OT but I know some of you guys will like it...

[vss1980]

As time goes by and you get older, getting the fastest and the best no longer becomes a necessity, and you drop into a state where you make sure what you have is 'good enough'. But of course, like most people, we are prone to outbursts of inexplicable behaviour.

Let me introduce you to my graphics card, an ELSA TNT2 Pro. For over a year now, this has served me well in thousands of hours of Half-Life, Counter-Strike, Unreal Tournament, and countless other games and forum posts.
However, it is getting old, and the fan started to rattle. Let me introduce you to my graphics card just hours later: ELSA TNT2 Pro, hours later.

Good news, the fan dont rattle

Oh and the core can hit 185MHz stable

 

[Kilowatt]

hehe That's the kind of thing I'd do.

 

[vss1980]

Kilowatt, IRC misses you m8. So many Linux questions, so few people to answer them

 

[littleprince]

kewl card and pic
but man, ur camera...

i thought i was wearing my glasses over my contact lenses again...
than i realized it was just your pic.

 

[vss1980]

LOL, its my mates camera. It cant do close-ups all that well. Otherwise a shot like this comes out ok.

 

[micron]

 

[BGod]

That close up looks like an Abit BE6 in an Inwin Q500A with the original Powerman power supply.

Am I even close?

 

[vss1980]

BGod, spookily close there, but not quite right.

Yep, correct about original power supply and make, but you got the case a little wrong, its a H500.

Motherboard, hmmm, you got the chipset (ie. BX) correct at least, but
Abit is bit far out. Here's a little help for ya: My System Rig

 

[Hellburner]

What, no RAM sinks? they're good for another 5 - 10 Mhz out of the memory...

For cheap RAM sinks I cut up old socket 7 HS into approriate sizes

 

[SpaceWalker]

YO VINNY!!!!!!!!!

Cool picture...
Hey, anything to keep you playing UT.....

in the second picture (after shot), it looks like the fan wouldn't let you insert the card all the way in....does it?

MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooooooooooooooooo...............

 

[vss1980]

Yeah SW, goes all the way in, the picture is a little off-center with the bottom of the card so it looks like it overhangs too much. It is just enough of a gap, about 1 or 2mm.

 

[littleprince]

how the heck are you seeing his case and internal components?
all i see is a video card!

i must be wearing both contacts and glasses again...

 

[vss1980]

littleprince, check the post after your first one. You'll see this link, providing you are using either your contacts or glasses

 

[JWMiddleton]

vss1980, The fan on my TnT2 Ultra died a long time ago. I don't use that machine much, so I haven't fixed it, but I should. So, how did you do it?

How to remove old HS/Fan?

How to connect new HS/Fan?

Thanks!

 

[vss1980]

JWM, depends on how your fan is mounted. If your heatsink is clipped on with a couple of clips going through part of the plate into holes in your graphics board, the fan is quite easy to remove.

In my case, it wasn't, so it had to be done the hard way. ELSA are quite happy to use thermal glue, and providing that the unit has no problems, it is fine, but is very hard to remove. I'll point you to the links I used, mainly because they explain it better and with pictures. This pretty much explains it close to what I did. It says that thermal glue is easier to seperate when colder, but I found that this wasn't quite what was happening (as have many other people), so I decided to use a hairdryer to heat it up (it gets quite hot, but not to a temperature that can damage the core) and ply it off carefully using a flat-edged knife.
Before I did this I placed pieces of thick paper card on the PCB around the chip so if I did manage to make things go flying I wouldn't take a few tracks or memory chips with me.

The most worrying part is when you hear to pop/ping of the heatsink being ripped from the chip and take a quick glance down.
You will either have a feeling of or :| - Good Luck

As for the new HS/fan, that I wanted to clip on, but one of the mounting holes on the board (yeah it has holes, but fan was glued on, duh??) would be slightly out of alignment, so I have currently tied it on using some string as a temporary measure.
The other options are to use frag tape (double sided heat transfer tape) or a heat-transfer pad.

 

[Slacker]

My Annihilator Pro had the same problem with the fan, I ripped it off and attached the heatsink/fan that came with my p3 700

 

[Eug]

No self-respecting AnandTecher would use the stock heatsink/fan.

Nope, the heatsink and glue job for my Voodoo 3 just sucked. So, I put on a 50 mm heatsink and fan with Arctic Silver and Crazy Glue, and the thing now gets about 20 Hz extra to 180 MHz ==> lots of extra FPS. It's now completely stable too whereas before at 160 Hz I'd get the rare glitch.

I actually have another heatsink/fan on the back (since I had no other use for it) as well as memory sinks, but they don't do anything except take up room.