M55SLI-S4 noisy chipset fan

[TheJudge]

Hello

 For some time now my PC has been making some noise which I have always assumed was one of the fans. After much cleaning of components I have finally found which one is the culprit, and it seems to be the fan on the nVIDIA nForce 4 SLI chipset that is causing the racket (if I stop the fan spinning, the noise goes away).

 This is on a Gigabyte M55SLI-S4 (Rev 2) mobo

 Are these fans replaceable? Or can at least "safely" remove the chipset and fan to try and give it a better clean?

 Any suggestions appreciated

[absic]

Hi there,

If you can find a small enough fan then yes, they are replaceable.

Yes, you can remove the heatsink from the chipset but a couple of things to bear in mind:
Make sure you clean off and replace the thermal grease and be careful when removing the mount fixings as they can be a bugger to replace if they are damaged. If they are damaged in the removal process an effective replacement are a couple of small plastic nuts and bolts but take care no to overtighten them.

[Dark Mantis]

If you want to clean the fan thoroughly the best way is with a air compressor. If the cleaning doesn't work as well as hoped though the fans are replaceable but many are glued on with a epoxy paste and so are not easy to remove.