Removing Heat Sinks from Vid Card

[mike288]

How do you remove the heat sinks and fan from a video card, its a 9800 pro, it has a pin sort of thing that has a spring wrapped around it

 

[Severian]

You need to use a pair of needle-nose pliers to compress the press-through pins from the back of the card, then press them back through to the front. The HSF should just pop off.

The spring on the pin provides the tension that holds the HSF against the GPU. When you compress the split anchor pins, you'll release that tension.

 

[cubby1223]

If you are replacing the hsf, and have replacement pins with the new hsf - then you can use wire cutters to cut the plastic on the back side of the card.

In my experience, there is a much greater risk of damaging the card by hitting it with the needle-nose pliers than with wire cutters.