Nowadays more and more features are crammed into the North Bridge chipset to cater for the newer multi-core processor which puts more strain on the chipset, and as we all know the more load on any chip will generate more heat,and heat is the enemy of performance.

Some high end motherboards have copper based heatpipe technology which draws heat away from both the south bridge and north bridge chipsets to the back of the system but these are usually on more expensive brands. What about motherboards with standard chipset cooling such as a stock heatsink, these are usually insufficient and you can probably feel temperatures of over 50°C on them. Those that are assisted by fans generate more noise which you really can do without.

I guess the solution is to look for replacement chipset cooler that does the job and does it quietly. Two contenders for this months cooling review on chipset cooling are Noctua NC-U6 and Coolink Mainboard Silencer, lets find out more about them...