Northbridge and video card fan woes.

[The Internal]

The short of it: I'd like to slap a Zalman NBF47 on my MSI Neo 4 Platinum northbridge, but I don't think it will fit and could use suggestions for an alternative.

The long of it: After having the Zalman NBF47 suggested to me as a good silent northbridge cooler for my MSI Neo 4 Platinum, I realized that I may have to buy a second fan to have it work. I'm currently running a single x16 PCI-express EVGA 6800 Ultra, but the clearance of the exsisting active northbridge cooler has about 1/8th of it's surface area covered by the big stock EVGA 6800 cooler... which is why I may have to get a new fan for the graphics card as well, should I go that route. I'd take a pic if I could get a digital camera...

suffice to say, I'd LIKE to get the Zalman NBF47 if I could fit it on there, but it looks like the likelihood of it fitting is slim. I don't own alot of tools, so extensive modifications are not going to be be possible or easy. If I later decided to do SLI mode or a second x16 card, I'd have to take off the Zalman northbridge cooler anywho.

Soooo.... does anyone know a good low profile northbridge heat sink? I've only replaced a few dozen GPU heatsinks at work, not really tinkered with Northbridge heatsinks, so am a little nervous about tinkerin with my baby.

I don't overclock. I just want to get rid of the irritating and loud little 40 mm northbridge fan on my system, and if need be, the fairly loud heatsink on my GPU. I'm probably going to slap a Ninja on my CPU, if I can find one availabel at a reputable vendor.

[Asian Dub Foundation]

run this: http://www.jab-tech.com/Evercool-VC-RE- ... -2291.html

do it with 2 fan mate to slow it down to around 1000rpm then it's silent

[Beel]

I think you are on the right track wanting to get rid of your Northbridge fan. It's a perfect example of something that is not terribly loud, but is very annoying.

Some thoughts: Have you looked at other Zalman Northbridge heatsinks? They have several different models, and some of them are shorter (and cheaper) than the one you mentioned. Perhaps one of them would work.

As a last resort, what about undervolting the existing northbridge fan? I've never tried it, so I don't know how much it would reduce the noise. It would also reduce the airflow, but if you are not overclocking, then that might not matter.

[The Internal]

Beel, I think my chipset/northbridge fan may actually be showing the first signs of going out. it only recently started making the really irritating noises, so I doubt an undervolt would help tremendously. I've actually had trouble finding any chipset/northbridge at the main vendors I buy from (newegg and zipzoomfly), so reliable vendor suggestions are always welcome (I'll glance through the forums to see if there are stickies on good places to do business with as well).

Asian Dub... could you elaborate on the "2 fan mate"? I've also never heard of "Jab-tech". The description on the fan you linked me listed the Gefore 3 series as being the highest it was menat for O.o

[Asian Dub Foundation]

well the evercool VC-RE twinkling cooler is actually made for video cards. however, it just so happens that it fit nforce 4 chipset mount holes (via push pins just like stockers are). at default speed, 5000rpm, it considerably more quiet than say the typical 9000rpm of stock chipset fans. However it does still whine. Thus, one must undervolt the fan (which is better than undervolting stock chipset fans because the evercool is all copper than cools better) to around 1000rpm (for me at least) to consider it silent. to archieve this, one must use two (2) zalman fan mate II fan controller (because at 5v it is still around ~ 2200rpm)

Jab-tech is an excellent company based on the east coast. they offer competitive prices. i would not hesitate to deal with them