Do you guys ever custom cool your AV receivers?

[GuruMeditationError]

I've picked up a manufacturer refurbished OnkyoTX-NR609 AV Receiver (fitted with a new revision HDMI board; the original boards tend to fail in this unit, it seems because of heat cracking the solder balls under one of the chips).

I want to keep it cool to try and increase its life-span and was wondering if people here have experience of doing that.

 

I was thinking of opening it up and putting heatsinks on the bare chips and lashing some 120mm PC fans to the bottom of the case to push air up through the unit.

Do people cool their AV stuff here? Is it something people do here and is there advice or guidelines?

[19_blackie_73]

no, at least i don't do it and i never heard anybody do it. they are normally designed to stay reasonable cool without additional cooling

 

if it really overheats that badly, check the web for similar cases, but it should stay as cool as it needs to be without doing anything.

 

But i don't want to stop you from doing it

[GuruMeditationError]

7 minutes ago, 19_blackie_73 said:

no, at least i don't do it and i never heard anybody do it. they are normally designed to stay reasonable cool without additional cooling

 

if it really overheats that badly, check the web for similar cases, but it should stay as cool as it needs to be without doing anything.

 

But i don't want to stop you from doing it

Thanks, that's good to know; I've heard these things have poor life-spans at the best of times but I'm not sure if that's correct. Mine has known heat issues and the HDMI boards fail in them. The one I have has been re-fitted with a newer revision HDMI board but I think I'm going to open it up and stick heatsinks on the chips.

Also, I'm thinking lashing some fans onto the bottom of the case to push air in through the intakes and pressurise the case to push some air up through it, might not be the worst idea...although I am a little concerned about altering the unit's thermal profile. I wouldn't want to cool the sensor that's controlling the case's existing extractor to the point where it wasn't ramping up when it needed to...I'm thinking that's a risk.

[Bananasplit_00]

i have never thought about adding more cooling to my reciver, its a 50W unit and keep itself as "slightly hotter then the suroundings" or less hot

[GuruMeditationError]

21 minutes ago, Bananasplit_00 said:

i have never thought about adding more cooling to my reciver, its a 50W unit and keep itself as "slightly hotter then the suroundings" or less hot

To be honest you might not need it...it's just the unit I have seems to have a design flaw that causes them to fail due to heat, so it's something I want to address.

 

I'm thinking it might be better, easier and more convenient (and probably safer re. potentially altering the unit's heat profile) if I just lay extractors across the top of the case rather than lashing them to the bottom, but again I guess even then its a risk...as for the heatsinks on the chips, it would invalidate my warranty but I think it might be worth doing, since I wan't the unit functional more than I want the money back for it should it fail, and I'm not sure where I'd pick up another like this (also, it might be worth comparing boards to see if the upgrade is actually legit and it's not just a regular HDMI board for that unit).

[Elerek]

I don't know about AV equipment, but I've seen plenty of custom cooled routers, both air and water cooled. If it gets too hot for your liking, go for it. It can't hurt and if done well can make it look better to boot.

Spoiler

 

 

 

[GuruMeditationError]

4 minutes ago, Elerek said:

I don't know about AV equipment, but I've seen plenty of custom cooled routers, both air and water cooled. If it gets too hot for your liking, go for it. It can't hurt and if done well can make it look better to boot.

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Omg, those look crazy. lol

...but yeah, just worried about cooling a sensor that's managing the main extractor for the whole system and creating a thermal hotspot elsewhere in the case. Unfortunately I don't  have the equipment to scan it for hotspots, so it's kind of a case of just flying blind with it.

[Bananasplit_00]

38 minutes ago, GuruMeditationError said:

To be honest you might not need it...it's just the unit I have seems to have a design flaw that causes them to fail due to heat, so it's something I want to address.

 

I'm thinking it might be better, easier and more convenient (and probably safer re. potentially altering the unit's heat profile) if I just lay extractors across the top of the case rather than lashing them to the bottom, but again I guess even then its a risk...as for the heatsinks on the chips, it would invalidate my warranty but I think it might be worth doing, since I wan't the unit functional more than I want the money back for it should it fail, and I'm not sure where I'd pick up another like this (also, it might be worth comparing boards to see if the upgrade is actually legit and it's not just a regular HDMI board for that unit).

maybe just have some fans around it? i dont know the unit myself but i know my reciver atleast has space to take 3 120mm fans(not officially ofc but there is definatly space for them)

[Elerek]

25 minutes ago, GuruMeditationError said:

Omg, those look crazy. lol

...but yeah, just worried about cooling a sensor that's managing the main extractor for the whole system and creating a thermal hotspot elsewhere in the case. Unfortunately I don't  have the equipment to scan it for hotspots, so it's kind of a case of just flying blind with it.

You could upload some pics for us to see better what your mane, but enough airflow should reduce the need for the stock cooling sensor to ramp things up I would think.

[GuruMeditationError]

13 minutes ago, Elerek said:

You could upload some pics for us to see better what your mane, but enough airflow should reduce the need for the stock cooling sensor to ramp things up I would think.

I don't think it's the kind of things that's going to be immediately apparent without an examination of the circuitry or knowing where the temp sensor/sensors that control its extractor are actually seated...?

