a8n-sli chipset heatsink fan

[FP]

Have you all who have killed your motherboards cleaned and examined the nF4 chip? It's probably chipped. That, or you scratched a trace on the motherboard somehow.

I killed my mobo and no I have not tried to examine the NF4 chip. I don't want to take the new Asus chipset HSF off because you can't reattach it. I am just going to send the whole thing back to Asus.

You do have a good point though. I did have to use considerable force to get the push pins to set. I did one side at a time so the HSF was tilted after the first push pin was set. I then slowly leveled the HSF and attached the other push pin.

I don't think I scratched a trace because nothing that I know of touched the actual PCB.

I do notice that when I am putting the mobo back in the slideout case tray that I have to scoot it across the standoffs a bit to get it in straight. Perhaps that scratched a trace. Is there a better way to attached a mobo to a case tray?

 

[Gerbil333]

Originally posted by: binister
I killed my mobo and no I have not tried to examine the NF4 chip. I don't want to take the new Asus chipset HSF off because you can't reattach it. I am just going to send the whole thing back to Asus.

You do have a good point though. I did have to use considerable force to get the push pins to set. I did one side at a time so the HSF was tilted after the first push pin was set. I then slowly leveled the HSF and attached the other push pin.

I don't think I scratched a trace because nothing that I know of touched the actual PCB.

I do notice that when I am putting the mobo back in the slideout case tray that I have to scoot it across the standoffs a bit to get it in straight. Perhaps that scratched a trace. Is there a better way to attached a mobo to a case tray?

What do you mean you can't reattach it? All you have to do is squeeze the push pins. I reused the original pins on the hsf I swapped.

One side at a time will kill the chip unless you're lucky. I did it one side at a time, but I held the opposite side down while I pushed in the first to simulate pushing both pins in at once. That was difficult and it barely tilted. Ideally, both pins should be pushed down at the same time. That will avoid chipping the core.

You may have to "scoot" the motherboard slightly, but when I install a motherboard it's usually not off by more than 1/8"; I can still see the stand offs' holes, but they're not centered until I slightly move the board. Carefully lower the motherboard into place, and you shouldn't have to move it very much at all.

 

[Fisher999]

Originally posted by: binister
...I do notice that when I am putting the mobo back in the slideout case tray that I have to scoot it across the standoffs a bit to get it in straight. Perhaps that scratched a trace. Is there a better way to attached a mobo to a case tray?

Wow, sliding the motherboard across the standoffs is not good; damage done to trace(s) under the board MAY account for your dead mobo, or as Gerbil has pointed out, the replacement of the HSF by doing only ONE pushpin at a time may have damaged the nf4 chip.

It's funny, I had contacted a forum member who had replaced his stock hsf about that very issue - i.e. the extra force being applied to only one side of the nf4 chip when only one push pin is pressed without equal, or counteracting, pressure being exherted on the other side of the chip. He responded that he had successfully replaced his hsf using the "one push-pin at a time" method but considered himself lucky.

I can't imagine, particularly with my large hands, being able to apply counteracting pressure with one hand while inserting the OTHER push-pin as Gerbil333 was able to accomplish.

BTW, thanks for the tips Gerbil.

Greg

 

[Fisher999]

Originally posted by: Kanchi
...I'm sorry, I was only kidding but yes, your reply:

Well, I hate to say it but U.S.A. ROCKS !!! We are the BEST, the GREATEST, we RULE !!! So I guess we DESERVE "special treatment" !!!

was very helpfull

Kanchi:

I apologize ! That spirited American diatribe was out of line and I should not have posted it.

Greg

 

[FP]

Wow, sliding the motherboard across the standoffs is not good; damage done to trace(s) under the board MAY account for your dead mobo, or as Gerbil has pointed out, the replacement of the HSF by doing only ONE pushpin at a time may have damaged the nf4 chip.

It's funny, I had contacted a forum member who had replaced his stock hsf about that very issue - i.e. the extra force being applied to only one side of the nf4 chip when only one push pin is pressed without equal, or counteracting, pressure being exherted on the other side of the chip. He responded that he had successfully replaced his hsf using the "one push-pin at a time" method but considered himself lucky.

I can't imagine, particularly with my large hands, being able to apply counteracting pressure with one hand while inserting the OTHER push-pin as Gerbil333 was able to accomplish.

BTW, thanks for the tips Gerbil.

Greg

Well it looks like it was the mobo. I purchased a new one and installed it and everything works perfectly again.

