svc golden gate

does anyone have the svc golden gate? i just ordered one and i was wondering if it was in need of lapping i saw some reviews that say it performs great and its tied with the sk6! and i just ordered it for 19 bucks! without a fan, because i have one

but all i need to know is if it needs lapping,

and i supose you can tell me how it performs for you and if you like it...

I have the OCZ Tech Gladiator, it's a clone to the Golden Gate. Works relatively well. The surface was very flat although it came with a thermalpad, so I lapped it down. I shaved a few degrees off of it after lapping. Lapping is really not necessary, but to be sure, take a look at the base and run your nail across it.

The Golden Gate I hear, is heavier, and will probably perform better or worse than my clone, although I feel it will perform better. I wouldn't take those reviews about the Golden Gate being as good as the SK6, since it depends on many variables, but I suppose it will be very close or at the same performance as the SK6.

anyone else have one of these?

I've got one. Ordered just after 2fastcpu.com did their review. Fairly heavy sink I thought. Mine came with that YS TECH screamer. I bought for the fins that actually are present over the core, the all copper construction, and the fan. All for $15 at the time.

Took the noise for about a week before looking to alternates. I did noticed a few degrees (3 at the most) difference after lapping to 800 grit. If memory serves, it was concave in and the edges took a while to get flat on it.
To get the noise down I tried several things, article in Overclockers about quieting a Delta using Silcon and making a gap with pencils to cut out the vibrations. That helped a lot. I really think that the YS TECH fan is out of balance, it shakes the whole damn case. The temps went up a little until I taped around the gap between the fan and the sink. Then I treied taping the gap between the aluminum sides and the fins. That helped a lot as well. Still too loud so I stuck the retail 60 mm fan that comes with the chip on it and it cooled well, around 44 idle I think. Not good enough so I started to look toward 80mm adapters. Decided to make one, didn't help much with the fans I had. Tried using a single, 1/4 inch plexiglass plate and an 80mm fan with the gap over the fins taped and that seem to work the best. Currently have the SVC with the plexiglass adapter, 80 MM sunon 50 cfm fan, tuned down to about 9 volts. Idles at 37-40 and loads around 45-46. Currently Artic Silver 3 is still breaking in so it should get better in time.
I've taken mine off so many times that I can do it without a screw driver. Clip is pretty good, easy to engage both lugs. Fins are well soldered to the base. I'm currently thinking about drilling a few holes through the base of it to get air moving around the core between the heat sink base and the chip. So far I've gotten some good feed back from other people in here but I'm chicken to do it at the moment. http://forum.oc-forums.com/vb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=71124

I want to see how good the Artic Silver 3 does first. Good luck.

wow thanx! thats an awesome thought! do you have any pics of how you made the 80-60mm adapter? i made one for my old heatsink out of cardboard and it works great with a 30cfm fan i get 34idle and 37 load.... im thinkin that these temps mite be rong though....

No pictures yet but I'm working on it. The next time I take it off I'll take some pictures.
The adpater is just a single flat piece of plexiglass with a 75mm hole in the center. I've got the heatsink on one side and the fan on the other. I got the idea after seeing a few fan adpaters that were nothing more that a piece of Aluminum with holes for different size fans. I tried making a funnel type adapters out of three pieces of .25 inch glued together to make it .75 inch thick. It was just too heavy I thought. The adapter now has a plexiglass skirt made from 1/8 inch stock to fit better around the heat sink. I cut groves in the cips sides so that I could work the clip with the adapter installed. I got tired of taping the gaps up all the time. This way I don't have to use any tape and it forces all the air through the fins. Works with the fan sucking or blowing. I have a JMC fan that does better sucking air out but nothing can compete with the Sunon 50 CFM ( well, maybe the deltas could.) I also trimmed off all of the aluminum sides that come up to mount the fan except for the actually corners that the man mounts on. That gave the 80mm fan a little more breathing room. Once I get the whole thing performing like I want it to, I'm going to rebuild it out of better and cleaner plexiglass, try not to scratch the hell out of it this time, stick a couple of bright red LED's in it and get a blue neon for the case. I think a calm blue interior would look great with a firey red coming from under the fan on the CPU. I promise to post pics when I can. I'm still thinking about the holes in the base thing.

Update on my heatsink:
I found an older power supply today at work that had a high out put Panaflo 80mm.
Tried it at home and with it blowing into the heatsink the temps were about the same as before if not higher, around 40 idle and 46 load. But it was very quiet.
Turned the fan around and the temps imediatley went down. I'm now sitting at 36 idle (internet, mbm, etc) and around 40-41 load with Seti running over an hour. And the best part, it's still quiet.
Well, actually, here's the best part, there are three more of those power supplies at work getting ready to be thrown out on Friday. Can't wait to see what else we find. My co worker discovered a bunch of massive IBM printers that have a 120mm, 38 v fan that will actually run at 12v. The fan makes my Conair Rotron Whisper 120mm sound like a delta 60mm. The pics are coming soon of my adapter and case mods. I'll post them here as soon as I can get a decent camera.

you got a pic yet?
i wanna see that thing to see if i wanna mod mine.....