 

If the temperature sensor's at the far end of the board with the electronics calibrated to ramp up the system fan when that end of the board reaches a certain temperature, if I create a cold spot around that sensor then hypothetically it might stop the fan from spinning up if it's needed for other areas of the case. 

It's a tricky one...I want to help the cooling but, potentially, it could actually have the opposite effect. 

[johnt]

3 hours ago, GuruMeditationError said:

I've picked up a manufacturer refurbished OnkyoTX-NR609 AV Receiver (fitted with a new revision HDMI board; the original boards tend to fail in this unit, it seems because of heat cracking the solder balls under one of the chips).

I want to keep it cool to try and increase its life-span and was wondering if people here have experience of doing that.

 

I was thinking of opening it up and putting heatsinks on the bare chips and lashing some 120mm PC fans to the bottom of the case to push air up through the unit.

Do people cool their AV stuff here? Is it something people do here and is there advice or guidelines?

It's not uncommon to cool your AV gear. Receivers in particular have two sources of extreme heat: 1) the amplifier, and 2) the image signal processor. Cheaper amplifiers tend not to warm up as much because they truly have nowhere near the advertised power. The higher end receivers get hot. Red hot. Sizzling super hot. This is why they generally recommend 6 inches of clearance around the product. Unfortunately that's not possible with higher end models that generally tend to push their size and weight limits inside tv cabinets. A cooler is not unusual.

 

There are options if you're truly concerned. Like you suggested, a fan is a good idea, but note, amplifiers tend to sound better when they are "warmed" up. A fan actively pushing air directly onto an amplifier is the best idea; however, a fan moving heat away (or pulling it out of the receiver from the top) is the better solution. This also helps significantly reduce dust build up inside the receiver. The other option (which you do not have) is to use the receiver's pre-outs and route the signal to a dedicated amplifier. Then you can turn off the amplifier inside your receiver. This helps spread the load and heat between two different devices. The last option is to use the receiver's "ECO" mode if it has one. You won't be able to tell a significant different and it tends to keep the unit cooler.

 

I had to place my receiver at the top of my stack because of heat. I don't have any measured temperatures, but it used to get so hot that I couldn't even touch it. It would also warm up the room and make it unbearable during summer. Yeah. It was that bad. I ended up going with a dedicated amplifier. Now my receiver is cool to the touch even on hot days.

 

[GuruMeditationError]

@JohnT 

 

Wow thanks...I didn't know you could run some of these things into amplifiers.

I think the only pre-amp socket I've got on this unit is for the Sub-woofer.

But I must say I was pretty amazed at the heat this thing was generating, I mean literally kind of amazed.

 

Based on my searches it seems it's a chip on the HDMI board that causes the problem...there's even a video on Youtube of someone actually re-flowing one...I'd assume, based on what you're telling me, that that must be the image signal processor.

The extractor fan seems to be positioned over the amp and it seems the chips on the HDMI board are left to cool passively.

I think, based on what you're telling me, the way to go might be to just isolate the problem on the HDMI board to address it directly (probably with a simple heatsink solution), rather than trying a blanket solution like seating a bank of fans onto the top of the case.

[johnt]

2 hours ago, GuruMeditationError said:

I think the only pre-amp socket I've got on this unit is for the Sub-woofer.

That is correct. Don't try connecting your speaker outputs to an amplifier

 

2 hours ago, GuruMeditationError said:

But I must say I was pretty amazed at the heat this thing was generating, I mean literally kind of amazed.

 

Based on my searches it seems it's a chip on the HDMI board that causes the problem...there's even a video on Youtube of someone actually re-flowing one...I'd assume, based on what you're telling me, that that must be the image signal processor.

I was also blown away. Being a 4k compatible image processor, it's probably a lot beefier than we realize. 

 

2 hours ago, GuruMeditationError said:

The extractor fan seems to be positioned over the amp and it seems the chips on the HDMI board are left to cool passively.

I think, based on what you're telling me, the way to go might be to just isolate the problem on the HDMI board to address it directly (probably with a simple heatsink solution), rather than trying a blanket solution like seating a bank of fans onto the top of the case.

Your receiver as a built-in fan for the amplifier?

 

A heatsink would probably help a lot, though I'm not sure it would actually reduce the temperatures

[GuruMeditationError]

11 minutes ago, JohnT said:

That is correct. Don't try connecting your speaker outputs to an amplifier

 

I was also blown away. Being a 4k compatible image processor, it's probably a lot beefier than we realize. 

 

Your receiver as a built-in fan for the amplifier?

 

A heatsink would probably help a lot, though I'm not sure it would actually reduce the temperatures

It's got an extractor fan and it's seated above what I think is the amplifier but the amplifier's heatsink spans almost the entire width of the receiver. I'm not sure why it's placed exactly where it is, but it's seated above the amplifier heatsink in the front and towards the right of the case.

But yeah, heatsinks help to reduce temperature but it's best to have a fan blowing fresh air through them to expel the hot air they generate. I'm almost certainly going to put heatsinks on the chips on the HDMI board and probably fit a fan in there somewhere as well to draw the heat off of them.