When I said slide I meant more like reposition. The mobo tray in my case makes it hard to just drop the mobo in perfectly. Some adjustment needs to be made in order to get the holes to line up perfectly. That requires nudging the mobo around a bit like Gerbil said.

Did you guys keep your mobo attached to your case when you installed the new chipset HSF? I had to take the whole thing out, clip off the pins and then install the new HSF. Equal pressure would be very difficult without 2 people or without the mobo being installed in a case first.

 

[Gerbil333]

It's normal to have to slightly move the motherboard into place. The I/O plate usually prevents it from lining up perfectly. But, you should be able to land it with the metal of the screw holes touching the standoffs (misaligned).

Yes, the motherboard should be outside of the case when you swap the northbridge heatsink. I placed the motherboard halfway on its box and half way off. The weight of the CPU hsf kept it from falling off. I was able to hold the northbridge heatsink down as I squeezed the bottoms of the push pins (to keep one side of the heatsink from tilting). Yeah, you almost need two people to do the job. It wasn't easy balancing the board, pushing one pin, and applying a counter force to the opposite side of the heatsink.

 

[amheck]

Thumbs up for Asus tech support. I don't even have the MB (A8N-E) yet, but I called RMA 2 days ago to get a new fan, so I could have it on hand when I get the MB next Friday. Fan arrived today. Super fast shipping for anyone who's on the fence. I figure I'll try the free route first and then consider the other options if I need to.

 

[mauri]

My stock fan died yesterday. Called to the retailer I bought it from and got the replacement fan (new model) an hour later. The new fan is bigger, but the heatsink is less than half the weight of the original. It didn't make me feel safe, if seems even worse design than the original (except the bigger fan = less noise).

So, I just installed the Zalman ZM-NB48-J. Everything is just fine and dandy, at the moment.

 

[Fisher999]

Originally posted by: mauri
My stock fan died yesterday. Called to the retailer I bought it from and got the replacement fan (new model) an hour later. The new fan is bigger, but the heatsink is less than half the weight of the original. It didn't make me feel safe, if seems even worse design than the original (except the bigger fan = less noise).

So, I just installed the Zalman ZM-NB48-J. Everything is just fine and dandy, at the moment.

Maury:

Did you intall your Zalman NB47J heatsink by itself without modifying it by adding a 40mm fan or provide additional cooling by some other method ???

I was just wondering because there seems to be some disagreement as to whether the NB47J heatsink (the blue one with the tall fins) is (by itself) sufficient to cool the nf4 chip under load.

Thanks

 

[Fisher999]

Originally posted by: binister

...Equal pressure would be very difficult without 2 people or without the mobo being installed in a case first.

That's EXACTLY what I was thinking binister when Gerbil333 originally posted that method.

 

[Fisher999]

Originally posted by: Gerbil333
...Yeah, you almost need two people to do the job. It wasn't easy balancing the board, pushing one pin, and applying a counter force to the opposite side of the heatsink.

Yes, Gerbil, when I read your original post I thought "How the heck did he balance the mobo AND push in the pushpin AND apply equal pressure to the opposite side of the heatsink. I bet is WAS quite a challenge !

I need one of you to come over to my place to stand there and do one of those three functions while I do the other two, lol.

 

[mauri]

Originally posted by: Fisher999

Originally posted by: mauri
My stock fan died yesterday. Called to the retailer I bought it from and got the replacement fan (new model) an hour later. The new fan is bigger, but the heatsink is less than half the weight of the original. It didn't make me feel safe, if seems even worse design than the original (except the bigger fan = less noise).

So, I just installed the Zalman ZM-NB48-J. Everything is just fine and dandy, at the moment.

Maury:

Did you intall your Zalman NB47J heatsink by itself without modifying it by adding a 40mm fan or provide additional cooling by some other method ???

I was just wondering because there seems to be some disagreement as to whether the NB47J heatsink (the blue one with the tall fins) is (by itself) sufficient to cool the nf4 chip under load.

Thanks

No, I didn't mod the Zalman heatsink by any ways. I ordered 40mm papst fan, but it was out of stock. So I'm runnig the Zalman without it.

I've also been following the discussion about the Zalman mod, and specially about the fact that should i mod the heatsink with 40mm fan. Since there doesn't seem to be a clear understanding wether the Zalman is enough without the fan, I decided to play it safe and ordered the 40mm papst. But that would require of taking the motherboard out again, and i'm not too happy about that, so I may just leave it as it is.

