Passive cooling on XL800X and solution

[Santilli]

Hi
David setup a gaming, school rig for me, and, it's been great, except for one minor problem. The Gigabyte passive cooling system is NOT up to 8 hours of intensive Quake 4 play: it checkerboards.

Last time I did it, I was thinking of switching cards with my Xeon box, but changed my mind. Has to be an easier solution. Turns out in my tons of stuff, Ive got a squirrel cage pci slot cooler, that just happens to fit perfectly next to the card, on the chip side of the card. So far, it's run 4 hours, then another 5 after the cooler was installed, and, its only slightly noiser then silent.

Actually, I just wondered now if I turned off all the other fans, if it would be silent. Pretty close. The major noise are two 120mm's going at high rpm, recently due to the card getting too hot. With the fan right next to it, it doesn't make much noise, and, it appears things are fine, heat wise. We'll see.

S

 

[time]

IMO you're on the right track, Greg. Adding even a small amount of airflow across the heatsink will significantly improve its efficacy. Squirrel fans are great (when they're quiet) and should probably be standard for CPU coolers instead of the axial fans that we're stuck with - the latter are a really poor design decision.

 

[Santilli]

Funny part is, David REALLY likes one of the fans designed to blow across the GPU, and out of the case, but, through the same pci slot. In other words, if I understand correctly, the fan exists the air through the single plate.
Hold on, let me look at this:


Check that. I think it takes two pci slots, and, blows the hot air out the second. My little squirrel cage is 2-3 times this size, and quieter.

 

[Santilli]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Showi...2MB+GDDR3+PCI+Express+x16+Video+Card+-+Retail

 

[time]

That graphics cooler is actually a small squirrel cage fan, but I guess that's what you're highlighting?

 

[ddrueding]

squirrel cage it is, this is the one I like.

 

[sechs]

This style of cooler is standard on higher-end ATi cards. Keeps you from dumping hot air from the GPU back into the case.

A lot of people have said good things about the Arctic Cooling Silencer, but I'm satisfied with the stock cooler on my X850 and don't know how loud it really gets.

 

[Santilli]

This is the fan I used, and it looks a bit bigger, and quieter, then the onboard cooling solutions. Plus, if it fails, the card isn't going to massive over heat.

 

[Santilli]

3.99

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835166038

 

[Santilli]

hmmm, now the link doesn't go to the product. Sorry.
GS