Noctua NH-D14, G.Skill PI, & Gigabyte X58A-UD5

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with the combination of a Noctua NH-D14 and the G.Skill PI Series of Ram. I am looking to get the Noctua today (NewEgg 15% off CPU coolers today), but am thinking I may have clearance issues with this combination on my Gigabyte X58A-UD5 motherboard. I checked Noctua's site, and they say its compatible with the board but not the RAM, given the tall heatsinks. I'm only running 3 sticks right now, so it isn't in the closest memory slot, but really don't want to end up with issues. Any help in the next few hours would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks, everyone was great when I started my build in December, and this just happens to be my first change to the system, so I thought I would come back to this community.

(And yes, I know there are threads on the clearance issue with the Noctua, but I didn't find much with this combination of components.)

http://noctua.at/main.php?show=faqs&step=2&products_id=34&lng=en#13

Measure and see!

m0r7if3r said:

http://noctua.at/main.php?show=faqs&step=2&products_id=34&lng=en#13

Measure and see!

Click to expand...

I actually did measure, and it was so close, that I thought I would see if others had any experience. The ram is too tall for the first slot, no doubt about that, but it is in slots 2,4 & 6 (counting away from the CPU). And slot 2 of the memory with the tall heatspreader makes it ridiculously close. It could go either way based on my measurements. Hence I was asking if anyone had prior exprience with this combination, particularly with the G.Skill PI and the Noctua.

I've used dom's with the d14 on an x58a-ud3r successfully. It's a super tight fit, but it's workable.

Hmm, any clue how tall those were from the top of the DIMM slot to the top of the heat spreader? I know, kind of a picky question.

Also, do you think orienting the D14 blowing upwards would work as an alternative? The HAF X has the big 200mm fan on the top, and my graphics card is in the second PCI-E slot down on the motherboard, providing some space for air intake on the push fan. I could add a second 200mm fan on top as an additional source pulling air out of the case in case the airflow direction from the D14 would be a problem.

Thoughts? And thanks for the help with regards to this.

herm, not sure how tall they are with the spreaders on, they definitely were higher than the bottom of the fan (and the fan was touching them). Worst case you can always just shift the fan up or run the 120mm fan in pull so that it's blowing air out the back of the case

I had considered that. I think the potential conflict with the actual fins of the heatspreader was more of the concern than running a push-pull vs. pull-pull setup. Any issue with the height and aluminum fins themselves?

it was touching the fan, so it mighta been putting some pressure on the socket or something, I didn't run it like that long...but I don't see any long term issues with it. Again though, different board. Check and see if you can turn it 90deg based on their measurements, that'd be my best bet.

I think I'll go ahead and order it. I figure I can test fit it before applying the thermal compound, and see how it lines up prior to finalizing the process. If its a no go, I could send it back I suppose.

Thanks again for all your help. It has definitely been appreciated!

Before you order, do a rough measurement, if in doubt or it is too close, dont order.

No point in returning/RMAing parts that arent bad.

It will perfectly as long as you take the first 120mm intake fan and move it behind for exhaust. You will actually get much better temps and any memory will clear. I actually only use the 140mm in the middle and my temps don't go above 75c. The front fan is the only thing that gets in the way so take it off. But with it on in the front, it will not fit at all. At least you'll have to move the 120mm fan more upwards.

Or you can remove the heatspreader on the ram since usually they are for show anyways.. unless benching the ram shouldn't ever heat up enough to become an issue with or without those high spreaders.. it still has the spreader plates on the sides of the ram, which should be just fine by themselves..plus if the cooler covers the 1 slot missing the spreader you'll never notice its not on!

psionic98 said:

Or you can remove the heatspreader on the ram since usually they are for show anyways.. unless benching the ram shouldn't ever heat up enough to become an issue with or without those high spreaders.. it still has the spreader plates on the sides of the ram, which should be just fine by themselves..plus if the cooler covers the 1 slot missing the spreader you'll never notice its not on!

Click to expand...

Don't think that's possible on the pi's

I know the DDR2 Pi ram I have doesn't have removable tops on the heatspreaders.

A couple of things, thanks to everyone for the advice and suggestions yet again. The wealth of knowledge here certainly helps considering my lack thereof...

As for the heatspreaders and clearance, whew, it was tight. The bottom spreader fin is just nicking the heatspreader on the closest stick of ram, at the top and is less than a millimeter away from it at the bottom. Another mm or two wider and it would have been a no go or required some modifications of the spreader fins.

So as you can tell, I did in fact get it and mount it last night. I flipped the fans into a Pull-Pull setup instead of Push-Pull, so obviously the 120 was switched to the back-side of the case. It's keeping the CPU at about 28-29C at Idle (Ambient was about 74F, a bit warmer than usual).

So far so good though! It cools vastly better than that throwaway bit from Intel did, and is worlds quieter, thankfully. I haven't overclocked the machine with it hooked up yet, but I'm quite impressed so far. It also gave me an opportunity to rework the wiring and clean up the look internally a bit, at least through the window on the side of the HAF X.

Anyhow, thanks again everyone!

Looks like I'm late but glad you like it. With a HAF X you should take the fans off and try it passive as it works quite effectively on my 920 up to ~1.2v under a linpack load in my 932. I find the case fans to be quite loud now. lol

On the ram clearance issue I was going to say that I have no problems with my G.Skill Pi heat spreaders and I have the ones with the silver and blue design that dwarf my Dominators.

http://www.noctua.at/main.php?show=compatibility_ram_gen&products_id=34

Or email them. They write back immediately. I swear there's a guy there 24/7 on email duty.

The D14 is a great product. I'd buy one again btw. For whatever that's worth. HATE the brown. Otherwise happy with it .