Archer57 wrote on 2025-09-01, 12:42:

gmaverick2k wrote on 2025-09-01, 12:35:

doesn't do harm as all you're doing is increasing the surface area for heat transfer

The harm is in messing with the PCB and all the tiny SMD stuff on it. I've seen way, way too many results of doing such things.

As for heat transfer - it will be negligible through that 2mm thermal pad and all the components on the back. There is no proper contact between this heatsink and the chip. Trying to cool the chip through all that stuff instead of doing it directly from the other side just does not make sense.

I'd like to second this, you'll gain much more from having a good cooler on the front of the card. Cooling the GPU mainly and, if the cooler style permits, the surrounding area with some airflow as well. We're talking about 38W tops for the whole card. The GPU being a part of it, but not all of it. The VRMs as well as the memory produce a fair amount of heat as well, all of them profit from airflow and better cooling. Give those BGAs some passive heatsinks. Get a nice big cooler for the front of the card, like a Zalman VF700, if you really want to get the card cooled properly.
If you want to stick with the stock fan: Give the card some good surrounding airflow.

I'd always advise against frankenstein solutions to cool a card. Putting the cooler on the back applies pressure to the PCB from the opposite direction as the usual fan mounts. This is not accounted for by the designers.

tehsiggi wrote on 2025-09-01, 13:11:

I'd like to second this, you'll gain much more from having a good cooler on the front of the card. Cooling the GPU mainly and, if the cooler style permits, the surrounding area with some airflow as well. We're talking about 38W tops for the whole card. The GPU being a part of it, but not all of it. The VRMs as well as the memory produce a fair amount of heat as well, all of them profit from airflow and better cooling. Give those BGAs some passive heatsinks. Get a nice big cooler for the front of the card, like a Zalman VF700, if you really want to get the card cooled properly.
If you want to stick with the stock fan: Give the card some good surrounding airflow.

I'd always advise against frankenstein solutions to cool a card. Putting the cooler on the back applies pressure to the PCB from the opposite direction as the usual fan mounts. This is not accounted for by the designers.

One more consideration here is that the PCB itself acts as heatsink which is being heated up by everything from GPU to memory and VRM, so to a degree all the things are coupled to each other.

I've observed this very clearly on HD3850 i replaced the cooler on recently - drop GPU temperature and PCB itself becomes cooler, meaning memory, VRM, etc become cooler too (that card does have VRM heatsink though). Suddenly when GPU is kept at 50C instead of 80C memory no longer needs any heatsinks, being barely warm to the touch, while before whole PCB was too hot to hold.

Airflow from larger fan helps that too, cooling the PCB itself a bit.

So i'd say it is worth dealing with GPU cooling first before sticking heatsinks onto memory and VRM - they may not be needed at all...

I did this with my old Ti 4200 way back when - I was broke, my old case had poor cooling (side panel permanently off) and I was desperate for FPS.

Re: Old photos of old rigs thread

So ended up having a bit of a disaster. The heatsink attached has rusted inside and I can't seperate the cover to attach a new fan to the heatsink. So I either have to buy the Deepcool, or consider mounting a generic heatsink onto the GPU with fan on top.

Any suggestions for the latter option? I'd need something with the correct mounting holes, I'm assuming they're not readily available.

If you do it right you don't have anything to be afraid of and it looks good , here is a 3dfx with front and back cooling

I think you mistake being afraid with having the right priorities. In the case of the 4Ti 4200 there's no need for that. Just put a proper cooler on the GPU and be good with it. This isn't a powerhouse of a GPU. That copper/alu is invested better on memory ICs than on the back of the GPU (through a couple of layers and a thick thermal pad.

I can check later if those 10€ coolers from aliexpress would fit on a 4Ti4200 for you @sketchus. If yes, that'd be plenty of cooling for that card and very affordable.

I'd certainly be interested, thanks.

The only other thing I've been looking at is to see if any other cheap cards from the era had the same mounting holes, I'm sure they must have. It looks like a number of 7300 cards have a similar spaced mount. Just asking around eBay for a seller to confirm.

I just had a minute to go to the basement and check.
Pulled the cooler off a Radeon 9700 and checked the mounting holes:

The two outermost mounting holes fit perfectly. So I'd say that is a go!

This is the cooler at hand:
https://aliexpress.com/item/1005007076816622.html

This should suffice easily to get that card cooled. Works a treat on a Radeon 9700.

Thanks so much for doing that. Really appreciated.

Do you think this is the same thing:

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/326696663068

I know it says CPU cooler on there, the seller insists it works with GPUs too and visually appears the same. I think he said he mounted it on a FX5700 too.

I would just buy the one from Aliexpress, but with shipping to the UK they're essentially the same price for me.

This is the same cooler, yes. Same holes etc. as mine, just different color. The manufacturer is the same as well.

Those coolers fit both of my GeForce 4 cards with no modifications, but I did have to use a hacksaw and trim the base of the one I put on my GeForce 3 because the base hit the RAM heatsinks.

Perfect, thanks. I've ordered one. Hopefully it's not too noisy!