RAM fan necessary on an older machine?

[Essence_of_War]

There is a computer in my office that has what appears to be some sort of RAM fan on it:

The fan has stopped working, is it OK to remove this RAM-fan-assembly thing?

The rest of the system specs (from SPECCY summary) are:

Operating System:
Windows XP Professional x64 Edition 64-bit SP2

CPU:
Intel Core i7 950 @ 3.07GHz 57 °C
Bloomfield 45nm Technology

RAM:
12.0GB Triple-Channel DDR3 @ 801MHz (9-9-9-24)

Motherboard:
ASUSTeK Computer INC. P6T7 WS SUPERCOMPUTER (LGA1366) 50 °C

Graphics:
X233H (1920x1080@60Hz)
1024MB NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GT (EVGA)
NVIDIA Tesla C1060 (NVIDIA)
ForceWare version: 197.45

SLI Disabled

Hard Drives:
1397GB Seagate ST31500341AS (SATA) 38 °C
1397GB Seagate ST31500341AS (SATA) 39 °C

Optical Drives:
Optiarc DVD RW AD-7240S
ELBY CLONEDRIVE SCSI CdRom Device

Audio:
SoundMAX Integrated Digital HD Audio

And the whole thing is mounted in an Antec 1200 v1.

 

[nsafreak]

Yeah it'll be fine. Never really understood the idea behind the RAM coolers anyways since most RAM is cooled just fine by the heatspreaders installed on them, heck some of the most overclockable RAM in the Samsung "magic" RAM doesn't even have heatspreaders. Just another way for RAM companies to make a few more bucks.

 

[Essence_of_War]

Yeah that's kind of what I figured.

It apparently costs ~ $30-40, and it looks cheap/chintzy. Easy profit margins I guess...

 

[Essence_of_War]

Another follow-up question, I'm seeing that idle'ing in windows XP, speccy is reporting CPU @ ~55-57C, which seems pretty high to me, am I correct?

 

[dma0991]

Yes, that's higher than necessary but double check with a different program like Real Temp. If it reads just as high, dusting the heatsink and/or reapplying new TIM should help.

 

[PliotronX]

Yeah it'll be fine. Never really understood the idea behind the RAM coolers anyways since most RAM is cooled just fine by the heatspreaders installed on them, heck some of the most overclockable RAM in the Samsung "magic" RAM doesn't even have heatspreaders. Just another way for RAM companies to make a few more bucks.

Its actually the reverse. Heatspreaders trap heat because they use sub partthermalpads and Dont allow air to flow as freely between the modules. They are aesthetic value for parallel DRAM (anything in the consumer market) while the idea of spreaders came about because serial modules (RAMBUS and registered ECC) is a requisite so that no one chip burns out. Airflow is all that is needed and nothing crazy. It promotes dissipation through the chip leadsand PCB which have more surface area than thin hunks of pretty colored aluminum. Back in the days of DDR I had actually overclocked so much that errors due to heat were traced to manufacturer labels across only three chips. You Dont need special RAM fans I just use zip ties or fishlike to suspend a quiet 92-120mm fan over mine. Insures long life and optimal OC.

 

[aigomorla]

YES you do need them unless the ram is truely 1.5V

Most ram is factory overvolted to get speed and timings.
This causes the ram to heat up.

On older ram especially crucial ballastix, those guys got very hot and died.
RMA on those Micron ram was astronomical, however the speed and timings on them made them worth every penny at a poor fail rate.

Look at the factory voltage on the ram and if ur going to overclock.
If your going to overclock the ram, which u end up doing when playing with bclk without the usage of mem dividers.

Its actually the reverse. Heatspreaders trap heat because they use sub partthermalpads and Dont allow air to flow as freely between the modules. .

This isnt quite true.
The thermalpads do as they are intended... its a medium to get rid of air pockets on the surface of the RAM with the contact surface on the spreader.
They also allow a lift large enough for air to come in and out if u had an active fan on them.

