Q: Mounting Zalman CNPS9700LED to Gigabyte DQ6

[basspig]

Alright, I'm not new to building PCs, but I'm sitting here with a big question mark about mounting the Zalman 9600 fan cooler on my new Gigabyte P35-DQ6.

The support bracket that is supposed to go on the back (solder) side of the motherboard won't seat into the holes because Gigabyte has a big heatsink there, right under the CPU socket!

I'm thinking I'll have to DIY some custom screws and nylon/plastic flat washers in place of the Zalman bracket, just to mount this thing.

Even if I could mount the bracket, the combined thickness of the heatsink + bracket would exceed the clearance provided by the motherboard chassis standoffs.

Surely some of you have already had this combination of motherboard and cooler to work with. What solution worked for you?

 

[basspig]

Here's what I'm thinking, after carefully examining the back plate stiffener:

The heatsink is a diecase metal and acts as a much more effective stiffener than any plastic piece provided by a cooler manufacturer, so this leads me to conclude that:

It's okay to cut the center "X" brace out of the back stiffener and use just the four nuts, mounted in the plastic tips that I plan to cut from the X brace.

My thought is to use hot melt glue, just a small drop, on each plastic part, to secure them to the motherboard, so that I can attach the heatsink without removing the motherboard. It looks like it can be done with just two screws. By glueing them, the screws can be inserted and tightened without pushing the backplate nuts out and losing them. The hot glue is also removable without damaging the motherboard, should the board ever be sold or sent to the factory for warranty repair.

I think this solution should work fine. I'm going to cut the backplate stiffener.

 

[ouch1]

Well supposedly Zalman has a special back plate for this board. But I have not been able to find it yet.

All have been able to find so far is the following link to a forum where a guy describes mod'ing the zalman bracket.
http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=75325

-ouch1

 

[basspig]

Looks like he did the same thing I did--cut off the corners and just use those, discarding the center "X" bracket. It's working fine for me.

I have it all assembled now, except for the CPU. And thanks to the fact that I glued the four "nuts" for the Zalman on to the back of the motherboard, I can remove and reinstall the CPU without needed to take out the motherboard.

Gosh, the last time I built a system was in June, 2001. A LOT has improved since then! I must say that I'm impressed with the elegance of the new PC components and how they fit together. Case manufacturers are putting out beautiful and thermally-efficient designs now, not just "boxes" with no airflow that are so full of sharp metal edges that you lose much blood just building one PC due to all the cuts one sustains. No such problems with the TJ06 case that I'm building. Nearly done, and not one scratch on my hands!

I had to mod the wind tunnel to fit over the SilentPipe heat exchanger, which involved cutting out a small section from the top of the back of the plastic shroud. It fits nicely now with minimal gaps from it to the board.

The 8800GTS is in. Took up two slots! But I see it vents out the second slot. Nice thermal design.

The ATX12V wire from the PSU barely reached because of the reverse orientation of the mobo in this TJ06 chassis, but I cut a tie wrap and routed that cable separately down through the drive cage and it makes it now.

I love the SATA cabling that comes with the DQ6. It's malleable and that made it possible to route them so neatly that they look like plumbing. All tied together with orange wire ties. This machine and all the components in it are an engineering marvel. I'm very pleased with how this is turning out.

Recalling the last time I spent four grand on a PC, it was in 1990 and it was only a Pentium 100 with 8MB RAM.
Four grand buys me the PC *and* a nice HP LP3065 30" LCD. Editing video on this baby is going to be a real pleasure!