motherboard heatsink blocks cpu fan heatsink

Romaboo · May 16, 2022

Parts:

Mobo: Asus ROG Strix X570-I Gaming Mini ITX AM4 Motherboard

Cooler: Noctua NH-L9i 33.84 CFM CPU Cooler (with adapter bracket for AM4)

This small bit of the motherboard cooling system makes it impossible for me to mount my CPU cooler. I've tried pushing it in from the side to no avail, and the screws are too short to even get it on there, though the piece would still be there.

What's my best course of action? I can take off the piece of the motherboard heatsink I think, but I've heard that you shouldn't leave it off. I think it's made of metal, so could it be possible to remove it and sand off the little bit I need for clearance? I really am stumped (and frustrated at the design). Thanks in advance.

Fasauceome · May 16, 2022

18 minutes ago, Romaboo said:

I think it's made of metal, so could it be possible to remove it

Yeah it's metal. Friend of mine had a heat sink that was too obstructive for his CPU cooler so he milled it out to accommodate.

If you're confident in your handiwork, it would be quite alright to do this. Doesn't look like there's a heat pipe inside this heat sink so you don't have to worry about rupturing anything.

Romaboo · May 16, 2022

I think I may have solved it actually. It turns out that the heatsink is asymmetrical, so one side has more clearance than the other, so I rotated the heatsink 180 degrees so that the side with less is on instead. In addition, I screwed in the problematic side first, and it actually seems seated properly. If anyone finds this thread in the future, I hope this helps them as well...

1sascha · August 13, 2023

Going to necro this one.

MSI Z690 Tomahawk DDR4 plus Lian Li Galahad 240 RGB plus bequiet! Pure Base 600 = couldn't mount the rad up top. That stupid mobo heatsink on top of the CPU protrudes just enough to make it impossible to fit the rad. Most frustrating was that with less than a centimeter (like, .5 or .7 or something like that) of additional clearance, it would've fit.

I couldn't see a way of McGyvering around the problem, but if anyone's got any suggestions, I'd still be grateful. I'll put in a new PSU soon so I'll have to re-route almost everything anyway (NOT looking forward to that!)

I had planned to put my 2x140mm fans in the front to suck cold air in and have the radiator push out air through the roof of the case. I ended up putting the radiator in the front - where it really shouldn't be in this case because it's not exactly an all-mesh front panel. So now I'm sucking in air through those two side-slits in the front, which then gets warmed up in the rad and then blown into the case and towards the GPU. I *think* the highest point of the radiator sits *just* higher than the waterblock/pump, and after a year in operation, the AiO still works great, so I think I haven't ruined my pump. Temperatures seem ok though - even with an OCed CPU and RTX 4070, so the setup doesn't seem too inefficient.

Still: I think temps would be better with my initial setup, plus those RGB fans of the AiO are pretty useless where they're mounted now. But I guess I would need a new case to mount the radiator at the top. Had I gone for, say, the Fractal Design Pop XL, which is 10mm wider than the bequiet, I probably would've been fine...

S.