Replacing a CPU fan

[essayons]

Lately my PC has been 'whining' when I boot it up, and now the ASUS motherboard monitor is telling me that my CPU fan is giving insufficient rpms. So I want to replace the fan/heatsink, but I have no idea what to replace it with. The CPU is 3+ years old and no longer in production or for sale.

CPU: AMD Athlon 64x2 4600+ Manchester 2.4 GHz Socket 939 Dual-Core

I got it from NewEgg, but when I do a search on CPU fans, Socket 939 isn't enough - there is a whole slew of 939 options (11, to be precise), but my CPU didn't specify anything like AM2, LGA775 - all I'm aware of is just plain old Socket 939.

In case it helps, my motherboard is an ASUS A8N-SLI Premium.

Basically, I'd love to get a whole new mobo and CPU, but I was out of work for a year and have only been back to work now for just over 6 months (with a kid going to college next fall) so the less I have to spend now, the better. I just need to repplace the heatsink/fan, but have no clue what to get.

[George Hallam]

this will be fine cheap cooling solution

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835233022

[essayons]

Thanks, George. I'm not questioning your judgement - I want to learn from this experience, as well. How do you know it will fit my CPU? What information is there in the item description that I need to be aware of in order to figure something like this out by myself, if I needed to?

[mjc]

You have an AMD Athlon 64x2 4600+...that's a socket AM2 CPU.

Here's the specsheet CPU list for the cooler...

All Intel Socket LGA 775 CPU ((Core2 Extreme / Core2 Quad / Core2 Duo / Pentium Extreme Edition / Pentium D / Celeron D) Pentium D / Celeron D)
All AMD Socket AM2 / 754 / 939 / 940 CPUs (Athlon 64 / FX / X2 / Opteron / Sempron)

[George Hallam]

Thanks, George. I'm not questioning your judgement

yes sorry i was in a rush thanks MJC for explaining ;)

[essayons]

So AM2 is the label used for AMD dual-core CPUs? That's assuming the 2 in AM2 stands for dual-core. Otherwise I don't get it. it would be nice if there was a book about this stuff - I don't find myself with as much time to keep up with things like I did when I was younger (and, admittedly, things were simpler).

Will I need thermal paste as well? I have some ... somewhere .....

[mjc]

AM2 is the socket type...that is what CPU heatsinks are made for...the socket type of the CPU. Different sockets have differing sizes, attachment configurations and many other items, beyond the most obvious one...pin count.

AM2 and AM2+ are basically the same, except for some internal differences in the 'chipset'...ie, support for differing memory and other features.

There have been single core chips that use the AM2 socket...the 2 has nothing to do with the number of cores in the CPU. With the AMD line, though, there are some oddities...such as, the AM2, AM2+ and AM3 sockets are all 940 pin sockets, but they are not the socket 940 socket. Socket 754, 939 and 940 all belong to the previous generation and AMDs stint at naming the sockets by pin count. Before those, AMD used the Socket A.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CPU_socket#AMD