Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

[ratdude747]

Found some missing pieces (thumbscrews) to one of my retired rigs, my dual Opteron X2 Socket 940 rig, went to move it to replace them, and made an unfortunate discovery:



The freaking plastic heatsink bracket sheared off while sitting. Thank goodness that didn't happen when it was running!

I removed the thermal compound before shooting that... it wasn't until after that I figured out why the cooler came loose, right as I was about to apply fresh

I have some Dead/Disused socket 940 stuff floating around if I want the cheap way to fix... anyway, anybody know of who/what makes for a better cooler bracket?

[linuxguru]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

I've seen this happen before. The metal integrated heat-spreader varies in height between Socket 939 and Socket AM2/2+. It looks like the HSF is interchangeable between the two, but the difference in the IHS height sometimes increases the stress in the plastic retaining bracket when the HSF is locked, causing the tab to snap on occasion. You can replace the whole assembly from a dead or flaky mobo if available.

There's an alternate heat-pipe stacked-fin cooler which uses the cabinet airflow, instead of a mounted fan, to cool the stack. I had that on a DFI Lanparty SLI board with a S939 Opteron 165, now retired. I'll take a pic in due course.

[Uranium-235]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

you can literally replace it with another bracket from a 939/am2/am3's motherboard

[Topcat]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

The tabs breaking off a socket370 meant the kiss of death... That one can easily be replaced. The socket-A/462 had the 3-tab sockets, and were pretty tough if using a heatsink that grabbed all 3.

939/940/AM2 were like skt478 brackets...broke easily, but cheap and easy to replace.

[ratdude747]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

Yeah I know it's replaceable... that wasn't my question. My question was more along the lines of "is there a particular brand or style that is less prone to breakage"?

The coolers are Cooler Master TX3's, for the record.

[Topcat]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

Yeah I know it's replaceable... that wasn't my question. My question was more along the lines of "is there a particular brand or style that is less prone to breakage"?

The coolers are Cooler Master TX3's, for the record.

The socket brackets are pretty universal like a P4 skt478 bracket is... If you need a replacement, just say the word, I've got a bunch of them. Are they prone to breaking? I've seen a few....but it wasn't a really big problem.

[ratdude747]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

The socket brackets are pretty universal like a P4 skt478 bracket is... If you need a replacement, just say the word, I've got a bunch of them. Are they prone to breaking? I've seen a few....but it wasn't a really big problem.

I have some on dead/defunct boards... Just seeing if there's something to look out for when picking a replacement.

[RJARRRPCGP]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

Back in 2001 and 2002, I only had a heatsink for socket 462 that connected to the middle tabs! Especially with a T-bird when gaming, losing a middle tab was death for them!

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

some companies like scythe, came up with metal heatsink mounting brackets for s478 and 775. ditto for 754/939/am2(+).

TechPowerup - Scythe enhances Cooler Mounting: CPU Cooler Stabilizer 775 replaces Push Pins
Quiet PC - Scythe CPU Cooler Stabiliser 775

TechPowerup - Scythe Brings In CPU Cooler Stabilizer for AMD Sockets 939, AM2
Quiet PC - Scythe CPU Cooler Stabiliser AMD

funny how the japanese always come to the rescue everytime someone else comes up with shitty aesthetics for their products!

[ratdude747]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

some companies like scythe, came up with metal heatsink mounting brackets for s478 and 775. ditto for 754/939/am2(+).

TechPowerup - Scythe enhances Cooler Mounting: CPU Cooler Stabilizer 775 replaces Push Pins
Quiet PC - Scythe CPU Cooler Stabiliser 775

TechPowerup - Scythe Brings In CPU Cooler Stabilizer for AMD Sockets 939, AM2
Quiet PC - Scythe CPU Cooler Stabiliser AMD

funny how the japanese always come to the rescue everytime someone else comes up with shitty aesthetics for their products!

Shame, they seem to be unobtainium... otherwise I'd buy four, for the two of my three AMD systems that could use such (I have a socket F system with the same TX3 coolers; my socket 940 server has Screw-down dynatrons that don't have this issue!)

[SMDFlea]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

Shame, they seem to be unobtainium... otherwise I'd buy four, for the two of my three AMD systems that could use such (I have a socket F system with the same TX3 coolers; my socket 940 server has Screw-down dynatrons that don't have this issue!)

They made an updated version called the Scythe Universal Retention Kit III, frozencpu seem to have some in stock

https://www.frozencpu.com/products/2...2_AM2_AM3.html

[ratdude747]

Re: Socket 940/939 Cooler bracket failure

They made an updated version called the Scythe Universal Retention Kit III, frozencpu seem to have some in stock

https://www.frozencpu.com/products/2...2_AM2_AM3.html

Good find. Noted... will probably get me some.