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It legitimately took me a second for my brain to un-break itself when I looked at the photo. First thinking...something's not right here....and not for even a moment thinking it would be something as stupid as putting the heat-sink on the case fan... Then the realisation that yes...it really is something that stupid.
In the old days, before laptops, we used to call the case and everything in it the CPU. You had your monitor, keyboard, mouse, maybe printer, maybe modem, and they would all plug into the "CPU." Yes, we knew there was also a chip inside called that but we didn't get all pedantic about it.
With that in mind: Place the CPU fan on the heat sink... That's exactly what they did.
That "we" isn't global. Some called it "the CPU", some called it "the hard drive", some made fun of those two groups for not knowing what they were talking about.
I must be stupid then because I've legitimately had that idea to put a fan on the radiator looking thing to maximize the precision of the cooling. Cooling the thing that gets hot
As in, the CPU fan right on the heat sink? Yeah, that's a pretty standard setup. I've got it on mine. The CPU came with that cooler combo.
The key is to actually put that cooler on the CPU, not the chassis.
Ah I see. That IS a DUH moment
Most programmers I know wouldn't understand what they're looking at here.
This is sysadmin humor maybe?
Yep. This is hardware related. To be fair, many programmers I know are also into self-building and more hardware-related stuff, but that's something I personally just don't know my way around well (instead I like more theoretical computer science more). So I genuinely don't know the problem here, and I think that's fine.
You get no shade from me. My only beef is with programmers who act like they are experts in all things computer when they aren't.
BTW, the issue in the picture is that the CPU cooler is attached to the wall of the case instead of the CPU. It shuts down because modern hardware will usually turn itself off when it overheats to mitigate the risk of permanent damage.
Some old cpus would actually go up in smoke if you ran them without cooler: https://youtu.be/Xf0VuRG7MN4
Wisdom is knowing what you don't know.
The CPU is the silver squarish shape towards the right. It generates a lot of heat when in use, so having good cooling for it is important. So important that CPUs come with a fan in the box. This involves a heat sink to help draw heat away from the CPU. This screws on mounting points around the CPU, but thermal paste is also used to help heat transfer up. Then there's a fan that attaches to that heat sink, so that the hot air from the CPU can be blown away from the CPU.
People spend a heckton of money on cooling for their CPU and GPU, because when things overheat, they throttle themselves and performance becomes super slow. Longevity of components can also be harmed by higher temperatures. If it gets too bad, then it will crash entirely.
This PC has put the CPU heatsink on the case fan on the left. I don't think this is especially harmful in and of itself — the big problem is that the CPU is entirely "naked" and has no cooling whatsoever. This means the CPU begins overheating basically as soon as the PC is turned on.
Edit: you can actually see where the heat sink should match up to the CPU here
At least the thermal paste isn't too thick..
I once inherited a PC from my older brother, he had built it himself and i decided it needed a sping clean. I opened it up and airdusted with the help of an old toothbrush, but couldnt get some fluff/dust out of the CPU cooler so i took it off to get behind it properly.
The little plastic cover over the thermal paste was still on the heatsink sandwiched between the heatstink and the CPU.
He hasnt heard the end of it.
Wow. I'm surprised it worked for so long. I assume there were issues, such as high temp, that your brother didn't diagnoze or didn't know how to. Impressive that CPU is working all those years. Any damage to its function?
It is surprising and Im sure it reduced the performance, but plastic still conducts heat and sounds like it was a thermoplastic and it didn't melt.
I used to work as an intern in a PC repair shop and we had a guy come in saying his new self build computer doesn’t work. Turns out he cut a huge part off the mainboard so it fits into the case.
That's significantly worse. Assembling a PC without knowing what a cooler is for is bad enough, but to actually cut pieces off complex electronic components, I don't know what kind of state of mind you have to be in for that.
The kind of state that would have me refund his money and tell him I'm baffled and can't figure it out.
what kind of state of mind you have to be in for that
Probably crazy enough to demand that the PC repair shop has to bear all the costs he caused by his genius idea.
It was long ago but I was this dumbass. I kept reading online people said a fan was optional and didn't understand they meant a case fan not a CPU fan so I built everything and couldnt figure out why it wouldn't turn on. Realized fairly quickly and bought one and everything worked after that
Honestly, I am envious of you, as well as the person OP posted above. You did something - learning from whatever source you could find best; having the determination and will to go ahead and sought help perhaps knowing too well you might be ridiculed. Because for the people that know this stuff, it is trivial and not worth of botheration. So the help is not enthusiastic - but for the new doer it is so challenging.
I wish I had the energy, time and courage of you all... Maybe someday I will but until then I can only love and admire your passion.
Must keep the fan cool!
I love that they had the heatsink and fan, they just didnt know where it went and actually mounted it to the case. It wasnt just that they didnt have one.
I'm sort of surprised it fit on the 120mm fan slot. Maybe they just forced screws through the grill though.
Oh shit I noticed the exposed CPU but totally missed that part.
Must’ve gotten a faulty CPU that produces heat when it runs.
... as opposed to those ones that consume heat from the environment when they run.
I asked chatgpt to put my CPU into heat consuming mode and it then suggested I mine BTC to equal out the thermodynamics. I'm still trying to figure out where the BTC is, but it's nice to go green
Wireless cooler
When you use ChatGPT for building instructions...
They're just too advanced for us, they already have "wireless" cooling technology.
There’s the problem, his BTX system is missing its airflow diverter!
It's also backwards
Good catch! I haven’t messed with one of those systems since the P4 era, i had two that were the only systems I scrapped before they died, they were just that mix of indestructible, dog slow, and with absolutely no upgrade path whatsoever
Stop trolling. No one knows why without a full diagnostic.
As someone who has worked in an IT repair facility, this image hurts my soul.
When I was in IT, had someone who couldn't get their USB printer to be detected by their laptop. They turned everything on/off and it never would show up. Even I was a little confused, so I unplugged it from the laptop, and then went to go plug it back in, but couldn't feel the port. I go to take a look, and find there's no USB ports on that entire side of the laptop. somehow they plugged the USB cable into the Ethernet port.
Just needs to drop the voltage and the clock down to 500Mhz and then no heatsink required.
Ah a mainboard with a dust protection-layer.
Eons ago, I had a guy bring me a non functioning Compaq desktop and say, "Wull the fan was makin' a lotta racket so I greased it."
What he actually meant was, "I sprayed the entire motherboard with WD-40 because I don't know shit about computers OR lubricants."
I gave it a bath in electronics cleaner and it actually fired right up after that.
Tell them to switch to water cooling. You will get an even more awesome picture.
Those damned unreliable AMD CPUs, he should have gone with Intel!
