I want to put the Framework Desktop mainboard in a smaller case, but the stock heat sink is too large. Is it possible to swap it out for something like a Noctua NH-L9a? Just for reference, the case is Custom_MOD SLM1m.
I’m not sure, gonna have to look at the mounting points on the board.
If I had to guess, probably not, it looks to be specifically designed for the mainboard, in that case, going with a slim fan is your best bet in reducing height but for some cases that’s still too tall.
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As the AI Max is a mobile cpu, it won’t share standard desktop cooler mounting points … so I very much doubt that standard coolers will fit.
Also, I have an L9a trying to cool a 3900X cpu running at 65 watts in ECO mode, and under any kind of sustained load it sounds like a fighter jet … so I doubt the L9a would be capable of cooling 120Watts of AI Max.
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no, it has memory cooling which you absolutely need for something like this
The heatsink mechanical drawings are available at Framework-Desktop/Mainboard/FRAMEWORK_DESKTOP_MAIN_PCB_V0.pdf at main · FrameworkComputer/Framework-Desktop · GitHub
It’s custom for this APU unfortunatelly, you need a bunch of adapters/shims to make it work with something meant for a desktop.
Yeah, I would also worry about cooling the ram chips and the regulators, the stock cooler does that.
On the other hand, the stock cooler is pretty decent (and possibly overkill), I don’t find the cpu heating up very much. Sorry, I guess that’s not very useful to you in a smaller case.
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