Mosfet cooler by Thermalright

[Arctucas]

They're nice coolers, alright. If only they fit my Striker Extreme like Thermalright said they would.

[iddqd]

most likely nickel plated copper, yeah...

[phelan1777]

I don't recall seeing the EVGA680i :-(

[grudgelord]

I have a pair of these, one HR-09U and one HR-09S. They are very nice quality and are every bit of the expected Thermalright sexy that would be expected. However, the fit is a bit of a disappointment for the reasons stated below.

They are indeed nickel plated copper. I know this because I had to take a dremel to one of the damn things to get it to fit on my P5W. The short side was too short to cover the entire row of MOSfets adequately and the long side was too long to fit within available space without interference. The "foot" wouldn't fit between the capacitor and the four pin auxiliary power plug at the end of the Mosfet row. Rather annoying. If you choose to dremel the thing down to fit then you can forget about using the clips as the clip pins still overshoot the holes.

For those who need to know: The large sink is 80mm x 12mm at the "foot". The small sink is 57.5mm x 12mm at the "foot".

[Baron]

These are available in the UK from ChilledPC, in around 2 weeks.

£15.99

HR-09S

http://www.chilledpc.co.uk/shop/prod...roducts_id=210

HR-09U

http://www.chilledpc.co.uk/shop/prod...roducts_id=211

[safan80]

in the US petra has them.

[hoax]

I have a pair of these, one HR-09U and one HR-09S. They are very nice quality and are every bit of the expected Thermalright sexy that would be expected. However, the fit is a bit of a disappointment for the reasons stated below.

They are indeed nickel plated copper. I know this because I had to take a dremel to one of the damn things to get it to fit on my P5W. The short side was too short to cover the entire row of MOSfets adequately and the long side was too long to fit within available space without interference. The "foot" wouldn't fit between the capacitor and the four pin auxiliary power plug at the end of the Mosfet row. Rather annoying. If you choose to dremel the thing down to fit then you can forget about using the clips as the clip pins still overshoot the holes.

For those who need to know: The large sink is 80mm x 12mm at the "foot". The small sink is 57.5mm x 12mm at the "foot".

I was looking for the HR-09U for my P5W DH, but this is some really bad news.. do you have any pictures of them installed on your P5W?

and why would they list the P5W DH Deluxe as compatible on the site??!

[Soker]

100% compatibile with P5W DH?

[hoax]

this is what I dont understand..why lure people into spending money by telling them that it would work??



and yeah...according to the above post and the measurements I dont see how it could ever fit

[safan80]

this is what I dont understand..why lure people into spending money by telling them that it would work??

and yeah...according to the above post and the measurements I dont see how it could ever fit

we need to see pics of what's going on here.

[n00b 0f l337]

It says 1 peice, are you sure that you cant get one of them to fit? It never said both would.

[grudgelord]

we need to see pics of what's going on here.

I'll see about getting some pictures up later today so you guys can see what's going on and get an idea of what I had to do to make it work.

[grudgelord]

As promised, here are some images that I hope will explain the fit issues a bit more clearly. I apologize for the lousy quality. My camera is a POS and I refuse to spend more money on a new camera until I can afford a D-50 or D-200. My current system build has become a great cashsink so it's not likely to happen any time soon.

After the removal of the stock aluminum heatsink (along with the Northbridge and heatpipe assembly) you can see the MOSfets arranged in pairs.




Here is an HR-09U with the small sink centered on the Mosfets. While the sink contacts all of the MOSfets in this configuration they are only partially covered. I suspect that this might be adequate enough for cooling purposes but I still find it troubling. When spending $20.00 on a replacement sink I expect complete coverage of heat generating components.




Here's the heatsink, in the same configuration but shifted to the left in order to cover the leftmost pair. As you can see, this leaves the right completely out of contact with the foot of the sink.




And again shifted to cover the rightmost transistors. Once again, same issue with the left side.




Flipping the heatsink assembly offers no joy either as the row of MOSfets is boxed in by the presence of a capacitor at one end and the four pin power plug at the other, making it impossible to place the heatsink in this configuration as the "foot" prevents it from sitting in the space.




Enter the Dremel: By this time I'd become pretty annoyed so I measured the length of the stock sink (74mm) and trimmed a few millimeters from the foot of an HR-09S in order to get it to fit in the space, yet entirely cover the transistors. (Pay no attention to the ugly, blurry thumb or the pile of crap on my desk. Vandal elves invaded my home and made a mess of my desk while watching :banana::banana::banana::banana:.)




After trimming the heatsink now fits within the space and properly covers the MOSfets. The only drawback is that there's still not enough space to use the clips so I'll either have to use the adhesive pad that came with the heatsink or use a mixture of AS5 and Arctic Silver adhesive (the latter is my choice and the adhesive is en route).




I do wish the image quality were better so that you could really appreciate the problems of fit. It is difficult to get a good idea of the problem from these pictures but, unfortunately, the little camera I have doesn't like closeups in poor light.

My advice to anyone considering these sinks is to consider their measurements carefully. As long as either 57.5 mm x 12 mm or 80 mm x 12 mm will suit your needs then all should be fine (the stock heatsink measures 74 mm x 12.5 mm). The distance from the outer edge of the farthest spaced MOSfets is 72 mm, so that should be considered. All measurements were taken with calipers, albeit cheap calipers.

