OT: CPU heat-sink problems

[Siri Amrit Kaur]

On Saturday 15 April 2006 07:56 pm, Vaughn Treude kindly wrote:
> A question for the build-it-yourselfers out there:
>
> It seems I always have trouble with heat when reinstalling a CPU.  Since
> it's a used heatsink I have to  put on new thermal compound.  I bought a
> tube of Arctic Alumina thermal grease and followed the instructions from
> the company's website as closely as I possibly could.  Still, the BIOS
> says that the CPU (an AMD 2600+ or something similar) is heating up to
> 60 degrees C.  Assuming the BIOS is right, I did something wrong.  I've
> already redone this twice.  This is the heatsink that came with the
> CPU.  And yes, I cleaned the old thermal pad off the heatsink with
> carburetor cleaner as recommended.  The problems, as I see it, are:
>
> 	1. It's extremely hard to get the thermal grease in a thin even layer.
> The directions say you can use a razor blade or a clean credit card.
> I've tried both.  I never get the layer quite even and if I try to fix
> it, I always make it worse, producing gaps and whatnot.
>
> 	2. The directions say you shouldn't twist or slide the heatsink when
> mating it down on the processor.  Makes sense, but with those tiny, tiny
> little plastic nubs on the sides of the CPU socket, it's very hard to
> mate that with the heatsink's mounting hardware exactly right the first
> time.  Seems like it's always a millimeter or two off.  Unless I want to
> take it off and reapply the goop, and do this about 50 times in
> succession, I need to slide the heatsink over a tiny bit.
>
> Has anybody had this kind of trouble, or am I some kind of idiot?  Is it
> better to just by a new heating with that meltable thermal pad on it?
>
> Vaughn
>

Is this an AMD CPU? What kind of system is it, e.g. socket A, or what? 

It's been a while since I had to put on a heatsink but I've built a number of 
AMD socket A machines, and the stock heatsinks that came with the CPU were 
always junk- loud and inefficient. But even so, this sounds hotter than 
normal. 

The only time I've ever had one get hot like that, it wasn't mounted flush 
with the board. I had tried using a shim to keep it from cracking upon 
mounting, and the shim made it not fit right. There was actually an air gap 
under half of it. 

Siri Amrit
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