a8n-sli chipset heatsink fan

[induveca]

I've not heard of the specific Iceberg model, but I've avoided Vantec fans in general over the past few years. I've always found them to be pretty poorly made and EXTREMELY loud.

Maybe things have changed, but I was never a "fan" of them (pun wasn't intended but I immediately noticed it so had to quote it.)

 

[imported_Jimbob]

Hi all thought I had to post pics of the mod I performed on my A8N setup. I'm running 2 x XFX 6800GT's in SLI, 2Gig Crucial Ballistix RAM and a 3500+ clocked up to 2.6Ghz. I can't stand PC noise and have managed to get this beast of an SLI system almost completely silent under my desk. I'm using the ultra quiet Tagan 480Watt PSU, Zalman CNPS7700-CU CPU cooler and 2 x Arctic Cooling Rev.4 nVidia 5 VGA Silencers which some people have asked about above. I also use a 120mm 11dba SilenX rear fan.

Anyway like the rest of you replacing the 8800 rpm screamer fan was a must for me! The Arctic Cooling VGA silencers are superb - not only very quiet but they exhaust the hot air via their plastic encasement directly out of the slot next to each graphics card. This is very important because two 6800GT's create way too much ambient case heat that otherwise you'd have to remove with faster louder case fans.

If I replaced the Northbridge fan with a heatsink the first cards cooling unit would be in the way of it... however I realised if I modded the Arctic cooling unit by removing a piece of the plastic encasement directly above the Northbridge I could fit a larger heatsink. This would also be superb for overclocking as the VGA fan would be spinning air directly onto the larger Norbridge Heatsink AS WELL as the 6800GT chipset! Bonus The 47mm high widely available blue Zalman heatsink was too tall however there is a yellow 32mm high Zalman ZM-NB32J - only available in the UK at www.quietpc.com that I could find. The blue Coolermaster PAC-P01 also 32mm high would also do the trick however isn't available in the UK.

Here's some pics:-

Zalman ZM-NB32J Heatsink with Arctic Cooling mod

Inside my case from above

It worked perfectly. As expected due to the fact it's now got a heat source under the fan GPU 1 has risen in temperature slightly. However so has GPU 2 and the CPU slightly. Unfortunately at the same time as the mod I also installed noise dampening material blocking some side venting as well as the slower SilenX rear fan, and I'm sure that has added to the temperatures! However it proves that the mod would probably have even less effect if this is all you're changing. The Northbridge is much cooler anyway! Great for overclocking should you wish to push it harder than I have. Here's temperatures monitored through Nvidia drivers and Asus Probe before and after the changes over many days, room temp ranging 20.5-22 degrees:

Before

Average in Windows/Idle
CPU 30
Northbridge 32
GPU1 43
GPU2 38

Highest recorded (Just after playing Halflife 2 and Call of Duty sometimes for 3-4 hours.)
CPU 45
Northbridge 44
GPU1 54
GPU2 45

After

Average in Windows/Idle
CPU 31
Northbridge 28
GPU1 51
GPU2 43

Highest recorded
CPU 45
Northbridge 39
GPU1 66
GPU2 50

Taking the VGA silencer apart was very easy - you can remove the large front plastic cover and hacksaw the exact piece of plastic away before screwing it back onto the back piece of plastic and then re-installing the unit onto the card.

Hope it helps someone.

Jimbob

 

[pesho00]

Guis i exchage my noisy heatsink/fan wit very cheap, eficiant, not loud and realy ease to install Evercool VC-RD (VGA cooler) - fets in same holes with providet bindings.
Hope it helps - buy the way all Video cards feat as this one is exactley teh same hight

 

[runestone]

pesho, did you use the Evercool on the nforce chip?
JimBob, that is a clever setup; hoping Arctic cooler will have one out soon for my 6600gt-the fan on my Leadtek is loud.

 

[The Land of Smeg]

Originally posted by: Jimbob
Hi all thought I had to post pics of the mod I performed on my A8N setup. I'm running 2 x XFX 6800GT's in SLI, 2Gig Crucial Ballistix RAM and a 3500+ clocked up to 2.6Ghz. I can't stand PC noise and have managed to get this beast of an SLI system almost completely silent under my desk. I'm using the ultra quiet Tagan 480Watt PSU, Zalman CNPS7700-CU CPU cooler and 2 x Arctic Cooling Rev.4 nVidia 5 VGA Silencers which some people have asked about above. I also use a 120mm 11dba SilenX rear fan.

