I don't know if I would remove it. If you're doing it just for the hell of it, then go ahead! You could try lapping the IHS, see http://www.overclock.net/air-cooling/225983-g … -pictorial.html . I lapped my Q6600 and got good results.

I think it's possible to remove it's IHS, but personally I'd never bother...well, perhaps only with Tualatin. If I want a Coppermine-t without IHS, I'll just use a regular Coppermine 😜

Personally I actually prefer Coppermine-t's to regular Coppermines, as it's easier to use those very big Alu only heatsinks. I once installed a big aluminium heatsink with 7cm fan on a Coppermine 800 and from time to time the system failed to boot, till I reinstalled the HSF.

Also, theres a chance the P3 dies with removed IHS are more fragile as it wasn't necessary to use a protective layer on the die.

I did it to a Celeron 1200. It was pointless. These chips don't get hot enough for there to be any benefit. I reattached the IHS to protect the core.

Also, with Coppermine and Tualatin it can be quite difficult to get a heatsink to sit flat on the bare die. It's harder than Athlon because the cores are smaller, retention mechanisms weaker, and you don't have the foam pads for protection either. This is why those copper shims showed up because people were destroying their CPUs and also having problems with heatsinks sitting at an angle.

Besides, the shims are nickel-plated copper. So they are not impeding thermal conductivity much anyway.

Is there a benefit from removing the IHS of a K6-2/3 cpu ?
I remember I did it years ago, but really don't remeber any of it and I don't have that chip anymore.
If someone did it, how much did the temperature went down ? Or is it useless like with the tualatins ?

No don't do it. It's very easy to kill a K6 chip from corners chipping away. I killed a K6-3 that way. I even had put foam pads on the corners but the core cracked extremely easily. The cores of the 180nm + chips are also very small and definitely suffer from the problems of getting a heatsink to sit flat. Bad news for cracking/chipping.

It also doesn't help overclocking much anyway. The K6 chips aren't so much heat limited as they are architecture limited. The CPU simply isn't designed for more than about 550-600 MHz. Not even the + chips.

On the old 2.4V K6-IIIs removing the heatspreader and mounting a Socket A heatsink helped a lot to improve temperatures. Unfortunately the CPU was hopeless for overclocking.

I don't remember how limited the original K6-III overclocking was anymore... Was an extra 50 MHz pretty common?

I think I'll leave the IHS where it is. 😉

50 MHz extra on a 2.4V K6 is quite a challenge. 😉
The 2.2V parts fare a bit better, and the + versions are good for 100 - 150 MHz more.

The depressing thing is that overclocking these chips won't do much for game performance. Even with a K6-3 at 600 MHz, a Celeron 300A @ 450 MHz would run circles around it.

i removed one off the celeron the other day it was flat under the lid and just small brass looking rectangle.

5u3 wrote:

50 MHz extra on a 2.4V K6 is quite a challenge. 😉
The 2.2V parts fare a bit better, and the + versions are good for 100 - 150 MHz more.

The depressing thing is that overclocking these chips won't do much for game performance. Even with a K6-3 at 600 MHz, a Celeron 300A @ 450 MHz would run circles around it.

Yeah I have overclocked a few + chips and they all have been good for at least 550 MHz. They actually seem limited by the motherboard because one would only do 550 in a VA503+ but then it would do 616 in a P5A.

And yea I too have seen a P6 chips dust a K6-3+. I did a Katmai 450 setup vs. the 600 MHz 3+ and the 450 was clearly faster. Voodoo5 + UT99 in Glide.