic top piece. After the incident, the spring-pin felt loose enough to compress down somewhat and the heatsink itself felt loose (rocks and slants to a firm touch). Another smaller heatsink located elsewhere on the motherboard has a similar spring-pin setup but when I press these, the pins feel tighter and don't compress much.
The rig started up fine and I haven't had any problems but I'm afraid that later down the road I might see the consequences of this. Idle motherboard temperature reads are 24 degrees Celsius according to PC Probe II (Asus software). My computer has been on for about 15 minutes before this reading has taken place.
Does the underneath of the heatsink have thermal compound on the motherboard? Could it be that I just pulled the heatsink off the thermal compound then put it back on? This should be okay right? Should I be concerned about a potential hotspot due to air bulbbles if this is the case?
Are there any stress tests that I can safely conduct to determine whether my motherboard is damaged? Is there anything I can do?
What do you guys think?
The motherboard is Asus M4A77TD.
Sincerely and sadly,
Chris
) like you broke the bond formed between the the motherboard's heatsink and the chipset. It should be a fairly simple procedure to unmount the heatsink, clean it, and apply a fresh coating of thermal compound.
Facebook
Twitter