Anyway like the rest of you replacing the 8800 rpm screamer fan was a must for me! The Arctic Cooling VGA silencers are superb - not only very quiet but they exhaust the hot air via their plastic encasement directly out of the slot next to each graphics card. This is very important because two 6800GT's create way too much ambient case heat that otherwise you'd have to remove with faster louder case fans.

If I replaced the Northbridge fan with a heatsink the first cards cooling unit would be in the way of it... however I realised if I modded the Arctic cooling unit by removing a piece of the plastic encasement directly above the Northbridge I could fit a larger heatsink. This would also be superb for overclocking as the VGA fan would be spinning air directly onto the larger Norbridge Heatsink AS WELL as the 6800GT chipset! Bonus The 47mm high widely available blue Zalman heatsink was too tall however there is a yellow 32mm high Zalman ZM-NB32J - only available in the UK at www.quietpc.com that I could find. The blue Coolermaster PAC-P01 also 32mm high would also do the trick however isn't available in the UK

I have been planning on buying an XFX 6800GT with an NV5 Silencer. That 30mm 8000RPM fan (Vette A3010M12S-N) is giving me the shits too, I would like to know how much CFM that fan pushes, but I'll just have to assume that a 40mm SilenX fan (6CFM/14dB) would be sufficient.

Now why I need your advice (or that of someone who already has an NV5 Silencer)... If I install the SilenX fan which is 10mm tall on top of the stock heatsink, it would raise the Chipset Cooling to about ~25mm. Would this collide with the NV5 Silencer or would I be able to sqeeze it in?

And if I did cut a bit out of the NV5, what would that do for airflow - having two intake fans sucking from the same air?

The only other two concerns I have is:

If I did squeeze the SilenX fan (10mm tall) + Stock Heatsink(~15mm tall) in(Total ~25mm), Would half of the fan be covered by the uncut NV5, and if it is, what Would that do for airflow (Maybe I would only get 3 out of a possible 6CFM pressure)?

And the stock Asus heatsink would have a round clearing in the middle where the 30mm/8000RPM fan used to be, how would that affect the effectiveness of having the 40mm fan 10~15mm away from the base of the heatsink?

 

[imported_Jimbob]

25mm would put the very top of the fan fractionally inside the plastic of the NV5 or pushing up on it! The 40mm fan would also mean you'd have to remove too much of the plastic including one of the screw points.

If you're happy to remove some plastic why not just get a larger heatsink like I did!? It lowers the Northbridge temp quite a bit below stock in this setup + has 0 noise.

Hardly any heat is lost in the centre of the stock heatsink because there's only one way for it to go - to the tiny fins at the side. The stock 8000rpm fan blows air outwoulds through these tiny fins giving enough cooling. I'm not sure a much slower 40mm SilenX would do a very good job with the stock heatsink but it would probably be enough. If I was set on using a 40mm SilenX fan I'd definitely not use NV5 silencers and I'd get a better heatsink as well...

btw - the XFX 6800GT PCI-X cards have a dual slot backing plate. This is really annoying! I had to remove it from each card and hacksaw in two to make them single slot. This is because the NV5 Silencers need the adjacent slot to blow all the hot air directly out of the case. So if anyone is thinking of using them I'd recommend not going for XFX to save you the hassle - however they are superb cards.

Jimbob

 

[The Land of Smeg]

Adding a fan that is quieter that your quietest component would hardly add any noise levels (0.1 - 0.5db) so using a SilenX 40mm fan is not much of an issue other than airflow . It's only 10mm in height so that 25mm I estimated includes if I had the SilenX fan installed.

Well anyway I don't mind cutting into the NV5. Who am I to back away from some minor modifications?? hehe I already modded my fan to fit the XP-120 heatsink. I don't mind modifying the XFX Rear Bracket either.

I am looking at This Heatsink (The one you used is not available around here) so I'll just use that without the included fan. It's 20mm in height.

