I have an MSI K9N SLI Platinum mobo and have realized that the northbridge is running so hot that 1) it is extremely uncomfortable to the touch (ya they are all hot, but you can barely keep your finger on it for more than a second) and 2) it is causing the system to crash randomly.
I have researched aftermarket heatsinks for this motherboard but have not been able to find any due to its unusual size/shape. Is anyone aware of such a heatsink/fan? Does anyone have any other possible solutions to this problem? Right now I have a window fan blowing into the computer with the side panel off... but i can't keep it like that, just isn't practical...

You mean something like this?

Personally I just got a Zalman northbridge heatsink combined with good case cooling.

does that fit on the K9N SLI Platinum though? And I called Zalman and talked to one of their people about the issue and they don't make a NB heatsink that will fit on the K9N. The problem is that it isn't as simple as getting a new heatsink for the NB. The K9N SLI has some stupid weird shaped NB heatsink... so it's hard to find one that will fit. Here is a picture of the mobo. See the weird NB heatsink?

Wow, that NB might be a problem. Whatever you put there will be in the way of the graphics card.

Hmm... You could always get some Arctic Silver 5 and use it with that heatsink. It should help cooling some. Then you could work on the case cooling. You could also either get a case with a side fan or mod the case you have to mount a side fan.

Ok, the computer store found the problem. There is apparently an issue with Nvidia 7 series graphics cards and the k9n SLI mobo... Currently the only bios update on the US website is the 1.0 or w/e version, however, the comp store found version 1.3 (or something) on the TAIWAN version of the website. This bios update fixes issues with (among other things) compatability with 7 series cards, RAM, etc. Hasn't reset/crashed since then, but it's only been a few hours. I'll let you all know if anything happens. Hope this helps anyone in a similar situation!