DFI NF4 SLI-DR Chipset Cooler

[lahire149]

Well from what I can see it doesn't look like a bad idea. The only thing I can think of is to make sure that you get it mounted well and use silver grease.

Also you could try this, it is similar to what I had to do with my old ABIT NB fan (which they are notorious for). Disassemle the HSF and drop one drop of lubricating oil into the back of the fan (the underside) and also use silver grease when reseating it onto the chipset. I did this to my ABIT fan, and it help tremendously.

EDIT: and about the ITE Smartguardian thing, on my system it doesn't even use 1k of memory and 0% CPU.

[Koroush Ghazi]

I'll definitely use the opportunity to use some proper thermal grease between the chipset and fan. Apparently it just has some crappy glue there at the moment (from what others have shown in pictures).

[sproaty]

Is the new fan the same size as DFI's fan? There's hardly any room between my graphics card and the chipset fan, a few mm I'd say.

[Domster]

52C!! And there was me gettin' worried that mine was at 40C idle and 44C full load. Just shows how much I know. Is that at stock voltage?

Then again, I've been reading on DFI street that there's a temp bug on the Expert so maybe mine's tellin' me lies.

[bisby]

i think i messed something up with mine: i think i popped up an end on the chipset when I put my graphics card in... but ive ignored any problems ^_^

[Morn]

Sorry that this post comes late. But I did this clever little mod for my DFI chipset, and its worked wonders.

But I agree that the chipset stock fan is absolutely ridiculous and thats why I wanted to change it.

And as someone as mentioned above... if your GFX card is in the first slot... your kind of royally buggered as to how to replace the fan. Well the above picture should change that. And here is the very clever little mod that does it.

http://img213.imageshack.us/img213/9118/dsc006462tn.jpg

Just a plain old zalman chipset heatsink, bent to suit your DFI needs

[7thSeal]

Originally Posted by Morn

Sorry that this post comes late. But I did this clever little mod for my DFI chipset, and its worked wonders.

But I agree that the chipset stock fan is absolutely ridiculous and thats why I wanted to change it.

And as someone as mentioned above... if your GFX card is in the first slot... your kind of royally buggered as to how to replace the fan. Well the above picture should change that. And here is the very clever little mod that does it.

http://img213.imageshack.us/img213/9118/dsc006462tn.jpg

Just a plain old zalman chipset heatsink, bent to suit your DFI needs

You have just enough room under the card lol. Thats pretty good thinking on that deal. Who said they have to point straight up.

[Koroush Ghazi]

Actually that's an amazing co-incidence. I have a brand new Zalman ZM-NB47J sitting in a box in the cupboard for months. It got tacked on to my main system order by accident and I never sent it back.

There's nothing to say the spines have to be straight as far as I know - they're just there to dissipate heat

However my chipset cooler is due shortly, and to be honest I would prefer active cooling on this chipset since it is so hot.

What are your temps with the zalman, both at idle and under full gaming load? From what I've seen everyone insists on active (fan + heatsink) cooling for the DFI NF4 chipset since it gets so hot.

[The Iranian Guy]

Koroush, it's funny you mention this, I had the EXACT same problem with my Abit IC7-G MaxII Advance northbridge fan.

It's a common problem for this motherboard and there is even a sticky thread in the Abit support forums where that very same Evercool fan is recommended as the replacement.

Actually, I simply removed the chipset fan using a miniature screwdriver, removed the bottom sticker cap of the fan, and put one drop of gear oil into the fan, and then spun the blades around several times to get the oil into the core of the fan mechanism.

I then wiped any excess oil, made sure none was dripping out, and re-attached the fan.

Noise was reduced, and the thing ran quiet for a few months, now it's acting up again.

[Koroush Ghazi]

Sounds good mate, but for me it's going to be a total replacement as anything else is just a stalling tactic as you've found out

Ok I finally got the cooler, here is a picture of it in its packet. It looks to be almost exactly the same height as the stock DFI chipset cooler, except this is copper and slightly larger in circumference. Should do a much better job



I'll post more pics, including a comparison of the old and new coolers side by side and how it looks on the board when installed later tonight (hopefully if I have time).

Additional Comment:
Ok, it took me over an hour, and a lot of messing around to do, but here is how it went down (excuse the crappy pictures):

Ok, here is the stock DFI chipset cooler on the motherboard before being removed:



First, I had to completely unscrew my motherboard and pull it up (with everything still on it) so I could get the damn pushpins out for the stock chipset cooler. It took me a lot of effort to get the pushpins out, and I thought at one point I'd cracked the motherboard. I hate pushpins...

Now, here is the NForce4 chipset hidden under the cooler - it's the green square with the silver middle:



I have to say, I should have cleaned the surface of the chipset, but I just didn't have the proper cleaning fluid, and the surface seemed to have absolutely no real thermal interface material on it, because all of it was on the bottom of the chipset fan:



One of the reasons why the DFI chipset cooler is so bad is not just the noise, but the fact that there is too much cheap crappy thermal material used, and there is a yellow padded shim which doesn't let the cooler sit flush on the chipset.

With all of this removed, I then put a small amount of thermal grease on the chipset, spread it evenly (using my finger inside a plastic bag), wiped off any excess. Then I put the new cooler on there - here is a comparison between the stock cooler and the new one:



And installed, it looks like this:



and it has more than enough clearance between it and my 7800GTX - in fact the same amount of clearance as the stock cooler does:




When I then put everything back in place and rebooted the machine, I got a real fright as nothing happened - fans running, light on, but no boot and monitor was blank. So I rebooted again, and luckily, everything works fine now

Ok onto the noise and temps. Firstly the noise: this fan runs at ~5000RPM maximum and is super silent. It is no lie to say that you will not be able to hear it over your other fans (e.g. graphics card or CPU fans). It is miles ahead of the noisy crappy stock cooler.

What about temps?

Well here is the new idle temp (Chipset used to idle at 44-46C):


Here it is immediately after a run of 3DMark06 (used to get up to 52C under load):


And here it is when running the Large FFTs test in Prime95 (max heat output) for around 5 minutes:


As you can see, the chipset temp is now 44C maximum, whereas it was 52C max. Not to mention it is now actually silent even when under full sustained load!

I suggest if you run a DFI Motherboard that you get this VGA cooler turned chipset cooler as it is dirt cheap (cost me $12.00 AUD = $7 US) and even comes with some decent thermal grease to use. 10 out of 10 for this minor but effective mod