Of course, if you aren't afraid of a little modification (which I am not and I happen to enjoy it) then it shouldn't be a real problem. But it is a shame that modification is necessary for a proper fit on a part that has been stated to fit. I guess that's the sacrifice Thermaright had to make in order to create an item that could accommodate a wider range of boards.

[hoax]

grudgelord, thank you so much for taking the time to post all the pics and explain the problem. its greatly appreciated.

I took one more pic to add to it, not sure if it helps at all:


red outlines represent the original heatsink shape near the plugs and the position of the capacitors that get in the way...there is a round capacitor under the heatpipe and the other square one to its left side on the pic...both are the ones that get in the way if I understand this right

cyan outlines is an aproximation of how big the HR-09 seems to be according to measurements

hope this makes sense...thanks again for all the info

[grudgelord]

grudgelord, thank you so much for taking the time to post all the pics and explain the problem. its greatly appreciated.

No problem. I'm just hope someone can get some use out of the info.

I took one more pic to add to it, not sure if it helps at all:


red outlines represent the original heatsink shape near the plugs and the position of the capacitors that get in the way...there is a round capacitor under the heatpipe and the other square one to its left side on the pic...both are the ones that get in the way if I understand this right

cyan outlines is an aproximation of how big the HR-09 seems to be according to measurements

hope this makes sense...thanks again for all the info

Yes. The round capacitor is one of the obstructions. The square... thing (a molded induction coil, perhaps?) is not so much an issue. If that round capacitor were not there the heatsink would fit but the holes would still fail to line up (this could be solved with adhesive).

Your cyan outline is a pretty good representation of the HR-09 footprint and illustrates the problem very well.

[hoax]

it really is a pity... thanks again for clearing it up.

I just wish they would remove the P5W DH from the compatible list or at least add some type of warning to it.. calling it "Okay, 1 piece" is just wrong..

[Daveb2012]

too bad its not compatible w/ Abit Quad Gt.

[linflas]

They also say compatable with the Striker Extreme, no way, no how, they fit, but you have to grind down the one on the top of the board so it fits between a cap, and the 8 pin, also, there is no way to mount them using the brackets, as the holes are covered. The shot side does not come close to covering all the necessary components. Thankfully I have a Mountain Mods UFO horizon case, so the MOBO lays flat, so am able to mount just by laying flat on the mosfets, any normal mounting case and they will of course fall off.

What a load of horsecrap there compatability list is.

[Frostbyte]

I really don't get why Thermaltake, a fairly respected name in the xtreme OC circles (or at least a major player) would risk some of their "karma" by releasing specs for mobos that is so obviously incorrect and discoverable. They start screwing over the main enthusiast crowds here and they will get a bad rep in a hurry. Look at Danger Den's fall from grace recently.

[deathman20]

I really don't get why Thermaltake, a fairly respected name in the xtreme OC circles (or at least a major player) would risk some of their "karma" by releasing specs for mobos that is so obviously incorrect and discoverable. They start screwing over the main enthusiast crowds here and they will get a bad rep in a hurry. Look at Danger Den's fall from grace recently.

Thermalright... Don't get confused by the 2 here.

[situman]

other than the quad gt, is it really necessary to cool the mosfets on other boards? Have you guys noticed Asus only covers some of the mosfets on their boards? I think this is nothing more than a gimmick, like watercooling your ram. If you want longevity, shouldn't overclock to begin with. The only boards that will truly benefit from this thing are the ones with digital PWMs. NOne of the boards on the compatibility list needs any sort of mosfet cooling.

[grudgelord]

other than the quad gt, is it really necessary to cool the mosfets on other boards? Have you guys noticed Asus only covers some of the mosfets on their boards? I think this is nothing more than a gimmick, like watercooling your ram. If you want longevity, shouldn't overclock to begin with. The only boards that will truly benefit from this thing are the ones with digital PWMs. NOne of the boards on the compatibility list needs any sort of mosfet cooling.

Well, my initial motivation was to find something to replace the stock sink that I pulled from my board. The P5W north bridge sink is connected to the MOSfet sink via a heatpipe and I wanted to keep the stock assembly unaltered rather than chop it up.

While I doubt that the P5W and similar motherboards require high performance cooling on the MOSfets it would not be wise to run the chips completely uncooled. Is it absolutely necessary for most motherboards? Probably not. But if I'm already spending a small fortune on custom CPU cooling, north bridge cooling, south bridge cooling, etc. then it would be derelict to leave the MOSfets unattended.

As a point of comparison, pull apart any high performance amplifier or even a television. Have a look at the power transistors in those devices and you will note that, when those components must suffer a heavy load, some sort of heat dissipation has been employed, sometimes small, sometimes freaking huge. Design engineers have been placing heat dissipation devices on these components for years and I'm not about to start second guessing their judgment this late in the game.

I agree that MOSfet cooling is probably mostly a gimmick. But then I'm inclined to believe that much of the performance aftermarket in computing is a gimmick but how much different is that from buying chrome valve covers or titanium headers for your car?

I've already invested in several unnecessary items for my rig; at this point I'm chalking it up as an investment in peace of mind more than performance... and for the fun of tinkering and adding a little bling.

Sorry if I'm not making sense as well as I should, I'm not full coherent yet. Still waking up.