Need passive heatsink for northbridge

[jeeves00]

I have an asus a7m266 motherboard and I'm tired of the noise coming from the northbridge fan. As it is now, the northbridge has a 1/4cm thick heatsink and a mini ~40mm fan on top of it. Its really pathetic.


Is there a bigger heatsink that I could throw on this sucker to replace the current stock hsf? Anyone tried this before, and more importantly, tried this on an a7m266??



TIA!

 

[Harvey]

There are too many variables. The purpose of the fan is to get heat away from the chip, itself, as quickly as possible. For a passive heatsink to replace the stock unit with a fan, it would have to be much more massive, with much bigger fins. Even then, it may not work if the ambient temp in your case is too high or if the actual contact surface area of the die was too small.

Here are some places to look for more info:

heatsink-guide.com

Aavid Thermallloy.com

 

[PliotronX]

The Zalman has never let me down, though I haven't used an A7M266 so I wouldn't know how that would work out.

 

[jeeves00]

so how does that zalman cooler mount? The review at the website you pointed me towards said something about using a lego brick to push spring-loaded screws. Is it that hard to mount? Do all motherboards have that kind of mount? I can't really tell on mine...



Also, is this adequate? Any experience with it.



I'd love it if this thing is a decent replacement... one less noise to hassle me.



Thanks so much for you help thus far!!!!

 

[Jeff7181]

Somehow I doubt that a 40mm fan creates an unbearable noise... but anyhow, I don't even use active cooling on my northbridge, and I don't have an enormous heatsink, and I have my FSB set to 140 and it's barely warm when the computer's running... I don't believe active cooling on the northbridge is necessary if you have adequate airflow through your case. Or unless you have your FSB set to 180 or somethin. But my motherboard is designed to work with XP processors with a 166 FSB, so I don't think 166 Mhz generates enough heat to warrant active cooling.

 

[Syclone4]

I have the Zalman ZMNB32J. Got it from sharkacorp.com. The page on their online store has an installation video link to the Zalman manufacturer website. Its easy to install. Check it out...
http://www.sharkacorp.com/cgi-bin/TLSstore.cgi?user_action=detail&catalogno=zmnb32j

 

[Elcs]

Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Somehow I doubt that a 40mm fan creates an unbearable noise...

Buy a few EPoX 8KHA+ boards... use them constantly and when their Northbridge fan starts to go.... listen to it. Its awful... with enough case fans it wont bother you but it is a nasty noise.

I said the 8KHA+ because its Northbridge fan does have a tendancy to go... like mine just did.

 

[Jhhnn]

Heh. Fan cooling the northbridge is a marketing ploy. For every board that has one of those really cheap coolers on the northbridge, there's a couple more that have a decent passive heatsink.

Don't fight it, get a Zalman, they're total overkill and easy to mount, they even include thermal epoxy for otherwise impossible situations...

Edit-spelling

 

[JokerF15]

Yup Get the Zalman best Chipset Cooler Ever.

That 40mm Fan is pretty damn loud though .


*God Haven't posted here in forever!*

-JokerF15