A8N-SLI northbridge thermal pad? installing NB47J

marcusb · Post by **marcusb** » Thu Jul 07, 2005 7:39 pm

Hi Guys,

I'm currently in the process of installing a Zalman NB47J on my A8N-SLI board after that awful whining little fan died. Now i've got the original fan off however there is a dark grey kinda pad that is partially off and i'm not 100% sure whether I remove it or leave it on?

I did some googling and I think it's desribed as some kinda thermal pad which can be safely removed. But just wanted to check this. Underneath the pad is the green chip with 'nforce 4' printed on it.

So my questions are:

1) do I remove the thermal pad ?

2) do I need to clean and apply thermal paste to just the core (in the middle)?

Sorry for the noob questions but i'm doing this for the first time, and would like to get it right so I don't have to remove the bloody mobo again

Thanks,
Marcus

gitto · Post by **gitto** » Thu Jul 07, 2005 7:44 pm

I would remove the thermal pad, and apply thermal paste on whatever parts of the chip the nb-47 will be touching - from memory it is just the middle.

marcusb · Post by **marcusb** » Thu Jul 07, 2005 10:41 pm

Thanks for the advice. Cleaned up the core and successfully mounted the heatsink ... reduction in noise was quite noticable. I have noticed however the sink gets pretty hot to touch after a little while -- obviously a good thing as its drawing heat from the chip out but think I may need to add fan down the front to keep it more respectable.

Not planning on overclocking. I work in the audio field so just need optimal silence

I have temporarily rigged up an old P3 fan in front of the heatsink which is giving me better cooling but is a bit noisy .. will replace this when thee stores open again after the weekend with something quieter

I'm now tossing up trying to install the ZD80 heatpipe cooler on my video card, a little concerned there may not be enough clearance with the northbridge cooler onboard now.

Cheers,
Marcus