help: cpu heatsinks on vga cards?

[yeha]

i'm planning on doing this for a 6600 non-gt pci-e card in particular, but i'm after some general cpu-heatsink-on-vga-card advice to get everything straight in my head. this will be a rambling post, here's basically all my thoughts mashed together:

the perfect candidate would be a copper, high-fin-density 80mm-fan heatsink preferably without the retention clip going through the middle. it could be attached either using zip-ties around the card itself, by drilling two holes through the sink to use the large-hole mounting system, or by drilling four holes through the sink to use the smaller-hole mounting system. since i don't have a drill i'd rather the zip-tie option, i'm curious about disadvantages to this - nothing major has popped into my head yet.

i don't drill holes in things very often, i'd like to mount eventually using screws but i'm not sure how to drill precise holes possibly through fins. perhaps high-fin-density means drilling holes isn't an option.

a hunch tells me that the gpu die is taller than the memory, so the heatsink wouldn't make ram contact despite possibly covering the chips. i wonder what kind of spacer material could be used to bridge the gap between memory and heatsink base - anything would be better than a gap of air, right?

these strike me as interesting candidates (once stripped of fans, housing, etc.), i'm just wondering if there's anything obvious i'm missing:

any thoughts, suggestions, flames? it seems many low-profile xeon heatsinks are exactly what i'm after. this one is a cheap monster, but 1 pound might be a bit much, not to mention it might not physically fit on the card.

 

[l3ored]

i've recently made a cpu heatsink ready for mounting on a video card. its from an athlon xp, aluminum construction, with a copper (its aluminum coated so at a glance you woulnt know it was copper) to make it ready for mounting, i drilled two holes in the base, stopping before i went all the way through, and jb welded in 2 1" #4-40 scews with their heads sawed off. theyre mounted with 2 washers, a nut, and a spring on each screw. i'd prefer to drill smaller holes and tap them, so that the screws screw into them, but i didnt have the equipment for them.

 

[yeha]

huh that's an interesting method - have attached screws sticking out the bottom of the heatsink to go through the mounting holes - then you just spin the nuts on the card underside for desired pressure. i was worried about somehow having to drill down through the fins from the topside, your way makes much more sense.

heck i might even be able to do that myself. any chance you could post some photos?

 

[l3ored]

nope, sorry. my brother took his digicam back a few months ago. wish i could though.

 

[el]

yeha 500grams! on video card? get the aero cool vm101 heatpipes and fanless. I really like the passive heatsink and plan on overclocking higher with that heatsink since it works great! beware if cpu is next to agp slot.

 

[yeha]

just to get it clear, you marked the drill points to match the card's 2 holes, drilled into the heatsink's base (how far in did you go? any drilling mishaps i might not expect on a heatsink? what size drill piece?), jb'ed in some headless screws, then added washers, springs and nuts. this outta be fun.

 

[kswaid]

I agree vith el. I have a vm101 mounted on my overclocked and volt-modded 5700U. Temps were decent fanless, but when I put a Zalman 92mm fan on it, the core barely breaks 40C at full load. Plus, it was pretty cheap, something around $20 on newegg. I fully recommend it for anything except a 6800 (too much heat).

 

[yeha]

heh yeah, hanging 500 grams of copper with zip-ties isn't the smartest thing to do, but some supernatural force is driving me to try it. i'll most likely end up with a vm-101 but this will be too much fun to pass up.

i'll probably go with the $2 xeon heatsink i linked to, but if i go insane i'll get a brutal supermicro snk-p0010 copper monster for $17 shipped.