I installed a Zalman fanless heatsink on my 8500 and now FPS games are screwed up?

[HeroOfPellinor]

BF1942 has lines and planes jutting out all over the place and CS has purple transparent dots. What about changing the heatsink on a vid card could be causing this? I tried Age of Mythology and it was just the same as it was before I made the switch. Any ideas? If I had damaged the chip wouldn't it not even be working? Is it just getting too hot when I run FPS games?

 

[LiLithTecH]

Did you use a generous amount of thermal grease?

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Originally posted by: LiLithTecH
Did you use a generous amount of thermal grease?

Very generous amounts everywhere it called for it. I put a glob about the size of a cherry seed on the GPU itself and spread it evenly with a credit card to account for the concave shape.

Is this kind of problem heat related or did I do damage to the GPU?

 

[LiLithTecH]

Sure sounds heat related to me.

Did you double check you installation, making sure the tube in angled
and not straight up and down?

You are using the ZM80A-HP version, correct? That is the correct version for the 8500.

Also, are there any fans in close proximity of the card?

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Originally posted by: LiLithTecH
Sure sounds heat related to me.

Did you double check you installation, making sure the tube in angled
and not straight up and down?

You are using the ZM80A-HP version, correct? That is the correct version for the 8500.

Also, are there any fans in close proximity of the card?

The tube is angled like it should be. There's a 92mm fan a few inches above the card. I was double checking my work as I went, but haven't checked it since the install...I think I'll do that and make sure heat is being conducted away and if the problem persists for another day or two, I'll take it off and try again or install a new HSF with a quiet fan.

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Just took the entire thing apart. The heatsink that makes direct contact with the GPU was slightly off-center so I adjusted it and reassembled the entire heatsink. Fired up BF1942 and had the same problem.

The heatsink is getting warm on both sides, so the heat pipe is working.

Damn it.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: HeroOfPellinor
Just took the entire thing apart. The heatsink that makes direct contact with the GPU was slightly off-center so I adjusted it and reassembled the entire heatsink. Fired up BF1942 and had the same problem.

The heatsink is getting warm on both sides, so the heat pipe is working.

Damn it.

What kind of thermal grease did you use? Is there any of it on the circuit board? A glob the size of a cherry seed sounds like a bit much.

 

[LiLithTecH]

HeroOfPellinor:

While the idea behind the Heatsink is reasonably sound,
the execution is less than ideal in most stituations.

If you have a Full Size tower, with good airflow, it will work well.
If you have a Mid-Size tower or Desktop, flow of air is reduced,
reducing the cooling effect.

Make no mistake about it. That GPU on the 8500 gets hot.
I think your idea with installing another HSF would be a good idea.


Jeff7:

The thermal grease is provided with the heatsink.

To find out more, go to:
Zalman VGA Heatpipe Cooler

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Originally posted by: Jeff7

Originally posted by: HeroOfPellinor
Just took the entire thing apart. The heatsink that makes direct contact with the GPU was slightly off-center so I adjusted it and reassembled the entire heatsink. Fired up BF1942 and had the same problem.

The heatsink is getting warm on both sides, so the heat pipe is working.

Damn it.

What kind of thermal grease did you use? Is there any of it on the circuit board? A glob the size of a cherry seed sounds like a bit much.

I used Arctic Silver II and none of it got on the circuit board. I must have got up half a dozen times to wash my hands when I got a tiny speck of it on me.

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Originally posted by: LiLithTecH
HeroOfPellinor:

While the idea behind the Heatsink is reasonably sound,
the execution is less than ideal in most stituations.

If you have a Full Size tower, with good airflow, it will work well.
If you have a Mid-Size tower or Desktop, flow of air is reduced,
reducing the cooling effect.

Make no mistake about it. That GPU on the 8500 gets hot.
I think your idea with installing another HSF would be a good idea.


Jeff7:

The thermal grease is provided with the heatsink.

To find out more, go to:
Zalman VGA Heatpipe Cooler

The Zalman fanless heatsink isn't getting too hot and I have an 80mm fan over my cpu and an 80mm intake fan and a 92mm rear exhaust fan.

I didn't use the thermal grease provided because it looked like that crap that comes with CPU heatsinks.

I just can't believe that piece of crap stock HSF that felt like plastic and was just glued on would cool better than this. I guess I'll have to get a crystal orb or something and see if that fixes the problem.

So you're saying it's definitly heat related?

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

How can I see the temperature of my vid card GPU? I have an Asus nForce2 board.

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Bump.

 

[HeroOfPellinor]

Another thing is that rollover (javascript or otherwise) are acting weird. In the BF1942 menu, when I roll over a button the button suddenly has about seven or eight black dots on it. The thumbnail images on Gamespot have vertical blue lines through them until I rollover on them and then the lines disappear and stay disappeared even when I roll off.

Does this still sound like overheating or did I screw up the GPU?