Wednesday, July 4, 2012

CPU Cooler Installation Blues

The CPU cooler, Coolermaster Hyper 212 EVO, which i use in my PC had in itself a fair amount of challenges, one of which was because of some bad packaging and which effected only me,  while other challenges can be faced by others. Let me list them down into two broad categories

(1) Installation of the Cooler (aluminum radiator part)
(2) Installation of fans

Issue 1
Before deciding to buy a cooler I noticed that my HAF-X case had a backplate cutout which as per the manuals and videos shown by Coolermaster is used for quickly installing the heatsink even with the motherboard already mounted in the case. The cabinet is so good in so many areas that we hardly expect any issue. The Hyper 212 EVO like most other heatsinks requires a backplate to be installed. Unfortunately the HAF-X's backplate cutout is small and partially covers the backplate screw holes making it impossible to mount the cooler with the motherboard in the cabinet. What a let down !!! This is a manufacturing defect in HAF-X, but not a very high severity one as a general users hardly changes coolers often.



Issue 2
I had to take out the motherboard (since I was doing it for the first time, it was a nuisance, risk and trouble) and then mount the heatsink on top of it. And mounted Wait. Now I couldn't get the retention plate fixed as the screws will not fit in the backplate holder. After going over the manual with a magnifying lens ;-)) and watching some installation videos, I figured out that something was wrong with my retention plate. I had to remove the Motherboard again, remove the back plate, repackage the whole cooler and together with the motherboard take it to the vendor (Ankit Infotech)  from whom i bought my components. The guys at the vendor's shop were a little clueless and ran around to call some technician who was equally dumbfounded. The owner then decided to replace my unit and took out another Hyper 212 EVO piece. We opened it to check and whoa !!! This time the retention plate will fit because the non removable screws are proper. We swap the retention plate.

I was finally able to install this big heatsink with the motherboard mounted and using a dot method of thermal paste application.

The next problem domain is the fan installation. Some questions/issues which I had

(1) How many fans to install ? One (was supplied) or two (one on each side) ?
(2) Should we use 4 pin fans or 3 pin fans in case I want an LED Fan and not the plane jane fan that comes with this heatsink
(3) what should be the mounting orientation of fans i.e push air into heatsink or pull air out of heatsink ?
(4) Will the facing the DIMM slots obstruct them or get obstructed by installed DIMMs ?


And here is what I concluded by practical experimentation and wisdom of others on the Internet

(1) Two is better than 1. The heatsink picks up and spreads heat from CPU and we need to dissipate it quickly so that temperature can be controlled.
(2) I have an Asus P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3 motherboard. It has two 4 pin PWM fan connectors for the heatsinks while all other power and chases fan connectors are 3 pin. 3pin fans cannot be speed controlled by motherboard and spin at their max speed. The idea is that the case airflow is fixed and therefore all chassis fans can be 3 pin while CPU cooler fans can be controlled  to match the load on CPU (which lowers noise). I decided to go for 2 new matching Xtraflow LED fans (red) and not use the one suppled with the cooler. Costed me Rs. 1000/-  extra.
(3) In HAF-X there is a huge 230mm fan at front (lower side), grilled vents in drive bays and a 200mm fan at one side for cool air intake. The fan at the back and the two fans on the top are for exhausting warm air. To match this orientation, the heatsink fan facing the intake fan was made a push fan (i..e it pushes air into the heatsink) while the other side facing the exhaust was made a pull (pulls warm air out). This way their is are no opposing air currents created by fans
(4) Yes they do. I have 4 x 4 GB GSkill Ripjaws X DIMMs and the fan facing the DIMMs does touch (but just marginally) the DIMM closest to it which means the fan has to sit half a mm protruding from the heatsink. I was lucky that the fan just touched the DIMM on three counts. First the thickness of the heatsink was just right (many top-end heatsinks will be wider and will surely block one of the DIMM slots on my motherboard).  Secondly the spacing between the CPU and DIMMs was just about right. And thirdly, the height of the heatsink fins on my DIMM modules was also just right. I have heard that the fins on the Corsairs are taller which would have made mounting this fan a big problem. This is Issue No. 3 and a potential deal breaker.

So I think we can judge what needs to be taken care while buying & installing an after-market CPU cooler of air cooling type. I might summarize this by some key guidelines

(a) Buy the Cooler, DIMMs and motherboard together and install them at the vendors place, otherwise have a return agreement with suitable swap option. I have not seen many internet reviews pointing to such problems/questions that I faced especially with the installations and I expect many users to encounter atleast one of them.
(b) Buy Fans with 3-pin connectors for chassis and 4-pin (PWM fans) for the CPU cooler. If you do not like the sound made by chassis fans whirring at full speed, then go for a 5.25" fan controller (NZXT, Lian Li, etc make them) and connect the chassis fan to it and not the Mobo. Just leave CPU fan connected to the Mobo and let it to its own power management. I prefer you mount two fans.
(c) Mount the cooler on the CPU and Motherboard before fixing the motherboard in the chassis. Don't depend on the cutouts. You will save time and trouble.
(d) If you buy a RAM with tall heatsinks, either leave the last slot empty or maker sure you buy a tall CPU cooler and a case to accommodate that ;-)). The HAF-X is a tall and wide one, but others are not and you may just run up into a situation where the case side panel is being blocked from getting closed because of the heatsink or fan.

Their are so many failure points in this, but hell it works well after all this hungama !!!



4 comments:

Unknown said...

Just had a look at the mid-tower HAF-XM Reviews (the so called younger brother of HAF-X) and it seems the cutout has been made very wide. This will ensure that coolers can be mounted with the motherboard mounted in the case.

Sai Trades Group said...

A round of applause for your post.Much thanks again. Great.


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Glenn Jacob said...

Great message for me, thanks a lot.
CPU Cooler Heatsink

Unknown said...

Just an update. Today I cleaned the insides of my PC using a MiniVac. I opened up the CPU cooler fans and found a ton of dust collected under the Push fan on the aluminium fins of the cooler. After cleaning this, I am observing CPU temperatures reducing 3~4 degrees at Idle. So one learning is that before changing the paste or anything, we need to clean the cooler probably once in a while (based on how dusty the operating environment is). MY take is every 3-6 month.