so there's this old mainboard I got for a bargain (never been used) and I wanna know :

I]WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE PCH FAN FAILS?

my mainboard's PCH has this "protection" :





basically it's a small heatsink with a fan & all covered by plastic



now they call it "thermal armor"

but logic says it's more like a thermal trap because:

1) it all depends on the fan, and the fan will fail (small fans are designed to fail)

2) the plastic cover will act as an INSULANT since air's no longer blown up when the fan fails

3) NO HEATPIPE (unlike the Rampage boards) so cannot evacuate the heat out of the PCH heatsink, when the fan fails: the heat remains trapped under the plastic cover


in other words when the fan fails this protection becomes the opposite of a protection


so this smells of planned obsolescence right? they designed this to fail & damage the board by frying the PCH


so should I remove this whole thing (the plastic along with the heatsink & fan) and just put a bigger passive chipset heatsink instead?

like this one:


at least it's "open" (not smothered by plastic) and doesn't depend on a fan