I'll see how I go with that Heatsink, you managed to fit 32mm in height without contact with the fins/blades/propellor/whatever so I guess that I'll give it a go with just the heatsink for w while, and then I'll add the 40x40x10mm SilenX fan later just to see how it performs like that. 30mm in total height should not be a problem if you've done 32mm

I'm looking forward to this.

 

[imported_Jimbob]

Yep 30mm high will be no problem if you're removing some plastic! 32mm is very close to the fan blades (only about 2mm away).

Remember though that my heatsink is only 37mm wide on each side. Whereas that Thermaltake heatsink and your fan will be 40mm wide. If you look closely at my first pic above you can see that the plastic I removed was very close on the left side to a screw position. It should be ok but very very close!

Good luck and let us know how you get on...

 

[TheNiceGuy]

Just an update -
I replaced the fan only with a new 4cm fan. Cost about $10 and 10 min (no need to take the mobo out). Now I can't hear a thing, and the heatsink temp dropped - a lot!

 

[T101]

Originally posted by: iscsidude
Well, I put a DB meter next to my A8N-SLI rig and unplugged the chipset fan. It went from 54 to 53 Decibels. Not sure if the original fans are louder than the current ones, but one thing I am sure of is that for one DB reduction in noise, it is no longer worth it to me.

In my case it turned out to be the one fan I had neglected to change out from my original Cooler Master Praetorian case. It resides in the back, so I thought it would be insignificant. Wrong and very red faced I disconnected this fan and found the DB level to go from 54 to 50.

Ordered another ThermalTake Smart Fan and will be good to go in a couple of days.

I also installed the Arctic Cooling NV5 which lowered the temp. 53 and DB level 58, to 50 and 54 respectively.

All I can think of is that ASUS changed the heatsink fan somewhere along the line. Asus Probe reports it running at 8KRPM, yet it is not generating any noise to speak of.

Just a small note, you know that decibel is not an incremental scale, but a logaritmic scale? which means an increase of 1 db means there is twice the amount of sound volume.

 

[doubleM]

This morning I woke up and got on my new a8n-sli deluxe (only 4 weeks old). Low and behold, ASUS Probe was up, flashing all over the screen! I looked down and... MY CHIPSET FAN WAS NOT SPINNING AT ALL!!! Who knows how long it had been off or how much damage it had created, luckily, the system still works. Any advice? All I know is that I definitly need a new fan...

 

[doubleM]

wow, seems like those fans sure get clogged easily. I just took it out and shot it with some compressed air, now it works good as new.

 

[imported_blarg]

I just replaced mine with the Zalman NB-47J heatsink, which is very cheap. Probably a good thing to consider if you have space in the case. I was thinking I'd also need to add an extra front or side case fan for ventilation, but it seems that my system is running completely stable without it even after many hours of playing games.

Me:
A8N-SLI w/ ZM-NB47J heatsink
AMD64 3500
Connect3D X850
1024MB DDR400
Antec Sonata Piano case with case fan under temp. control

 

[cdcushman]

Originally posted by: induveca
Hey guys, been following this thread for a while.

Found a fan which works GREAT, and also even dug through the crates at home depot to find screws which would easily screw onto the existing heatsink through the new fan.

I hope this saves you guys a lot of time. Note however, the fan is a 4 pin fan........so if you want to plug it into the Northbridge fan slot you'll need a 4 pin to 3 pin connector. I just plugged it into a 4 prong.

This fan has an RPM of 4300, and is only 19 DBA! It's also made by a GREAT company, Papst. My northbridge temps idle at 32-34 C and it's completely quiet!

I bought the fan for about 16 bucks here:
(NOTE: Remove the current fan, it's simple and temps are lower without leaving it in there.)

http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/40mmpapst.html

If you want to purchase the same screws I used to mount it to the existing heatsink, here's all the info off the HomeDepot Screw Bag:

#4 x 5/8" Metal

Pan Head
Phillips
13 Pcs 24791
ZINC/CINC

Crown Bolt Inc

The Bar Code number on the back of the little bag is 30699 24791

Hope this helps everyone! Note, I'm using this fan with 2 eVGA 6800 Ultra cards. It's a very tight fit, but it pops right in. It baaaaarely bends a single fin on my EVGA heatsink, but it's not a problem at all. For those of you without hte gargantuan eVGA Ultra heatsinks even less of a worry.

