loose graphics card fan

one of the two fans on my graphics card is loose and making a lot of noise. it still spins at seemingly normal speed but it wobbles on its axis. if i stop it with my finger i can tell its able to move side to side a lot more than the other fan can. there are some screws and stuff on here, that attach some metal plate that im assuming is a heat sink, and i dont know if i should remove it and try to find a screw to tighten the fan. suggestions please?

its an asylum GeForce FX5950 ultra
http://www.bjorn3d.com/Material/Images/383_bfg5950-1.jpg

 

I assume this is the card you mean (your link doesnt work):

http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=383

http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=361&pageID=524

That looks fairly straight forward to remove the housing....looks like 3 screws.....just have 2-3 Sheets of white A4 spread around you so you can lay the parts out neatly and sequentially.

 

yes but once i remove the heat sink will there be a way to tighten the fan? it looks like its attached to a pin in the center, and it seems like its moved too far away from the base attachment, it can move up and down with this pin.

 

Sadly I cant comment without seeing it for myself. It looks simple enough to remove the cover so you can at least have a better look.

 

i took out all the screws and the heat sink appears to be held on by a spot weld or something. it isnt removable, the screws do nothing.

 

It wont be a spot weld!!!!!!

When you removed the cover if you look on the back of the card you probably should have seen something similar to a cross mount/brace. This would be firmly holding the center of the HS to the GPU, have a look at the pic of mine. I just pulled mine apart for cleaning and reapplication of thermal paste today (lowered temps by at least 5C) and there were 8 screws on the back with the 4 in the cross mount pulling the center of the HS onto the GPU and 4 for the housing, most cards have something similar. If it is firmly "stuck" it is probably gummed up and dried thermal paste which has created a bond they do not WELD onto cards (would fry the GPU!!!!!!). Be very careful if you cant find any screws on the back and only attempt to pry it apart if you can afford another one. I will not be held responsible if you break something okay!

 

i removed all the visible screws and the plates were stuck on more than i was willing to pry at it. on the center of the back side theres what looks to be a pin going through it. whatever it is, its holding it on, and it cant be removed. so i left the screws off as they seemed to do nothing and would be a hassle to re-attach, and just put the card back in.

 

Please put the screws back in......as those fans spin the are going to vibrate like mad without the screws and will most likely cause something to either fall apart or fail!

 

well you were right. i was playing far cry when all of a sudden i heard a thud and then everything started changing colors. so i shut down the computer and opened it up and the fans and heat sink had come off, they were just attached by the glue. so i put it back together as i didnt have the screw driver required to further disassemble the piece and access the fans to try and tighten one. ill have to go to the store tomorrow to buy one. i wish they didnt make the screws so small.

 

Well I hate to say it but I told you so. Now that it is off I would highly recommend you clean up the old thermal paste (it is probably not very effective any more and is dry and crusty) and refresh it with some more.

I use Isoproponyl Alcohol (99% pure/proof) with Q-tips to clean of the old thermal grease, and gently wipe over with a tissue, being careful not to touch any surrounding components and then apply Arctic Silver 5 arguably the best Thermal paste there is. You can see the heatsink and GPU I did today with gunk on then cleaned off and then I applied new paste and lowered temps by at least 5C. When applying the Arctic Silver 5 on apply a small amount:

Arctic Silver 5

Follow these instructions:

Intel or AMD Exposed Single Core CPU

Only apply a "thin layer" as the article indicates. I highly recommend you do this as you have exposed and broken the seal of the old thermal paste (which Im assuming was very old and gummy and not very effective) otherwise you will experience some overheating problems with the GPU.

 

where could i buy some of that glue and how much is it?
also how often should i take it out and reapply it?

in the instructions it says this,
Arctic Silver 5 has no adhesive qualities and is considered grease. It will
never dry or set and cannot be used to glue a heatsink to a CPU core.
To permanently glue a heatsink to a CPU core that does not have any other
attachment method, please use Arctic Silver Adhesive or Arctic Alumina
Adhesive.
will it leak out?