In my opinion the original heatsink was even hotter than the Zalman at passive mode (fingertip-test-method done several times), so I've come to the conclusion that the Zalman is doing very good job at passive mode. The fact that it is hot tells me that it is working, and it is transferring the heat out of the chip.

Still what is bothering me is that what would be "enough" airflow to the case that would be considered enough for the Zalman? At the moment I got 50CFM of air coming in to the case by 2 80mm fans, but does anyone know if it is enough?

 

[Fisher999]

Originally posted by: mauri
[
No, I didn't mod the Zalman heatsink by any ways. I ordered 40mm papst fan, but it was out of stock. So I'm runnig the Zalman without it.

I've also been following the discussion about the Zalman mod, and specially about the fact that should i mod the heatsink with 40mm fan. Since there doesn't seem to be a clear understanding wether the Zalman is enough without the fan, I decided to play it safe and ordered the 40mm papst. But that would require of taking the motherboard out again, and i'm not too happy about that, so I may just leave it as it is.

In my opinion the original heatsink was even hotter than the Zalman at passive mode (fingertip-test-method done several times), so I've come to the conclusion that the Zalman is doing very good job at passive mode. The fact that it is hot tells me that it is working, and it is transferring the heat out of the chip.

Still what is bothering me is that what would be "enough" airflow to the case that would be considered enough for the Zalman? At the moment I got 50CFM of air coming in to the case by 2 80mm fans, but does anyone know if it is enough?

Thanks for the information; keep us posted; surely someone hear can answer your question about your case airflow.

 

[The Sly Syl]

So, I decided to do the unnnecessarily large amount of work required to install the Asus fan today. My old one finally started making annoying noises.
Note to self: Hope that you never ahve to remove the motherboard ever again.

That said, it is definately quieter, but its actually cooling slightly worse, the fanspeed tends to stay around 4800rpm, its only about 1 or 2c higher, don't think its that big of a deal.
However,the fan itself doesn't really seem as though its on as tight as it should be, its slightly loose, i haven't messed with it too much, as I read earlier that it is incredibly easy to mess up the nforce4 chipset if you push down on a single edge, but.. Is it like that for the rest of you guys?
(Oh, I used a tiny bit of Artic Silver 5 as my thermal goo)

 

[Cees]

Originally posted by: Kanchi
Asus is screwing the Netherlands it seems. Helpdesk is only available through a webform that gets answered in Taiwan and when you have a comment about the support you can sent a mail to some adress in China which doesn't reply at all. I also tried the german webform but no reply as well. I'm sure there are a lot of others with the same problem but they just seem to either accept it or replace it with other solutions.
I got an email from my dealer that says they expect a new version (of what? the fan, the board?) to arive within a month. I realy have no reason to believe them though. (0 trust in them)
Just the fact that the US has an Asus hotline and we don't proves the US is getting special treatment. Or the other way around I suppose since it's only reasonable they'd replace the fans. So back to point 1: Asus is screwing the Netherlands.

This morning my motherboard-dealer in the Netherlands send me an email that they have now received the new type fan from Asus and they will send me one today !!
So Asus in the Netherlands also delivers the new fans now. So better contact your dealer about this again now.

 

[pnyxtr]

Hi all,

first thanks for the great info posted here. Now let me tell you of my experience mounting the Zalman NB47J cooler on my a8n-sli mobo (not deluxe).

The first issue was removing the chipset fan. There are two pins that hold the fan in place. I tried pushing them in while lifting. No success. I didn't want to remove my mobo so I tried to cut them of with a small plier. That succeeded eventually, but I still couldnt continue, because I couldn't push in the remaining plastic pins through the holes (they hit the side of my case. So I had to unscrew the mobo and tilt it so that I could cut off those plastic things from underneath. There, finally got off that stupid fan. I stilled had all cables plugged in, didn't nead to remove the mobo entirerly. Note: It's no use unscrewing the four screws on top of the fan, they are only for removing the fan-part from the heatsink. So conclusion 1: You have to unmount your mobo.

Then I remounted the mobo. Unfortunatly I cut my self while doing it, and being pumped up with adrenaline (I always get high mounting computers), I didn't feel a thing. "Hope no blood on the mobo" I thought for myself.

Step 2: Cleaned the surface of the chipset and applied new thermal grease (supplied with the Zalman).

Step 3: Mounted the Zalman. This was the easy part. Just follow the instructions and push in those pins.

