Does anyone else hate Installing after market CPU fans?

[NR500R]

Everyone I have installed over the years has been a pain. It's like they make them hard to install on purpose. Does anyone else share this frustration?

[Astraea Kisaragi]

Installation is harder cause they are made being compatible for many different sockets, while box cooler are for that one CPU type and usually you just click in.

But I would object. I had one of those - "only for Intel" aftermarket coolers where you just put in the plastic pins and turn them onto side to fix it. To get them inside the holes was much harder as fix my "complex" Coolermaster Gemini on with metal screws and a backplate.

[Keljai]

The coolermasters EVO coolers used to drive me nuts yeah lol.

[Kaihekoa]

Yep, especially when installing it on a dual tower HSF in a case with little clearance on the top ><

[[☥] - CJ -]

i only dislike it cuz my case doesnt have a cutout in the back to make it easier

[tacoshy]

Originally posted by ☥ - CJ -:

i only dislike it cuz my case doesnt have a cutout in the back to make it easier

dont you put on the cooler on the cpu befor you putting in the MoBo in the case? Any real pc builder builds everything out of the case first to check if it works in the first place. and only then putting the MoBo in the case.

[[☥] - CJ -]

Cases with aftermarket cooling cutouts make it so you dont HAVE to do it with the motherboard outside of the case, you can do it while its in it, which makes it much easier.

[tacoshy]

still no pc builder does it... not really easier imo and most hate to unwire everything because you figure out then that something is faulty...

[[☥] - CJ -]

Plenty builders do it
and even if they dont
People that change out their Cooler WOULD do it because its much easier

and dude, you are aware thats the point of case makers having the cutouts right?

Having to remove the Motherboard every single time to change the cooler or make modifications to it gets old after a while, the cutout makes it easier and saves time, and again THAT is the point of it.

[tacoshy]

Originally posted by ☥ - CJ -:

Plenty builders do it
and even if they dont
People that change out their Cooler WOULD do it because its much easier

and dude, you are aware thats the point of case makers having the cutouts right?

Having to remove the Motherboard every single time to change the cooler or make modifications to it gets old after a while, the cutout makes it easier and saves time, and again THAT is the point of it.

yeah if you only work ont he cooler by replacing them or adding new thermal paste but not right at the beginning.

[[☥] - CJ -]

i never said the beginning.

[NR500R]

It took me about 50 minutes to install the Hyper T4 CPU Fan from cooler master. It was such a pain.

[shiel]

Originally posted by ☥ - CJ -:

Plenty builders do it
and even if they dont
People that change out their Cooler WOULD do it because its much easier

and dude, you are aware thats the point of case makers having the cutouts right?

Having to remove the Motherboard every single time to change the cooler or make modifications to it gets old after a while, the cutout makes it easier and saves time, and again THAT is the point of it.

This^
Installed my Noctua NH-D14 about 2 years after originally building my PC. There was NO WAY I was taking the whole thing apart to do it. That being said, plugging the fans in and then routing the cables was absolute hell and I ended out with it looking pretty sloppy because of it(fan cables wrapped over the top of the fans and very visible from the outside) but that's something I can fix when I do decide to do more than a gpu change.

[Arya]

It depends on the cooler. Some of them are absolutely nightmarish, others are pretty easy.

The worst I've ever encountered was Phantek's PH-TC12DX. This cooler attached with two loadbearing brackets, one down either side of the CPU. These each have a captive nut, and a retainer with two threaded captive bolts locks the heatsink onto these loadbearing brackets.

The problem is, the captive bolts are just a fraction too short to easily find the captive nuts. That forces you to wiggle the cooler and forcefully jam it downwards until it finally gets purchase on the brackets. It's a ridiculous problem - one that could've the solved by simply making the captive bolts a millimetres longer, or the captive nuts a fraction deeper. Meh.

Another problem is the retainer itself, which is free-floating and very, very easily knocked out of position while mounting. Once it's kicked loose, getting it back into place is a fiddling and frustrating mess. Especially since I wear mechanic's gloves when installing a CPU/cooler to avoid having to wash paste of my hands.

The best air cooler I've used was a cheap Cooler Master, I don't know the specific model. It looked like a 212, but was very compact and had different mounts of the heatpipes. Anyway, it was a great cooler. It punched vastly above it's weight keeping a 4.2 GHz 3770K to 55 degrees under full gaming load with nothing but a thin heatsink and one bitty fan.

The mounting system was also great. Like the Phanteks it had two brackets with a captive nut/captive bolt arrangement. Unlike the phanteks it actually fit together. Perfectly. Having it off to replace the Thermal paste last year was a cinch, as simple as torquing off the bolts by hand and unplugging the fan.

[pasa]

Can't recall any actual pain. The installation leaflet was somewhat intimidating but in practice the installation went faster than reading.

Certainly that applies to the case when the cooler fits alright. My friend had to carve off some of the sound dumpening material from the case side panel to make enogh room height-wise, that took some time and effort.... :)

[⛧EyMi Mayhem⛧]

bequiet dark rock tf, not rly a pain but tricky.