Modder Proves X570 Boards' Chipset Can Be Cooled Passively With Custom Heatsink

For some reason almost all AMD X570 motherboards come with a tiny little chipset fan, some even hiding inside covers that look like passive heatsinks. Modder "DerRuehrer" didn't like the pesky little fan on his Asus ROG Strix X570-E motherboard, and thus decided it was time for some DIY work, as detailed by OC3D

(Image credit: DerRuerer Imgur)

He did this by milling his own heatsink out of a block of aluminium, which he covered with a layer of paint to make it match the motherboard's theme. This didn't quite do the job, so he also added a heatpipe along the bottom of the heatsink along its length, which would distribute the heat better from the chip's surface. A good mating between the heatpipe and heatsink was created using Arctic MX-2 paste.

Original cooling solution that hides under the shroud.

Original cooling solution that hides under the shroud. (Image credit: DerRuerer Imgur)

The solution does depend on some air being blown over the heatsink from the graphics card, but overall, it even improved the chipset temperatures. "Depending on the ambient temperature the idle temperature is between 45° C and 50° C, the temperature under load varies between 55° C and 65° C," DerRuehrer explained. "Both were initially on the higher side but went down after a few weeks." 

He said that the temperatures at idle with the original cooler hovered around the 60°C mark while the fan was spinning at 2500 RPM, which makes us wonder: why do motherboard vendors choose to implement these noisy little fans?

A neat and tidy end result: Passively cooled ROG Strix X570-E

A neat and tidy end result: Passively cooled ROG Strix X570-E (Image credit: DerRuerer Imgur)

For more details, be sure to scroll through the Imgur thread that DerRuehrer published, as it provides quite an interesting read with lots of great image material.

Niels Broekhuijsen

Niels Broekhuijsen is a Contributing Writer for Tom's Hardware US. He reviews cases, water cooling and pc builds.