Step 4: Started up the computer, entered setup. The mobo temp was 30 degrees, I monitored it for about 30 sec the boom the computer shuts down. Then it goes up, then it shuts down. Then it went up again, then shutting down after 2 sec. Wtf I thought and pulled the plug. It must be blood on the mobo :-(

Unmounted it again and found some blood on top of it and underneath it as well. Cleaned it off with a wet peace of paper, then a dry peace of paper. Remounted it. Come on now computer.... yes it runs! Entered windows and it has been running stable for over an hour now, so hopefully it stable. Asus Probe shows 36 degrees on the mobo which is the same I had with the fan. By the way, I have an Arctic T2 case with 4 chassi fans so I guess the airstream is enough. So I don't need a special fan for the chipset. My other gear is 2 hdds, a leadtek geforce 6600gt extreme.

And now, finally, SILENCE!

 

[ProviaFan]

Thank you, pnyxtr. I had heard some rumors and horror stories, so your post was very reassuring (I am going to put on my Zalman chipset cooler on my A8N-E before installing the motherboard in the case, so unintentional spilling of blood should be easier to avoid).

 

[Kanchi]

Originally posted by: Cees
This morning my motherboard-dealer in the Netherlands send me an email that they have now received the new type fan from Asus and they will send me one today !!
So Asus in the Netherlands also delivers the new fans now. So better contact your dealer about this again now.

My dealer doesn't have them (yet) :frown: Where did you get yours? (if you don't mind me asking)

 

[133bpm]

Hey yall, got a bunch of questions for you...

So, how does one go about removing the old chipset fan without damaging the chipset?
Is it easy to take off?
Is it stuck on the chipset with thermal paste/glue/epoxy?
Do i just pull it off after undoing the pushpins from the motherboard, or do i twist it off?

When installing the new heatsink, should i use the thermal pad that comes with it?
I am planning on overclocking sooo i was thinking to use some AS5.
Should i remove the thermal pad with a razor?
Any special things i shoudl do while i am at it?

thanks,
one33_bpm

 

[ryansebiz]

i've read through most of this thread and i just wanted to let everyone know that i bought a brand new a8n-sli and got it yesterday. it does, in fact, have the new and improved 6,000 diagonal chipset fan.

i was ecstatic. it is very, very quiet.

just wanted to give everyone a head's up in case they are thinking about ordering the motherboard.

 

[Deinonych]

I received my Zalman NB47J in the mail today and installed it this evening. It was easy to install, but I can't imagine doing it without removing the motherboard first. What amazes me is that the original HSF even kept the chipset cool at all. It seems pretty cheaply made, and the "heatsink" is just a flat surface with a fan mounted on it.

My chipset temps are 1-2°C cooler with the NB47J than they were with the original HSF. Go figure.

Thumbs up to Zalman for another fine product.

 

[Gerbil333]

Originally posted by: Deinonych
I received my Zalman NB47J in the mail today and installed it this evening. It was easy to install, but I can't imagine doing it without removing the motherboard first. What amazes me is that the original HSF even kept the chipset cool at all. It seems pretty cheaply made, and the "heatsink" is just a flat surface with a fan mounted on it.

My chipset temps are 1-2°C cooler with the NB47J than they were with the original HSF. Go figure.

Thumbs up to Zalman for another fine product.

Unless you have a true thermal probe, those aren't the true temps. There is no northbridge temperature sensor on any of the nF4 motherboards. The "motherboard" sensor has nothing to do with the northbridge.

I agree with you about the stock hsf. A slab of metal with a fan is hardly effective at all! What's worse is that instead of making fins as they should for a proper heatsink, Asus spelled out "ASUS" on all four sides...like that's an effective design.:roll:

 

[Deinonych]

Originally posted by: Gerbil333
Unless you have a true thermal probe, those aren't the true temps. There is no northbridge temperature sensor on any of the nF4 motherboards. The "motherboard" sensor has nothing to do with the northbridge.

Ah, did not realize that. Thanks for the info.

 

[133bpm]

Is anyone using the thermalpad that comes attached to the new heatsink, or are you carving it off with a razor and using something like AS5 only?

 

[mauri]

To solve the sufficent airfolw to NB47-J I decided to mount Zalman FB123 system cooler to the side/bottom of the NB47-J heatsink (Instead of taking out the the whole motherboard again to install the 40mm papst fan).

The fan is 92mm, and it pushes 40CFM of air in silent mode (20dB) right towards the Zalman northbridge heatsink. It also cools other components on my motehrboard (such as memory), by pushing the air upwards/towards motherboard and chipset heatsink, fed by 2 intake fans. And it is silent. Now the heatsink is cooler and not running as hot as before (fingertip-test-method, again).