Whats the best solution for NB cooling on 8RDA+?

[Redrum]

I have all my moffet sinks cut and ready to go. But I need a good solution for north bridge cooling. I will take the original NB heatsink and mod it for the south bridge. I want to get all my parts together so I only have to take this board out once. Any ideas? All are welcome to reply.

Thanks..

[refermadness]

Well I just modded a old socket 370 HS with a YS-Tech 60mm (40cfm) fan to it, too soon to tell if it is better then the zalman northbridge heatsink.

But if you are going with air cool, then either a older socket 370 heatsink or a zalman NB heatsink. Use a high CFM 40-60mm fan for either choice and make sure you lap the HS and use AS3 for thermal compound.

As for modding the original HS to the SB, no modding to it. My original HS fit right on the SB. But I would requimend a zalman HS for the SB also. Just be perpared to lose a few PCI slots using either the factory HS or the zalman.

You might want to think about active cooling for the SB though. When I put active cooling on my SB it seemed to of solved the cracking problem I had during heavy gaming.

[qwerty57]

swiftech mcw40-t is the final word in NB cooling.

[Redrum]

Originally posted by qwerty57
swiftech mcw40-t is the final word in NB cooling.

I'm not water cooling this one at the moment. Its in the experiment stage right now till I get it to run like I want it to.
My main rig is water cooled. The 8K5A2+.

Computer Specs

[Redrum]

Originally posted by refermadness
Well I just modded a old socket 370 HS with a YS-Tech 60mm (40cfm) fan to it, too soon to tell if it is better then the zalman northbridge heatsink.

But if you are going with air cool, then either a older socket 370 heatsink or a zalman NB heatsink. Use a high CFM 40-60mm fan for either choice and make sure you lap the HS and use AS3 for thermal compound

I have a few of these laying around, socket 370 heatsinks complete with fans. How did you go about attaching it to the Motherboard, Or did you epoxy it to the NB?

[refermadness]

My step borthers own Epoxy. AS3 and a few good drops of superglue and about 15 minutes of dry time. Its just as strong as a thermal epoxy, but is easier to remove the HS then thermal epoxy.

[k1114]

I still say that nothing beats a good lapping and a vantec iceburg.

[Redrum]

Originally posted by k1114
I still say that nothing beats a good lapping and a vantec iceburg.

I'm kind of leaning this way also. But the Vantec Iceburg is 5000 RPM with only 3.5 CFM of air. How about the Thermaltake Crystal Orb? At least at 5000 RPM it puts out 12.4 CFM of air. I was a Union Sheet Metal Worker for 34 years, I know a little about air flow and 3.5 CFM doesn't seem like it would be quite enough, LOL!!

Computer Specs

[TANKORR]

I going iceberq for NB abd Zalman for the SB - I haso have a small fan that might just fit ontop of the Zalman but not sure if it will do much.

[refermadness]

Originally posted by k1114
I still say that nothing beats a good lapping and a vantec iceburg.

How is a vantec or CROB better then a HS with a 40CFM fan?

I have already tried a CROB if that tells you anything.

[K_R]

The stock AMD HSF, with the fan at 7V... Then again I leave my machine horizontal (briefcase mod with too many heavy things inside - not safe to leave it vertical anymore). Could probably leave it passively cooled this way... haven't tried. It's probably too heavy for a vertically mounted board though.

And a good lapping! re: k1114

[MasterAtArms]

Lap the NB? When I fitted my vantec iceberg I notice/imagined that the NB core was receeded against the plastic surround, hindering proper contact - much like the 9700 and its shim. I didn't feel up to lapping it since I just had my kr7a die in front of me for no(?) reason. It has a big hole in a power trace, maybe it shorted to the case because I didn't double check that the standoffs were not conflicting with the different layout.

[zettler]

I am fairly new to all this, so this might be a silly question to some of you...

I have a couple of Golden Orb HS/Fan combo's, that I bought a couple of year's ago to put on two P3 500's back then, but never did anything with them. I believe they are made by Thermaltake.

