I have plenty of clearance around the CPU cooler, no issue with sizes, no issue with heights.
The latch is an assembly which is really difficult to master, being 2 pieces which must nest together UNDER the huge tower of fins, AND be connected onto the motherboard cooler mounting frame, and only THEN should you rotate the latch all the while holding everything with ONE hand. Not at all easy to do (but probably much easier to do if the motherboard is NOT in a case).
But then consider these 4 critical points:
1] My Athlon 64 X2 6000 is a huge chip compared to the cooler mounting base, the cooler contact area barely covers 3/4 of the chip surface. Maybe less?
But wait!
2] The 3 heat pipes on the contact area of the cooler are NOT flush with the mounting base but are ABOVE the mounting base (which holds the 3 heat pipes) by almost 2/3rds the thickness of a credit card. Which means that the only contact points to the CPU are the 3 heat pipes. Or less - see next point. This is a design issue which most builders will NEVER accept.
3] When the cooler is 'mounted', you stand a chance of one of the heat pipes NOT making full contact with the CPU, because the cooler can easily be placed to one side.
Yet this next point takes all the above moot:
4] The latch arm will NOT rotate completely due to mechanical interference (a design error). Which means the latch arm will spring open when you are simply looking at it. It did so for me several times and I was almost going to use a twist tie to hold it in an ALMOST LATCHED position.
After I added all 4 of the above problems, I reassembled the original CPU cooler I had been using - this one cannot and will not be used in my system, it is totally inadequate for my needs.
DO NOT BUY this cooler unless you can machine it to correct the 2 design issues AND you have a smaller chip.
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