If you have active cooling on or near the ram, like that corsair ram cooler, the spreaders do a much better job.
The spreaders are also more effective on systems which have spaced out ram banks. Ie.. 2 banks... of dual channel.. or tri channel, or quad channel, as u dont have those pockets from tightly populated ram. (most gamer atx design... not itx design)

I can go on and on about the misconceptions of memory spreaders... its a misconception because people arent using the theory / application behind them as intended.

Yeah that's kind of what I figured.

It apparently costs ~ $30-40, and it looks cheap/chintzy. Easy profit margins I guess...

Sigh..

I use them here..

I use another pair here:

Oh.. umm... this is embarrassing.. i micky mouse it here...

Hmm... even my current build has it..

Now can you tell my stance on active ram cooling?

 

[wheelerj]

I love the fan tied to the memory clips! What ever works right.

 

[Essence_of_War]

aigomorla,

Nothing in this machine is being overclocked. I understand why one might want a separate RAM cooler if doing a lot of BCLK OC'ing, especially if one is also WC'ing.

The RAM is 6 x 2GB Corsair Dominator 9-9-9-24 @ 1.5V.

To be clear, it isn't overvolted, it isn't overclocked, so it should be fine if I remove the (broken for ~months) RAM fans?

 

[aigomorla]

I love the fan tied to the memory clips! What ever works right.

lol thats how our hobby used to be.
We didnt care if it had bright red blue led's...
nor did we care if the colors matched.

We only cared about function! :sneaky:

aigomorla,

Nothing in this machine is being overclocked. I understand why one might want a separate RAM cooler if doing a lot of BCLK OC'ing, especially if one is also WC'ing.

The RAM is 6 x 2GB Corsair Dominator 9-9-9-24 @ 1.5V.

To be clear, it isn't overvolted, it isn't overclocked, so it should be fine if I remove the (broken for ~months) RAM fans?

yeah its fine cuz its raited at 1.5 which all DDR3 is raited.

I only stated one needed a fan if u had it factory overclocked, which 1.55 and 1.6V memory is.
Also if ur doing memory overclocking.

 

[fleshconsumed]

I've had a system with Crucial Ballistix ram that would give me errors when it ran too hot. Most commonly it would manifest itself when trying to unrar a known good archive, it would always fail with checksum error, but I knew that the archive was good because I could easily extract it on a different machine. However, my situation was kind of exceptional, it was a mining machine, so the videocard was dumping too much heat in the case heating up the ram. During normal operation the same set of RAM ran fine. So while I would agree that in a majority of situations you do not need a fan on RAM, sometimes you do...

 

[PliotronX]

This isnt quite true.
The thermalpads do as they are intended... its a medium to get rid of air pockets on the surface of the RAM with the contact surface on the spreader.
They also allow a lift large enough for air to come in and out if u had an active fan on them.

If you have active cooling on or near the ram, like that corsair ram cooler, the spreaders do a much better job.
The spreaders are also more effective on systems which have spaced out ram banks. Ie.. 2 banks... of dual channel.. or tri channel, or quad channel, as u dont have those pockets from tightly populated ram. (most gamer atx design... not itx design)

I can go on and on about the misconceptions of memory spreaders... its a misconception because people arent using the theory / application behind them as intended.

The theory behind a thin piece of metal implemented to dissipate heat doing anything for parallel modules is what is hokey. They were first put in place as a requirement for RDRAM because one chip would be active per cycle and so in order to keep that chip from frying, the spreader would distribute the heat rather than dissipate it. Then some SDRAM manufacturer thought it would be a good idea to slap it on for dressing and it has apparently worked as far as sales go. My stance and from personal experience is that a quiet fan over naked chips is optimal and I have been able to overclock better without spreaders every single time. The effect was more noticeable with TSOP because the exposed tin/copper leads acted more as heatsinks than any spreader.

Oh.. umm... this is embarrassing.. i micky mouse it here...

Looks like my ghetto cooling, no need for those tiny loud fans designed for RAM.