Installation
Note: A detailed HR-03 Plus Installation Guide is available on Thermalright’s website. It provides a lot more information and pictures about the installation process than the single page of instructions that come packaged with the cooler.
The Thermalright HR-03 Plus is designed to work specifically with NVIDIA 8800 video cards only. It can be mounted with the main heatsink wing positioned either on the front side or back side of the video card. I personally prefer positioning the wing on the front side of the video card so that air from the fan will directly cool the component heatsinks.
The HR-03 Plus hardware uses the four thru-holes around the GPU for mounting. An assortment of low profile and full height V-RAM heatsinks come with the cooler that attach to the V-RAM chips with the pre-applied adhesive back tape. The installation kit also includes four passive heatsinks for the 8800 Voltage Regulator Modules (VRMs) and one for the High Speed Interconnect (HSI) chip.
For this review I used an NVIDIA 8800 GTX video card. The stock NVIDIA cooler is a very large, one-piece cooler that is attached with no less than 13 screws.
The first step is of course to remove the existing 8800 cooler and carefully clean the top surface of the GPU, V-RAM, VRM, and HSI chips. I use lint free, pre-moistened isopropyl alcohol wipes for cleaning (available at most office supply stores). Note: As video cards have become more complex, so has the installation of aftermarket VGA coolers.
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All of the passive aluminum heatsinks come with adhesive backed pads for applying them to their respective components. Just peel off the plastic backing and press them on, but the chips must be clean in order for the heatsinks to stick. Thermal compound must first be applied to the GPU and HSI chips.
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And as we mentioned earlier, Thermalright has just released a re-designed HSI heatsink that is now compatible with GTX and GTS video cards.
The new HSI heatsink is on the right in the photo above.
