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How secure are the Intel heatsinks?

watdahel

watdahel

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 8, 2010
Messages
456
I recently bought an Intel G530 processor. I noticed that the included heatsink doesn't use compression springs to actively apply pressure on the processor. I simply pushed four plastic clips into the motherboard to secure it. Is this enough pressure to properly mate with the processor?
 
It's a reassuring system isn't it?:rolleyes:

It should be fine but I don't like it.

You either like it or loathe it as a retention system. I've never liked installing them on other machines I've built. I prefer the feel of a nice thick metal clip snapping into place or some screws.
 
it's been in use for years, and installed on millions machines. If it was bad, it would means millions computers blowing up all over the world :rolleyes:

Put it in perspective - under what kind of scenario do you need screws/clips to lock in the hsf? If you intend to overclock and use a massive heatsink. Can you really call the stock Intel hsf massive or designed for overclocking? Far from it. It's main purpose - cool the cpu to acceptable temperatures under stock usage conditions. For that purpose, plastic tabs is all it needs to stay in place and provide minimum of contact between cpu and hsf, and it works. If you really gonna overclock that g530, you get an aftermarket cooler anyways, because the stock one, even you deadbolt it to the cpu, won't cool much at all. In other words, adding super-secure retention system to a stock hsf is a waste of time and money because any increase in cooling is neglible, if any at all.
 
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Intel stock coolers are designed to keep a CPU running at it's stock clockspeed at tolerable temperatures under normal indoor conditions.They seem quite capable of doing that. Presumablly there is enough springyness in the mounting system to provide tolerable contact.

You aren't going to significantly overclock a SB celeron anyway due to the combination of locked multiplier and barely adjustable BCLK so unless your PC is in a really hot location there isn't really much point putting a better heatsink on it.
 
pinoy said:
I recently bought an Intel G530 processor. I noticed that the included heatsink doesn't use compression springs to actively apply pressure on the processor. I simply pushed four plastic clips into the motherboard to secure it. Is this enough pressure to properly mate with the processor?
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If you did not have to use a lot of pressure to when installing the heat-sink, then you did it wrong.
 
Those stock heatsinks are garbage period. Not only does it not put enough pressure with the CPU but every one I have ever messed with won't attach properly once you remove it more then twice. The plastic pins won't hold it down anymore. With how great Intel is with their CPU's you would think they would give you a better attachment for the heatsinks. Come on Intel, even the lowest AMD chips come with heatsink attachment that are 100 time better.
 
thenightman4u said:
Those stock heatsinks are garbage period. Not only does it not put enough pressure with the CPU but every one I have ever messed with won't attach properly once you remove it more then twice. The plastic pins won't hold it down anymore. With how great Intel is with their CPU's you would think they would give you a better attachment for the heatsinks. Come on Intel, even the lowest AMD chips come with heatsink attachment that are 100 time better.
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Yup...Like the LGA socket way more than AM socket...but AMD's HSF retention system is better.

That being said, no one seriously straining their system is going to stick to stock HSFs. Both camps suck relative to even low-end aftermarket CPU coolers.
 
Eh, who cares. $10-20 gets you a cheap tower / heatpipe cooler if it matters to you, and as others have said the stock HSF is capable of what it needs to do. I'd rather they be shitty and cheap and not increase the price of chips at all than just be mediocre. Truth is I've never used the stock HSF for any longer than a few days while waiting for an aftermarket HSF or retention kit to reuse an old HSF in the mail. If I could get the same chip for even $5 less without the stock HSF, I would.

Yes, the AMD sinks are better... but no one uses them above stock speeds either, do they? Doesn't seem like a real big benefit to me.
 
Here is the issue I see, not everyone is like us all and monitor temps and such, with the Intel clips popping out all it take is someone not to notice the cpu is overheating, then the chip is garbage. In fact I use to use the stock heatsink on my 2600K and one day I removed it and reapplied thermal paste and I know for a fact I had it secure but I guess from moving the tower around one clip came loose and I was thankful that I run everest OSD and I was able to catch it in time. I guess from so many years of using AMD I got use to the security of their design that once I started to build with Intel I never feft safe using the plastic clips. If they would just change the clip design it would be a decent cooler for a stock system.
 
thenightman4u said:
Here is the issue I see, not everyone is like us all and monitor temps and such, with the Intel clips popping out all it take is someone not to notice the cpu is overheating, then the chip is garbage. In fact I use to use the stock heatsink on my 2600K and one day I removed it and reapplied thermal paste and I know for a fact I had it secure but I guess from moving the tower around one clip came loose and I was thankful that I run everest OSD and I was able to catch in in time. If they would just change the clip design it would be a decent cooler for a stock system.
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That's not really true. Intel's thermal management system is the cat's ass. I once fired up an OC'd Q6600 (pretty good OC), and the heatsink was hanging on by one or two tabs. Some place I used to work had an older Intel rig running for weeks with the heatsink knocked loose. It throttled back and ran completely happy.