Also, anyone out there who has a PC Power and Cooling 510 SLI PSU.......please note.........the fan in that thing is LOUD as well. I was super excited to remove the stock northbridge fan, only to be driven crazy by the PSU fan.

I was lucky enough to have an old PC with a PC Power and Cooling 510 ATX PSU which I found to be very quiet. I just swapped out the fan in that one and threw it in the SLI version.

For anyone who is driven batty by this same problem, just give PC Power and Cooling a call and ask to buy the same fan (NOT THE DELTA FAN!) in the "standard" 510 ATX PSU.

Good luck, and quiet SLI computing. :-D

Has anyone else tried this and seen the same results...
or have come across a better, hopefully the BEST solution!!??

I can't wait to stomp that fan under my boot!!!!!!

 

[cdcushman]

Bump
No-one?

 

[Travic]

I've been havign a problem with the fan too. It's giving me that "death rattle" right now. I can't decide whether to replace it with the NB-47 or that Vantec Iceberg fan. I'm worried that the Zalman will overheat. I've got two stock 80mm fans that blow air near the chipset. They don't really hit it directly. The actual air column they push covers about half of the chipset area.

What should I do?

 

[Aquila76]

The fan noise was driving me nuts too. I ended up hooking the fan lead to my Harcano 13 fan controller with a temp lead on the base of the HS/Fan next to the chip. Right now it's at 30C spinning at 1200 RPM. If I take the controller off auto and bring it up to even 2500rpm, it sounds like an Apache helicopter. Now it's a whisper.

 

[esromneb]

I just read the whole thread, and the cheapest option seems to be removing the fan blade from the stock cooler, but leaving the actual heat sink still on the board. Then mount one of 2 fans on top. The two options (presented in this thread) are:
SilenX:
http://www.pccasegear.com/prod1900.htm

and

Papst:
http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/40mmpapst.html

Just looking at the specs the silenX looks to be better, but has anybody acually tested them? If not I might be the one. Heh, I got a lil extra cash to burn

-ben

 

[TurboTronix]

I just water cooled my system. I got no fans running (water cooling X800Xl and the AMD 3500+ with zalman reserator1, fanless power supply). My DFI Ultra-D Nforce4 motherboard has a tiny fan on it which is the only fan I got in my system and it is making an annoying noise. Also it is right under my X800XL so I don't know with what should I change it since the isn't allot of room for something like the Zalman heatsink (I don't even know if it will work well since i got no fans to cool it).

What should I do? This noise is annoying...

T_Tronix

 

[esromneb]

I would suggest reading this entire thread. It has a lot of helpful info. But hey, if your already watercooling, why not water cool block for your nb as well?
-ben

 

[cdcushman]

Well... I'll be another guinney pig for the pabst one

http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/40mmpapst.html

as no one seems to want to comment on trying it...
other than the initial thread.

With such good airflow trhough my case(XaserV) and the need for a cheap solution that does not get in the way of my SLI, i think 4k or so rpm should be fine.

I'll post my results...

 

[TurboTronix]

I don't think the Zalman Reserator1 can keep up with another chipset to cool (even though it does cool the CPU + GPU better then a regular air cooling system, on avg 10 degrees less)...Will this pabst 40mm fan fit under my X800XL? Anyone tryied using a CPU + GPU + Chipset setting with a Reserator1?

I read this thread, the thing is there lots of nice choices but I don't know which one I can use on my DFI Ultra-D mobo since the fan is right under the X800XL...

 

[dlw5]

The ASUS A8N-SLI chipset fan is piece of junk. I replaced it with a Swiftech MCX 159-R (Chipset Cooler). Well made and low noise...

 

[P0pinjay]

Originally posted by: cdcushman
Well... I'll be another guinney pig for the pabst one

http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/40mmpapst.html

as no one seems to want to comment on trying it...
other than the initial thread.

With such good airflow trhough my case(XaserV) and the need for a cheap solution that does not get in the way of my SLI, i think 4k or so rpm should be fine.

I'll post my results...

Thx Cush,
I'm trying the "hook up fanmate to the chipset fan" in just a few moments. I'll post my results from that test in a min.

 

[thunderroller]

fan of same size but hi speed