Cooling the Great North Bridge...

[Gooserider]

I'm working on designing a system. While I've pretty much decided on the mobo I'll be using, (Tyan Thunder K7X (S2468UGN)) I don't have it in hand. This means all I have to go on is the pictures on Tyan's website.

I'm trying to make as close to a silent PC as I can, so I'm not planning to have a great deal of air circulation going through the case beyond what I use to cool the rad.

The only heatsink on the mobo pix that I've seen is a passive item about half the size of a CPU socket that is sitting fairly close to the center of the board. As far as I can tell, that must be the NB since I don't know of any other major heat generators on the board.

I'm wondering how to cool it, if I need to do anything to it at all beyond just letting it sit there with the stock passive heat sink.

I'm NOT going to put a fan on it, as I'm avoiding fans as much as I can. If I'm going to add cooling it will be WC based.

I see three options in increasing order of difficulty:

1. Do nothing, leave it the way it is with just the passive block.

2. Jam some copper tubing inbetween the fins on the existing heatsink, (it looks like about 1/4" or more spacing betwen them) I think I can get about 4 passes in it. Given all the thermal interface losses I don't know if this would work, but it certainly would be cheap and easy

3. Make a WB for it. Presumably it wouldn't need much flow since the NB doesn't put out all that much heat so I was thinking in terms of a U or S shaped passage in a low profile block with 1/4" barbs. (note, I'd be running this in parallel with the CPU loop, so flow losses shouldn't be a problem)

What do folks here think I should do?

Gooserider

[TerraMex]

http://www.tyan.com/products/html/thunderk7x.html
ftp://ftp.tyan.com/datasheets/d_s2468_150.pdf

Just to make it clear... this one right?

(offtopic, damnit, where's a dual Barton mobo when you need one?/offtopic)

The inital problem is that , and i am assuming it, you dont have the motherboard yet, so there is no way of telling. Unless you can dig up some datasheets from Tyan or the AMD chipset.

http://www.amd.com/us-en/assets/cont...docs/24416.pdf

If i read it correctly ....er 6W ? If so, the passive cooler is more than enough ... even with a low airflow.

Anyway, IMO , you should first get your hardware and run a few tests on it before you get into watercooling it. If the datasheet is correct (just in case, test first).

If it's not the case, then you really should consider getting a block there. Iit's preferable to build/buy one, that to try a very ghetto approach on it.

[Gooserider]

Just to make it clear... this one right?

Yep, that's it. You're right I don't have it yet, I'm just getting towards the end of the 'deciding what to get phase', and moving into the 'looking for good prices' phase. That is followed of course by the 'ordering everything' and 'putting it all together' phases.

Just took a quick look at the ref. you mentioned, and it looks like 6W to me as well, but I'm not sure it's the right ref - The board is using a 760 chipset, the ref was to a 762, don't know if there's a difference. (but I may be missing something as I'm new to looking into boards this deeply.)

I guess that does mean I should probably wait and see what it actually does once I get the hardware built. It will be a pain to have to add the cooling later, but not that big of one.

Thanks for the info and pointers,

Gooserider

[TerraMex]

I've seen a few (at least one) of those motherboards , in a couple of watercooled PC's, and it was interesting to see that none had a NB block.

Anyway, in case of emergency you can always go to the 2CPU forums and ask around. At least a few users have watercooled dual MP's, with watercooling.

[Althornin]

i believe it was Volenti who just soldered a copper pipe to the existing HS, said he got good results.

[Gooserider]

you can always go to the 2CPU forums

Hmmm... I looked at the main forum menu, and I didn't see anything that looked like a 2CPU forum. Could you give me a pointer TerraMex?

I've seen a few (at least one) of those motherboards , in a couple of watercooled PC's, and it was interesting to see that none had a NB block.

Not to argue the point, but see
http://3rotor.homelinux.com/images/P...0/DCP04985.JPG
If that isn't the board I'm using, its a close relative, and that looks like an NB with a cooler At last you can say you've seen one...

Thanks
Gooserider

[utabintarbo]

Originally posted by Gooserider
Hmmm... I looked at the main forum menu, and I didn't see anything that looked like a 2CPU forum. Could you give me a pointer TerraMex?



...

Try here

[lukasz70]

offtopic, damnit, where's a dual Barton mobo when you need one?/offtopic

right here
http://www.hardwarezone.com/articles...aid=747&page=1

[Gooserider]

Looks like good stuff, where I might be able to get some additional info.

Gooserider

[TerraMex]

>right here
>http://www.hardwarezone.com/article...&aid=747&page=1

No no no. They dont support 400Mhz fsb Barton's (or even 333Mhz fsb, ) in an MP configuration. It's not the processors, its the mobos really. The AMD760 MPX only supports 266Mhz fsb.

[Gooserider]

TerraMex: No no no. They dont support 400Mhz fsb Barton's (or even 333Mhz fsb, ) in an MP configuration. ... The AMD760 MPX only supports 266Mhz fsb.

Ah, mild confusion... There were two links, I was referring more to the 2CPU one. The other was interesting, but I classed it more as amusement than practical. I'm not planning to OC at all, or otherwise do things that void warranties beyond watercooling which I'm doing for noise control, not performance.

I figure the performance I'll get from a system like I'm building will so totally blow what I'm using (P-200 w/ 64mb ram, etc.) away that I don't even need to think about OC'ing. Most benchmarks I've seen don't even go as slow as what I've got, the ones I have seen suggest about a 1500% improvement in some things with only a miserable 300% improvement in drive intensive stuff... I'm not worried about performance with those kind of improvements. (I tend to get a new system about every 7-10 years, so this will be the new baby for a while)

Gooserider