 

You shouldn't need an adhesive, I'm sure, and once all the screws are back in place, holding the housing firmly to the card, the HS will be snuggly held onto the GPU. You only use the adhesive for RAM heatsinks or to North or South Bridge Chipsets when there is no other way to hold them into place. All the Thermal compound is meant to be a grease that never dries out but "transfers heat". You can readily buy Arctic Silver 5 from any decent Electronic or PC shop (try your best to get that product as it is the best!), otherwise you can get it on-line at:

Newegg

A $5 tube will last 4-5 years. I would apply it every 6-12 months depending how often you use it. You also should be applying that to your CPU 1-2 times a year.

 

but theres no worry of it seeping out into something else?

and where do i put it on my cpu, ive never looked at it, its an intel dual core i believe, 3 Ghz, and it has black metal...sheets, protruding from it, i assume theyre for heat dissipation.

 

If you DL and install this you will be able to get all the info you need:

EVEREST

Look under Computer and click on summary this will tell you exactly what sort of CPU Type you have.

When applying Thermal Grease as the instructions say it will only be a very thin layer you are aiming for and therefore there should be none of very very little smudged out of the sides. Also once you know exactly what sort of CPU Type you have you can look at the most appropriate application instructions from here:

Application Instructions

I also have a guide for removing Intel Heatsinks but we need to ascertain what type!

 

CPU Type Intel Pentium 4, 3300 MHz (15 x 220)

also i was looking at some other things on it, and should the 'PAE' be active?
i dont know anything about this, so i thought id ask.

Physical Memory
Total 1022 MB
Used 590 MB
Free 432 MB
Utilization 58 %

Swap Space
Total 3998 MB
Used 713 MB
Free 3285 MB
Utilization 18 %

Virtual Memory
Total 5021 MB
Used 1304 MB
Free 3717 MB
Utilization 26 %

Physical Address Extension (PAE)
Supported by Operating System Yes
Supported by CPU Yes
Active No

 

Well we can note from PAE that unless you intend to use greater than 4Gb of RAM with the appropriate OS (ideally a Linux distro) you wont use it. Basically it is intended for servers.

You have a P4 which will be a "Large Single Core Intel" and should follow these instructions. Please note the very small amount that is applied, "the amount of Arctic Silver 5 needed would be equivalent to about one (1) uncooked short-grain of white rice."

Here is how to remove the heatsink for a 478 CPU:

Intel 478 HS removal

You do this at your own risk, I remove any responsibility, so please read it very carefully at least twice before you undertake this. Some people never remove their HS and use the PC for 10 years or more without any heat issues, so you don't have to do it, but personally it is good maintenance practice.

 

would there be any harm in using a 70% isopropyl alcohol solution? its all i could find.

also i dont think i will be removing the processor heat sink, after reading that guide im terrified of what i might do to it. especially because i dont exactly have the best work environment, i typically use my floor, i dont think it would be too smart to go messing with such a complex thing when all i have is some materials and a screw driver, im certainly no professional.

how much would my graphics card be affected from the heat sink removal and re-attachment without applying a thermal compound? because while playing far cry just now it started to glitch up, not like before though with the colors, it looked like it was outlining the 3d surfaces with their wire frames. i dont know if its just the game or if the card was over heating again. could this happen? or may i have permanently damaged it? also this only occurred after alt-tabbing out and then back again, there was severe lag as well.

 

70% should be fine just make sure you wipe the surfaces clean with a dry cotton bud (Q-tip) after you have used it and allow it to evaporate for a while. Use a couple of sheets of white paper to lay your parts out on so you can see them all clearly. I'm hoping you haven't damaged your Video Card but I did request you get those screws back in. We won't know until you have put it all back together. I can't comment on whether it will be okay to just put it back together or whether you need to re-apply the thermal paste, but I am very confident that you do need to re-apply it after they way you mentioned it was stuck together and you have it apart now so why not do the job properly.