The Intel mounting system is completely adequate, and fast & easy once you get used to it. I've removed & installed literally thousands of them. There is a spring pressure in the metal that holds the clips to the proper tension. It will fall off if you drop the computer or something (or bounce around in the back of a shipping container), but sitting on your desk shouldn't affect it.

For a stock machine, the OEM heat sink is typically free and adequate. The only time I replace it is for sound or OCing. Intel spends a ton of effort validating things, including the heat sink. Each CPU they make has a specific heat sink it's married to. Even if two HSF's look identical, they can have different fan specs and so forth. I worked on a lot of different generations of stuff and we had to make sure they matched up.

Honestly, if the HSF retention mechanism they've used for years now was not 100% functional, they wouldn't be shipping it.
 
iroc409 said:
That's not really true. Intel's thermal management system is the cat's ass. I once fired up an OC'd Q6600 (pretty good OC), and the heatsink was hanging on by one or two tabs. Some place I used to work had an older Intel rig running for weeks with the heatsink knocked loose. It throttled back and ran completely happy.

The Intel mounting system is completely adequate, and fast & easy once you get used to it. I've removed & installed literally thousands of them. There is a spring pressure in the metal that holds the clips to the proper tension. It will fall off if you drop the computer or something (or bounce around in the back of a shipping container), but sitting on your desk shouldn't affect it.

For a stock machine, the OEM heat sink is typically free and adequate. The only time I replace it is for sound or OCing. Intel spends a ton of effort validating things, including the heat sink. Each CPU they make has a specific heat sink it's married to. Even if two HSF's look identical, they can have different fan specs and so forth. I worked on a lot of different generations of stuff and we had to make sure they matched up.

Honestly, if the HSF retention mechanism they've used for years now was not 100% functional, they wouldn't be shipping it.
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IIRC, isn't the Intel HSF outsourced to Foxconn, at least through LGA1366? I'd be curious how much if anything Intel has to do with it. I'd be surprised if Intel gives more info to Foxconn than die size, TDP, and hold down dimensions.
 
Skripka said:
IIRC, isn't the Intel HSF outsourced to Foxconn, at least through LGA1366? I'd be curious how much if anything Intel has to do with it. I'd be surprised if Intel gives more info to Foxconn than die size, TDP, and hold down dimensions.
Click to expand...

We have a number of contract companies all making HSF (heatsinks/fan) for us and every single one of them is the same basic design. (Foxconn, Lotes, Molex, Tyco, ITW Fastex, Nidex, and Delta all have made HSF for us for 1156 and 1155 socket based processors).

I think that the Intel® stock HSF are fine as long as you make sure that they are seated well. Generally I advise that you mount the HSF on the board before you put in the case. By doing this you can check to make sure that all of the push clips are down and locked in place before you mount the board.
 
Well, I have never used stock heatsinks in my builds. I always buy a 3rd party heatsink whether I OC or not. I usually like to keep my CPU cooler and quieter than average.
 
my grandfather who was formerly computer savvy built a p4 system years ago and I never inspected it. Recently he said his computer had been beeping at him. I opened it up to discover he attempted to screw in the heatsink which had destroyed the retention system. Basically it was being held on the cpu by the top two pins just resting in the holes and the termal paste adhesion. The cpu was clocking itself down to like 400mhz to stay alive.

you may not like the retention system but even if it fails the cpu will save itself.
 
I just don't like the push-pin units. I just feel safer with the bracket on the bottom of the mobo and the push-down/screws on the HS itself.
 
IMHO The Intel heatsink system is way better than the AMD one. Yeah the AMD one seems more secure but its harder to release when the mobo is in the case and you have less access to it. The Intel setup is VERY easy to install/uninstall in a cramped space as long as you know how to install it. Takes me less than 30 seconds.
 
extide said:
IMHO The Intel heatsink system is way better than the AMD one. Yeah the AMD one seems more secure but its harder to release when the mobo is in the case and you have less access to it. The Intel setup is VERY easy to install/uninstall in a cramped space as long as you know how to install it. Takes me less than 30 seconds.
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The intel plastic pin and the 2 shells around it are very easy to bend. You may think you have it lined up in the hole in the motherboard and when you go to push it in, you end up bending the pastic shell that encloses the pin.

I'm talking about the clear part as seen here. I've seen people break and bend those off.

push-pin.jpg
 
always worked fine for me, they dont break after 2 uses either, your doing it wrong, period. i have reused several intel heatsinks in the office and they all do the job they were designed to do.
 
