heatsink/fan fell off of cpu in UPS mailing to vermont.

hello, I haven't posted in a long while but I was wondering if I could possibly get some assistance with this.

I recently moved from Oakland, cali to benn, vermont and had my computer shipped out here to me. When I opened the box that the case was in I heard a bit of rattling around inside and horrified I realized something had come undone while in transit and had smashed everything up; so I took a look inside to find that the heatsink/fan combo had fallen off the cpu clamp and was crashing around the whole time. So, with a horrible anxiety I set up the machine and tried to make sure everything was as it should be.

When I reattached the heatsink/fan to the cpu the clamp that holds it to the motherboard was too loose. When it was clamped I could still move it around too much and knew that the connection between the cpu die and the heatsink would be horrible so I took off the heatsink shroud and bent the clamp a bit in the opposite direction it had gone in to make it have a better fit. Anyways I finally got it on and everything set up as best I could and when I started it up and put it into Bios is said that it was way too hot and the cpu alarm was going off making a horrible racket. So I had to lower the FSB to the original clock [p3 600e was at 822] so get it to stop yelling at me.

There were quite a few other things that were being shifty and wanted adjusting all over so that took a while to get everything in order again.

The cpu temp was still way too high even though it was at spec so I decided I better get some more thermal grease because the stuff I had on it before got nasty and I had to take it off when the heatsink had fallen. So I got some cheap Radio Shack thermal compound and put it on and made the clip still tighter for a better fit.

Now I the cpu clocked up to 800 from 600 but it's still way too hot and I can't get it back to it's normal 822 anymore. The heatsink I think [sorry can't remember] is an Alpha Pep66[?] that was for a slot 2 but which I had converted to fit my flat cpu on the motherboard.

The bios seems to always read a ~140f temp and when in windows the motherboard monitor program says it's at around 98-105 normally but will jump up to ~150 whenever I try to do something that takes up any cpu capacity.

Sorry for the long winded post but I felt I just had to get it all out to try and get any possible explanation out.

Is it possible that the bios is a bit screwed up from transit and is misreading things?

thanks for your help in advance,
-nicco

You're lucky that your computer still works. Yet another example proving that you should always disassemble your computer (especially the CPU heatsink; and remove the CPU to package it by itself) before shipping it or taking it on a trip. If you had an AMD I'd venture to say that you might've chipped your processor. I'm not familiar with the P3 heatsink clamps, so I can't help you there, but I very much doubt that your BIOS was damaged during shipping. Your surest bet is to just get a new heatsink.

Sounds like a poor contact. If you can slide the sink on the cpu its still too loose. Possibly try bending the clip again to gain more pressure, but once its been bent it may never give the same tension again (past its elastic limit) I'd get some better thermal grease as well, the radioshack stuff sucks in comparison to the better greases on the market. (this coming from an employee of the shack) Also, when you reapplied the thermal grease did you clean the cpu die and heatsink with isopropal alcohol? If residure is left that will also affect temps (a fingerprint can) . Thats all i can think of at the moment, good luck

yeah I'm surprised the computer even works too actually, heh. Well I had gotten kicked out of the house in oakland cause things were too crazy there so I took a train here and I just got the computer in the mail a few days ago. I didn't package it though. If I had I definately would have disassembled it.

Anyways, yeah I figured that the clamp was probably just bending out again and again and that I'd need a new one but I don't feel like having to go out and buy another 30dollar heatsink/fan and since I have to access to a credit card i can't order online and I'm in vermont so there's really no place to get such thigns around here.

The surface of the heatsink where it connects is a bit scratched looking and probably should be sanded down a bit but I'm not sure what the number of the sandpaper ought to be.

What's with the different cpu temp readouts though? I mean the one in the bios ought to be a whole lot cooler than the one in windows right?

hey mizzery, Albany NY? I'm in bennington vermont right now which is about an hour from albany. Are there any good places to buy parts there?

nicco said:

The surface of the heatsink where it connects is a bit scratched looking and probably should be sanded down a bit but I'm not sure what the number of the sandpaper ought to be.

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I generally lap with the coarsest I have on hand (which for a long time has been 220 grit) to completely flatten the heatsink, then I jump up to 800 and sand for a long time, then smooth it with 1500. But please, don't do this until you have a new heatsink. It would be worthless to try it on the broken one you have now.

nicco said:

What's with the different cpu temp readouts though? I mean the one in the bios ought to be a whole lot cooler than the one in windows right?

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I've heard that BIOSes will put a load on the CPU for temperature monitoring. My Gigabyte board doesn't do this, but some others may.

My Abit board loads the CPU in BIOS as well.

I'm glad that you didn't completely destroy your machine. Might it be possible that the heatsink damaged the motherboard's voltage regulation for your processor? I'd check your CPU voltage in your BIOS to see and look for any missing/damaged components (capacitors, resistors) near the CPU.

Ken

yeah, we gots a comp-usa and a couple of smaller computer shops thatwould probabally have heatsinks, but there's got to be a computer shop in bennington.

yeah there's prob some stores but none that would carry any good heatsinks tht would actually do anything.