Noctua NH-D14 not clearing first PCI-E x1 slot on mobo

m3ta1head

m3ta1head

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Installed my new D14 yesterday, needless to say it was a bit of a squeeze. I was having problems getting it to sit straight-the darn thing kept wanting to rotate slightly to the left. I remounted both the hsf and bracket several times in an attempt to get it straight. This is as good as I could get it:

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The bottom of the D14 was actually touching the solder joints on the back of the STX and shorting it out! For now, I've resorted to spacing them apart with a credit card, but a more permanent solution is needed. I can move the STX to the slot immediately below my 7950, but that will block airflow to the card significantly. I can put it in the second pci-e x16 slot, but that will throttle both slots back to x8 (I believe, can someone please confirm?) I've also tried moving the 7950 to the bottom x16 slot, but the heatsink on the card does not clear the power/reset headers for the case. Whoever laid this board out should be shot!

Anyone have any suggestions on how to rearrange/fix things, short of going out and buying a new mobo?
 
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Benchmark it the way it is & then with the sound card in the second pcie x16 slot. See how much you really lose. Might not be enough to notice.
 
Ended up modifying the case headers and moving the 7950 to the lower x16 slot, with the STX in one of the x1 slots above. However, after installing the card in the lower slot, it is reporting to be running at x8 v1.1 (according to GPU-Z). Not sure how this is possible, but after googling some benchmarks it appears that this will be noticeably detrimental to performance. Can anyone chime in and clarify what's going on here?

On the plus side, there's more breathing room now.

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Good fan, I have the same one. Running my 6core really cool :)
 
I'm pretty sure you could put the GPU in the first PCI-e x16 slot and the sound card 2nd x16 slot, even though it's an x1 card.
 
Mr Flibble said:
I'm pretty sure you could put the GPU in the first PCI-e x16 slot and the sound card 2nd x16 slot, even though it's an x1 card.
Click to expand...

He didn't want to do this as it would take the card back to x8 instead of x16.

OP I believe there is like a 2-3% performance diference in x8 vs x16. If you are running IB I believe that PCIe 3.0 x8 is equal to PCIe 2.0 x16
 
Mr Flibble said:
I'm pretty sure you could put the GPU in the first PCI-e x16 slot and the sound card 2nd x16 slot, even though it's an x1 card.
Click to expand...

CAxVIPER said:
He didn't want to do this as it would take the card back to x8 instead of x16.

OP I believe there is like a 2-3% performance diference in x8 vs x16. If you are running IB I believe that PCIe 3.0 x8 is equal to PCIe 2.0 x16
Click to expand...

Exactly, with either the GPU in the lower slot, or both of the x16 width slots occupied, the bandwidth to the gpu falls back to PCIe x8 2.0 (5gb/s). This is low enough to choke off the 7950 in some situations.

Ended up going full circle and returning everything to their original positions. Remounted the D14 one final time, before carefully inserting the cards. I separated the sound card and D14 with a layer of ESD paper to ensure no shorts. All seems well now-the 7950 is running on a full speed bus and the sound card isn't shorting/producing any static from interference. I'm just going to leave it this way.

Click for high res version

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