Black_Paladin
01-14-03, 01:38 AM
I recently took of my stock HSF off my Radeon 8500 to put on a waterblock. Taking off the HSF proved to be hard at first but once I put the card in the freezer for about an hour, when I took it out of the freezer, I was able to pop the HSF pretty easily. On this subject, I learned the trick of putting the card in the freezer from someone in the forums here (can't remember who right now) so thanx a whole bunch to whoever came up with the idea and posted it here, it worked great for me! One thing I realized after I did this though was that the person had suggested putting the card in a ziploc bag for protecting against condensation when putting it in a freezer which I didn't do! :eek: :eek: (I know that's VERY stupid). Fortunately, I had at least the brains to leave the card out to become completely dry before putting it in my system and when I finally inserted the card, it worked OK.
Now, the problem that I have here is that when I removed the HSF to put the waterblock on, I noticed that there was this hard glue on the chip surface (or maybe I should say the heatspreader??) which used to bind it with the HSF. When I got rid of this glue completely to put the arctic silver on, I didn't notice that the chip (heatspreader) ended up being in a lower position than the plastic area surrounding it. So, I put the arctic silver, put the waterblock on and noticed that I couldn't overclock the core 1Mhz more than I could when it had the stock HSF on. Wondering about the contact the waterblock did to the chip (heatspreader?) I removed the waterblock and realized that the waterblock was only touching the sides of the chip (heatspreader) and not the center. I could tell this by the spreading of the arctic silver. There was NO acrtic silver at the very center at all!! (I had put arctic silver on the waterblock first so this means the center never actually touched). I then tried smoothing the plastic at the sides with sandpaper to make them get to a lower level so the waterblock can have better contact but I couldn't really do much with sandpaper. Right now, I still don't have good contact with the waterblock. What would you guys recommend? The area the waterblock is supposed to connect to looks very much like a heatspreader rather than the actual core so could I remove to expose the actual core? But IF I could do that, the problem would be that I would be removing yet another layer which will make the plastic sorrounding the chip area end up even higher than before and the chip will be kind up buried in the middle there. What are my options? I tried using a really thick layer of arctic silver on my second attempt but that didn't do any good either. For all I know, my chip could now be running hotter than it was with the stock HSF because of bad contact. Maybe I could somehow raise the level of this heatspreader a bit but I have no idea how I would be able to do that. Any suggestions appreciated. :)
Now, the problem that I have here is that when I removed the HSF to put the waterblock on, I noticed that there was this hard glue on the chip surface (or maybe I should say the heatspreader??) which used to bind it with the HSF. When I got rid of this glue completely to put the arctic silver on, I didn't notice that the chip (heatspreader) ended up being in a lower position than the plastic area surrounding it. So, I put the arctic silver, put the waterblock on and noticed that I couldn't overclock the core 1Mhz more than I could when it had the stock HSF on. Wondering about the contact the waterblock did to the chip (heatspreader?) I removed the waterblock and realized that the waterblock was only touching the sides of the chip (heatspreader) and not the center. I could tell this by the spreading of the arctic silver. There was NO acrtic silver at the very center at all!! (I had put arctic silver on the waterblock first so this means the center never actually touched). I then tried smoothing the plastic at the sides with sandpaper to make them get to a lower level so the waterblock can have better contact but I couldn't really do much with sandpaper. Right now, I still don't have good contact with the waterblock. What would you guys recommend? The area the waterblock is supposed to connect to looks very much like a heatspreader rather than the actual core so could I remove to expose the actual core? But IF I could do that, the problem would be that I would be removing yet another layer which will make the plastic sorrounding the chip area end up even higher than before and the chip will be kind up buried in the middle there. What are my options? I tried using a really thick layer of arctic silver on my second attempt but that didn't do any good either. For all I know, my chip could now be running hotter than it was with the stock HSF because of bad contact. Maybe I could somehow raise the level of this heatspreader a bit but I have no idea how I would be able to do that. Any suggestions appreciated. :)