Aftermarket GPU cooler guide?

I finally narrowed down the noise to my GPU fan/heatsink so I'm thinking about replacing it, especially because it does get rather hot.
Is taking a stock fan/heatsink off and putting a new one in hard work? Does anyone know any good guides out there? Also, what would I be looking for as far as compatibility? If it says "most" Nvidia cards, I assume I should be safe? Any recommendations for quiet ones?

Not really looking to spend more than $30 if possible, to help narrow down the choices.

http://www.overclock.net/ati/388922-...t-coolers.html here they are.. look for ones compatible with your GPU.. and credit goes to kamikaze

Before any spending try using rivatuner to set a fixed speed for your gpu fan and then monitor the temps when playing to make sure its safe.

kinda like installing TRUE on a CPU

I highly recommend this cooler:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835186016

you can buy the turbo package for it and have dual 80mm fans, or you can just zip tie your favorite 120mm fan.

I have one on my 8800GTS 512 and even without a fan my load temps are lower than stock fan idle temps. Great cooler, add an undervolted Yate Loon or Scythe Slipstream for only a few $$$ and you've got one of the best gpu coolers you can get and you won't be able to hear it.

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Hard no. You just can't be sloppy. If you don't lap the surface of the heat sink then you need to put a very small amount of heatsink compound. If you do then you need to put even less. Grab a chair throw a piece of 280 to 400 grit wet/dry sandpaper on the kitchen counter. Grab the heatsink and run it lightly with little pressure back and forth on the sandpaper.. You can use a tiny bit of dishwashing detergent to make it sand easier if you want alluminum is kinda grabby on aluminum oxide sandpaper. If you polish with 800 1200 and then 2000 grit sandpaper then you want to put a thin enough layer of compund to pretend like you're trying to read the chip writing through the compund if you don't then you want to use enough that it's just on the verge of semitranslucent. When the heatsink presses down and fills the voids which there will be very few on a sanded square surface and almost none on a polished surface you don't want it squeezing out and hitting the pins of the GPU. Some heatsinks are big enough it's hard to even see if it's squeezing onto pins. Stock surface will keep the overflow on the heatsink, sanded surface will try to and if you go for polished you had better practice on some old video cards to get it right. You're looking to squeeze out just a tiny tiny tiny little line of compound all around the heatsink that looks like someone painted it on with a brush containing about 5 bristles. A semi broken up line around the edge is even better if you can look at it and see where it's breaking up which indicates you used just the perfect amount. If there's none squeezing out on corners then that's alright because all the heat transfer action is in the middle of the chip anyway.

If you do one on old video card and get no squeeze out on pins then you sort of know what you're doing and should feel fairly safe doing it to expensive cards. If the card has enough space on backside for tiny screws with plastic washers without contacting any circuitry then you can use screws to put it on and give it about twice the tension it would have using the plastic standoff then it will work much better than stock. If you lightly touch a hot pan with your finger you get heat off it but if you push your finger into the pan hard the heat will transfer much much quicker into your finger so tension matters. As long as you aren't using huge tensions and crushing cores or overly stressing the chip package which effectively results in a crush over time as the package tries to relax the tension by allowing atomic bonds to slip against each other over time from repeated heating and cooling cycles.