Good Passive HS for Northbridge on a KT7A

[drees]

I'm looking to ditch that noisy Northbridge Fan/HS on my Abit KT7A, where can I get a nice passive HS to plug on it? Something that clips on would be ideal, but if I had to use some AS epoxy that wouldn't be bad, either.

 

[drees]

Well, I found a couple over at Millisec. Anyone know if I need the 46x46mm one or will the 55x55mm one fit?

 

[Jhhnn]

Both 2cooltek and Silicon Acoustics carry the Zalman passive sink kit- not a bad deal if you don't already have thermal adhesive. Most of the specialty cooling vendors carry small pin type or wing fin sinks, any of them should work OK. The 46 mm sq. sink you linked would work fine.

 

[jsproul]

I contacted Sharka Computers, the US distributor for Zalman, and they said they should have the new Zalman NB-32J heatsink within a few weeks. For now, you can get the NB-32 model.

The only difference I can see is that the NB-32J has a cool adjustable mounting system to support almost any motherboard layout without thermal adhesives. (You may have noticed that most motherboards place the screws for the northbridge HSF in different places.) You can attach the NB-32 with thermal adhesive if its screw mounts don't line up with your mobo, or wait for the NB-32J.

BTW, the reason I'm looking into the Zalman is that they are much taller (32mm) than most northbridge heat sinks, which should make it more effective. The two sinks that drees linked to are 9mm and 15mm high. A taller heat sink usually works better than one which is much wider than the chip being cooled, because warm air can pool underneath a wide heat sink and reduce its cooling performance. CPU heat sinks often have copper thermal spreaders to help conduct heat away from the chip and prevent pooling, but northbridge heat sinks don't seem to offer this feature.

Just make sure your CPU HSF has enough clearance for whatever northbridge heat sink you choose!

 

[drees]

The Zalman looks perfect, and since it includes thermal adhesive should do the trick. I'm not worried about removing the HS, if I get another MB, either I will look for one that uses passive cooling stock, or will pick up another Zalman kit.

Thanks for the pointer!

BTW, 2Cooltec has some badass silver braided cables, going to pick up some of those at the same time!