They are secure if you make sure it is installed right and you don't move your system. But they can really suck to install as sometimes the pins close before going all the way through the hole and can pop off when moving your pc. Basically it is adequate for the stock heatsink and not much else. Amd mounting is a lot better to me.
 
IntelEnthusiast said:
We have a number of contract companies all making HSF (heatsinks/fan) for us and every single one of them is the same basic design. (Foxconn, Lotes, Molex, Tyco, ITW Fastex, Nidex, and Delta all have made HSF for us for 1156 and 1155 socket based processors).

I think that the Intel® stock HSF are fine as long as you make sure that they are seated well. Generally I advise that you mount the HSF on the board before you put in the case. By doing this you can check to make sure that all of the push clips are down and locked in place before you mount the board.
Click to expand...

Same basic design, but different spec. Hotter CPUs had heavier HSFs, with the bigger older ones having a copper core. Then they switched to aluminum core. Smaller power CPUs like the Celeron series may not have had any core in them. There is a thickness difference (height of fins) that varies widely depending on the unit.

My experience with all the different HSF's ended almost 5 years ago so there may be fewer specs now. My overlords then said each CPU had a spec'd unit specifically for it, and we could not mix them up. Each series I dealt with (quad core, dual core, EE's, etc) had their own specific heat sink. I've only bought a couple CPU's since then, though so it may be different.
 
Only time I have heard of one un-mounting itself from the board, was my sisters comp I shipped to her, the heatsink got knocked loose, and the side window got cracked (possibly because of the heatsink), system was still fine.
 
IntelEnthusiast said:
We have a number of contract companies all making HSF (heatsinks/fan) for us and every single one of them is the same basic design. (Foxconn, Lotes, Molex, Tyco, ITW Fastex, Nidex, and Delta all have made HSF for us for 1156 and 1155 socket based processors).

I think that the Intel® stock HSF are fine as long as you make sure that they are seated well. Generally I advise that you mount the HSF on the board before you put in the case. By doing this you can check to make sure that all of the push clips are down and locked in place before you mount the board.
Click to expand...

I agree with mounting the HSF before you mount the motherboard. I think that's where people run into problems with them not being mounted properly.

If you can pick up the motherboard by the CPU cooler without any of the four plastic pins popping out, then it's mounted properly.
 
I hate how many of the stock intel pushpin heatsinks bend the motherboards severly. This seemed to the norm back in the 775 days and I am not sure if things have improved. Not long ago I bought a used 790i board with a Q9450 and stock heatsink. This was a high end board that went for about $500 when new. It was warped so bad that when you looked at the top edge of the board you would notice that most of the mosfets were not touching the mosfet heatsink. The board always ran fine, but I hated that.
I also had an E6300 and motherboard combo that warped bad too, so Intel had this warping problem across their product line for years and never bothered to change anything. Seeing that 790i warped like that almost made me sick.
 
They work fine. Do NOT overclock more than a few hundred MHZ using them.
 
i can it your ambient temps are fine and you dont pump voltage into it.... they can work, i got my i5 2500k at 3.4Ghz right now on the stock heatsink and lets go back to the Q6600 running at 3Ghz from 2.4Ghz...
 
Agree with most everyone else, just install the sink before the board goes in the case, and triple check to make sure the white tab is all the way in the board and the black locking tab is all the way in the white part. Easy to overlook if you dont take a good look at it for a first timer.

They are nice and quiet...only real good thing to say about them.

That and the box of unused ones I have is probably getting close to 50$ just in scrap metal :D
 
I don't mind them. If they were better, they would cost more to make and would increase the price of a boxed processor which is pointless when most enthusiasts don't even use it.
 
Sojuuk said:
I can't recommend overclocking at all on a stock heatsink.
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You can: *

*I did once, a lot. But, the board was running on one of those open test-bench cases. I also had two Delta 120MM chop-yer-finger-off server fans running across it. It actually worked great, and I had something like a 900Mhz overclock on a X6800. :D
 
Never had a problem with them. Just push down each tab until you hear the series of clicks and you know it's in.
 
tangoseal said:
They work fine. Do NOT overclock more than a few hundred MHZ using them.
Click to expand...

The Intel HSF is more then capable of sustaining a mild overclock. I have a release E8400 still running at 3.6ghz that, while running hot under heavy tasks, is still running well within the tolerance. I haven't bothered to overclock my 2600k yet (No reason to), but on the stock HSF it idles at 26c, and only hits 48c under load. Given the upper temp limit for this CPU - I'm confident I can get it to a moderate overclock of 4.2-4.4ghz and still be well within moderate CPU temps.
 
I've had problems with the plastic push-turn corners on the Intel stock heatsinks. I always buy a third party cooler when I do a build.
 
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