As these are all-in-one units, could they be used on the NB for cooling (1#) if I come up with a way to attach them?

They appear to be larger (and heavy) but I haven't measured them. I did take my new system and move it to a new case. I had picked up an ANTEC SX835 last week and it offers better space and cooling. However, even though it has an ANTEC SmartPower 350W PS included, I was surprised (very) that it did NOT have leads to go to the MB to display fan speed!

In addition, the two or three ANTEC fans that come with the case, had the larger power connectors (wrong terminology) that also did not have leads that would connect to the MB.

I now have a system that has plenty of cooling but cannot monitor the fan speeds.....and suggestions (#2)???

I am pleased that this system still maintains a recorded CPU temperature of between 96 and 100 degrees Fahrenheit - even while running Sandra burn-in tests it stayed at 97 degrees or less.

My rig is a AMD 1700+ (B) on an 8RDA+ with an ATI Radeon 9500 Pro. Thanks for any comments!

[TANKORR]

Originally posted by refermadness
Well I just modded a old socket 370 HS with a YS-Tech 60mm (40cfm) fan to it, too soon to tell if it is better then the zalman northbridge heatsink.

But if you are going with air cool, then either a older socket 370 heatsink or a zalman NB heatsink. Use a high CFM 40-60mm fan for either choice and make sure you lap the HS and use AS3 for thermal compound.

As for modding the original HS to the SB, no modding to it. My original HS fit right on the SB. But I would requimend a zalman HS for the SB also. Just be perpared to lose a few PCI slots using either the factory HS or the zalman.

You might want to think about active cooling for the SB though. When I put active cooling on my SB it seemed to of solved the cracking problem I had during heavy gaming.

@ refer - do you mind providing more details and maybe pix of what you did for your NB & SB? I have all the parts and am about to dive in to building my first PC and what too measure twice and cut once

I am specifically interested in how your attaching the fan to the HS and then to the mobo - the more detail the better

[LL_NEO]

Just a question to k1114
Since the shape of the nb is concave(or sth like that) I feel that lapping the nb will make the distance between the nb and the hsf a lot bigger. Wouldn't this affect the cooling in the wrong way?
(Oh I my god my last line has about a dozen of syntax errors)

[refermadness]

Originally posted by TANKORR



@ refer - do you mind providing more details and maybe pix of what you did for your NB & SB? I have all the parts and am about to dive in to building my first PC and what too measure twice and cut once

I am specifically interested in how your attaching the fan to the HS and then to the mobo - the more detail the better

I don't have a camera. But what I did was, I used a old celeron socket 370 HS that had a 60mm fan. Took off the factory fan and lapped the HS, attached a YS-Tech 60mm fan to it. I applied AS3 to the NB and some superglue and then held down the HS until it dried. Very simple and easy and the plus is, easier to remove then when using thermal epoxy. As for the SB, I just used the stock NB HS and AS3 with a little super glue so that the HS will make firm contact to the SB, then I superglued a 40mm VC fan to it. The clips on the stock NB HS will fit on the SB mounting holes, but the HS was still somewhat loose, that is why I added the superglue to it.

[timbob2469]

Guys , you could have a look at some of the excellent 8RDA+ FAQ sites put together by members of this forum :
http://www.8rda.com/
and
http://www.8rdafaq.com/8RDA/index.html
this might help you a little bit. Or in my case , A LOT. Thank You.
bob
ps. I started trying to cool my Northbridge stock heatsink with an old Pentium1 cooler fan fastened with 2 small screws (try and get them to "catch or bite" in between fins of the stock heatsink) . The problem is twofold. The stocker is attached with double-sided tape which tends to insulate the chip from the h/sink , so it doesn't feel that hot AND if you look at it closely you'll notice that the contact area is probably less than 50%. If you are wary of lapping the chip , you can apply the correct amount of thermal compound to fill the concave area. Put some on there , place the heatsink down , then pull it back off and look for 100% contact.