NVME M.2 SSD cooling

[Amornik]

Hey all,

 

So I bought the MysifitalSSD BPX drive, and went ahead and got this cooling for it :

https://www.ekwb.com/shop/ek-m-2-nvme-heatsink-gold

 

problem: manual stated I MUST use thermal pads (supplied) on both sides. but it's meant for single sided drives and this one is double sided. so it won't fit. only way I could close it is by *not* putting a thermal pad on the bottom side.

1. Does it really pose any danger to the drive? (tried with both sides using a 0.5MM thermal pad (thinnest I could find) but still won't close.

2. any solutions for 2 sided drives?

 

 

By the way, drive works fine, even dropped 10 degrees now...Wondering if I could just keep it this way (one sided padded only).

 

thanks guys!

[Farden]

I would say running it 1 sided should be fine. Ultimately, if the drives *needed* cooling they'd come with heat spreaders/sinks built onto the PCB or with clips in the box, keeping them cool is just a nice addition. If you're running it with the coolers on one side I don't see how that could cause any problems (as long as nothing metal on the cooler is poking the SSD anywhere it shouldn't)

 

 

[Bananasplit_00]

well you DONT want to cool the NAND, you only want to cool the controller so just stick the heatsink on the side with the controller

[Amornik]

But that's what I mean (I should have explained this better).

the kit is 2 plates. both metal. you place them on both sides and there are clips to secure them to one another. if you put thermal pads on both sides (between the actual drive and the plate) it's too thick and the clips don't reach.

 

So what I did was put a thermal pad on one side, but not the other. the bottom part is the metal plate touching the SSD directly.

 

I don't see any reason why metal on the chips should be an issue, especially if the temperature is lower now...but I need experts to tell me this is OK.

 

hope it makes sense now, let me know what you think!

 

thanks.

[Farden]

Theoretically speaking, you're right that metal on plastic should be fine however i'd probably suggest putting a piece of paper or something in between the heat sink and the SSD on the side that doesnt have the pads.

 

@Bananasplit_00 is right though - there shouldn't be any need to cool the NAND chips themselves, just the controller.

[Amornik]

That's what I did, I put the thermal pad on the side with the controller. so a piece of paper you say? that in no way will cause any danger (or potential flames!) on the drive?

 

thanks guys, appreciate the speedy help!

[Farden]

Well cardboard would be better but I'm guessing the tolerances are quite small. Paper doesn't auto-ignite until around 230c iirc so I think you'd be running into problems way before that if it got even half way to that temperature! That being said, this is definitely a bodge and I probably wouldn't suggest doing it.

I'd say just send the heat sink back and run without it. Its unlikely you'd actually need it - or - if you're looking to use it for aesthetics then maybe take a dremel to the heat sink and customize it yourself so that the clearance isn't an issue in the first place (this is what i'd do)

 

But yeah, if you super want to use it and don't want to customize it - attaching it without the pads so the seat sink is touching the chips is technically fine (just no metal on metal) but not really recommended, a slip of paper on the offending side would be 'better' but your best option is to send back and get something that works, or mod the heat sink.

 

 

[Ace McPlane]

Yea, I'd send it back. All of the solutions to your problem sound janky and I wouldn't be comfortable with them especially since cooling the drive is pretty much pointless anyways.

[Amornik]

Well, I found a way in-between, seeing as I like the way it looks, and it actually helps with the temp.

one side has a full thermal pad, while the other has it on the board part (half) to keep it thin, and the 2 chips are bare (so that's the metal to plastic part).

I'm getting -10 degrees flat so idle was 61 now 51, and under load is 60-62 when it was 70-72 (and without anything, reached 80).

 

I'm not sure what's the temperature where the drive would start throttling, but isn't it around 70-80 ?

 

anyway, thanks for the advice guys!

[Palii]

Found this:

https://www.delock.de/produkte/G_89577/merkmale.html?setLanguage=en

You can move the heatsink around to cover only the controller.

 

 

 

 

[adrjork]

Hi everyone,

sorry if i push this discussion just a bit out of topic, but my problem is very near to the OP.

I have an HighPoint SSD7101A controller for a 4x NVMe RAID. I bought 4x double-sided NVMe drives, and they sit perfectly into the controller (there is space between NVMe and surface of the card) but the controller is thought to dissipate the heat from the NVME's upper side only! (HighPoint gives you the thermal pad and the metal heatsink for the upper side of the drives, but nothing for the down side.)

 

Anyway I found a suggestion from SilverStone: in the manual of their TP02-M2 (heatsink for double-sided NVMe), in order to avoid thermal throttling they recommend to use an upper thermal pad between NVMe and metal heatsink, and also another thermal pad between NVMe and motherboard/controller. That surprised me a lot: because it means transmitting heat from the NVMe to the controller/motherboard. In particular, my HighPoint controller has printed circuits right under the NVMe drives!!! Is it safe??? And more than this, I wonder how can be effective using the card surface as heatsink since the card surface is NOT made of metal!

Question 1: do you think a thermal pad under the NVMe could be dangerous for the controller's printed circuits?

Question 2: do you think it's better leaving the void space under the NVMe in order to cool it down via fan only?

Question 3: do you think that cooling down only the NVMe's upper side could be sufficient to avoid thermal throlling?

 

Thanks a lot for your help!