 

oh no i put it back together yesterday after it fell off. but i didnt have the arctic silver 5 or anything yet. in the intel guide it mentioned to never remove the heat sink without re-applying some thermal compound, i assumed it would also apply to a graphics card and that the lack of it there may be causing it to overheat when its under more stress?

 

Well overheating can cause artifacts and graphical glitches, etc so it will be best to try and re-apply some thermal grease and see if this helps. I have to agree with Intel and do recommend it.

 

im going to be applying the thermal compound and attempting to repair my fan later tonight. in the application guide it says to firmly attach the heat sink and then to rotate it a few degrees each direction. im quite sure once attached the heat sink will not be doing this. should i apply the arctic silver 5, then press the heat sink on, rotate it, and then attach the screws? or just avoid this step altogether? im fairly sure that once i apply it im not supposed to remove the heat sink again, to allow it to properly set, im not sure if this can be done as there are separators that need to go on the screws and its easiest to have all the screws in place on the heat sink and then all at once insert it into the gfx card. would it be ok to apply the compound, then spread it with the heat sink, and then remove the heat sink and place the screws and separators in it, then re-attach it to the card?

 

I had spacers as well and couldn't rotate it slightly either, Im sure it says to rotate "if you can", indicating that in some instants you can't, like a Video Card and for that matter 478 Stock HS. Good luck and hope it goes well. Remember to look at least twice carefully and understand in your head how everything should go together before you start doing it.

 

well i just got done working on my gfx card. i would have done it a couple days ago but other things came up.

the isopropyl alcohol did not dissolve the thermal compound already present whatsoever. i had to remove it by literally scraping it off with a plastic pie cutter. i removed all that i could but there was clearly still a thin layer on as it was discolored. the fan does not seem to be fixable, and repairing it was my original intention. after looking at it for some time i discovered there was some sort of gunk building up on it. it was rust colored and im assuming thats what it was. i removed all that i could, again by scraping, and found that there was nothing i could do to secure the fan propellers. the propellers and the magnet they are attached to sits too loosely on the copper coiled part. its held in place by a pin that goes through the whole thing and has a washer attached to the back end. it would appear as if the washer was simply too thin, as it did not do its job of securing the fan blades. i dont know if the corrosive material i found in it has anything to do with that, it was located on the microchip portion of the fan and not in the housing of the pin. i tried to file down the propeller blades to keep it from scraping against the aluminum portion of the heat sink, which was causing the noise in the first place, but after about 30 minutes of filing i realized i simply couldnt remove enough of it to keep it from hitting the screws that hold the fan in place, i didnt know they were even hitting that. after apply the arctic silver 5 and reassembling the entire thing the fan no longer makes the same noise, i think it now makes a far worse one. its a very high pitched squeal that will stop if i hit or shake the tower just the right way to make the fan recede into its proper place. this whole ordeal was quite annoying and i would assume the fan needs replacing, although i have no idea how to do so, it looks like the power cords for it were welded into place, i think it would take a professional to replace the fan, if its even replaceable without buying a whole new gfx card.

well, thats my story, it was pretty much just a big waste of time.

oh, and to be absolutely sure, i placed the bulk of the thermal compound i removed into a cup with a more than adequate amount of isopropyl alcohol to dissolve it, so if it is soluble, we will find out, its been soaking about 2 hours now, and look just the same, the only change is the aroma of the room.

 

Ouch sorry to hear it didn't go well. Has the graphic glitches gone away?

 

yes they have, i didnt think they would, i assumed with one crappy fan the card would overheat like it was before, but the game runs smoothly. and every so often the annoying high pitched squeal will go away, im not sure if the fan is stopping when this happens or not, but i havent noticed any performance problems, so im not concerned.