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Hardware Hacking Graphics Software

Lighter and Cooler Graphics Card Cooler 84

Posted by CmdrTaco from the doing-it-the-easy-way-is-boring dept.
Joey Braff writes "Max did a great guide on converting a cpu cooler into a graphics card cooler. Produced better results than expensive graphics coolers even though its lighter and cheaper. Test results available."
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Lighter and Cooler Graphics Card Cooler More

Lighter and Cooler Graphics Card Cooler

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  • Max? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:08PM (#13316593)
    Who the hell is Max?

  • So why the price difference? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by bcmm ( 768152 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:13PM (#13316614)
    It's not supply and demand, because high-end cooling units probably get used as much with graphics as CPUs, at least in expensive desktops.

    Maybe the just reckon that that sort of gamer has more money to blow on overpriced stuff to allow the graphics go faster?
    • I think you just hit the nail on the head. Companies come out with gizmos and whiz-bangs to satisfy a gamers desire to tell his friend, "Hey! Look what I just got!" With today's PC cases full of fans on the inside and outside, I can't see a reason to buy one and I'm a hardcore gamers. :).

    • There's a sucker born every minute (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Uninformed gamers will blow money on overpriced stuff. Even gamers who know better may spend more. When you spend big bucks on a graphics card, what's a few more for cooling? BTW that fits very neatly into "supply and DEMAND" economics, rather than contradicting it.

    • It's not supply and demand, because high-end cooling units probably get used as much with graphics as CPUs, at least in expensive desktops.

      Maybe the just reckon that that sort of gamer has more money to blow on overpriced stuff to allow the graphics go faster?

      I once read a quote in a magazine, in an article talking about modern art, which I believe fits here and explains this phenomenon perfectly. Here's a free translation:

      "An artist puts stones into a circle and a collector pays a million bucks for

  • Err... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rsrsharma ( 769904 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:16PM (#13316623) Homepage Journal

    Considering Thermalright already makes an almost identical version specifically made for graphics cards [systemcooling.com] which doesn't take up as much space, and probably doesn't cost much more (or maybe even less), what's the point? The one made for GPUs seems to be better anyway, since it only rose 35 deg. C w/ a 6800GT (with is much hotter than a 9800 Pro).

    • Re:Err... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by lightyear4 ( 852813 )
      Anyone who runs a gfx card with power output requiring additional cooling owns a high end system to begin with. The cost of a graphic card cooler is far far dwarfed by the total cost of the system...at that point, might as well go with the more expensive /efficient models anyway.

  • Blocks too many PCI slots. (Score:5, Informative)

    by brandorf ( 586083 ) <brandorf@brandorf.com> on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:17PM (#13316626) Homepage
    Sheesh, the mod blocks off three or four of the boards PCI slots! Who needs a RAID or Wireless card when you've got such high graphics power!

  • Takes up 5 PCI slots - useless for most people (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    How cheap can you be? A Zalman VGA cooler costs $25 at Newegg [newegg.com], takes up 2 PCI slots including the PCI-E/VGA, and cools the card almost completely silently. How many people have 5 free PCI slots on their motherboard to waste on an oversized VGA cooler of questionable usefulness? The thing is not even near silent since they use a noisy 80MM fan to do the cooling.
    • I was thinking that... in what way are graphics coolers 'expensive'. If you've spent $300 on your graphics card adding a silent cooler for 1/10th of that is *not* expensive.
      • His solution was not only more unwieldy but is more expensive than an aftermarket Graphics card heatsink. (He even uses the rear retention clip from another graphics card cooler)

        Also it doesn't cool the ram chips which almost all of the ready-made graphics card coolers do.

        He should have just invested in a water cooling setup for CPU and GPU and eliminated all those fans from his system.

        Would've cost a little more, but obtained far better (and neater) results, with much less effort (ever tried removing all t

  • Cooler and more silent (Score:4, Interesting)

    by DevanJedi ( 892762 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:21PM (#13316651) Homepage Journal
    Temperature and noise are going to be major factors in computer design as the PC moves from the desktop to other locations in the house. A Celeron with 256MB RAM is already a tremendous workhorse for video, audio, etc. I am in the process of creating client-server based media centre and my prime concern is heat and noise; not power and memory, those are cheap and easy to come by.

  • Whats the deal? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by JustNiz ( 692889 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:21PM (#13316652)
    Why is everyone so worried about cooling? Assuming, like the majority, you're not overclocking, as long as you GPU doesn't burn out it will give the same performance no mtter how hot it is.

    The stock fans already fitted are more than sufficient to make sure it won't melt down so why waste money?

    • Re:Whats the deal? (Score:3, Informative)

      by khrtt ( 701691 )
      Assuming, like the majority, you're not overclocking...

      Assuming, like the majority, you won't RTFA no matter what, allow me to correct your perceptions right here -- this guy is not only overclocking, but voltage-modding as well.

    • Re:Whats the deal? (Score:1, Offtopic)

      by bcmm ( 768152 )
      Yes, but this guy was overclocking. Probably shouldn't have made the front page though.
    • I never overclock, and I found the 6800GT would overheat and crash with its stock cooling... not to mention the fans sounded like an aircraft taking off (could hear them from then next room!!!). I replaced them with a zalman cooler and it's silent, and a lot cooler, and only crashes on extremely hot days.

      • Re:Whats the deal? (Score:2, Insightful)

        by blackicye ( 760472 )
        " I never overclock, and I found the 6800GT would overheat and crash with its stock cooling"

        Assuming your AGP bus isn't overclocked. Its most likely that the cooling/air circulation within your casing is insufficient.

        Or your power supply and/or motherboard are possibly faulty.
        • My case temps were hovering around 50C, and my GPU temp was hitting 80C (playing Half-Life 2). Honestly, I wouldn't care much, except my GPU started glitching. It glitched enough it became quite annoying. I already have a Zalman video card cooler for it, and it moves a lot of air quietly, it just seemed to me like that blowing 50C air over the video card isn't going to cool it as effectively as room-temp air.

          So I kicked my case fan up to full speed, and it solved the problem. Case temps are now around 40C a
          • 50C case temp?!?!

            What were you doing?
            (I cant imagine a case getting that hot without some serious layout problems...

            Just for the record: normal thermal solutions for (stock) cpu and GPU coolers usually assume a maximum case temperatur of 40 (or 38 with later intel p4) degrees.
            • 50C case temp?!?!

              What were you doing?
              (I cant imagine a case getting that hot without some serious layout problems...

              Serious layout problems? like just about any ATX case on the market?

              I'm running a xp2800, ATI 9600 256-D based card, the fanless one 325mhz core, Two HDS one DVD burner. Also PCI scsi, SB live 5.1, Promise UDMA-100 IDE, V stream digitizer card, network adapter.

              For a very long time I thought I had some layout issues as I was getting casetemps of 60C according to the Asus-probe.

              After dremmeli
            • There's two answers:

              I had a 6800 Ultra in an Antec Sonata (mini-Tower) case with two HDs and two optical drives, and it has only a single case fan and that was only at 5V or something. Plus the PS has only a single PS fan.

              So basically, no air flow.

              The additional thing to know is that the 50C "case temp" I reported is actually the "ambient" sensor on the 6800 Ultra, so it doesn't mean my whole case interior was really at 50C. In fact, I would say it wasn't, since you could touch the case and it didn't feel w
  • But then I realised that it would be cheaper just to move to Pluto where cooling would be an easy-to-solve problem.
    • But then I realised that it would be cheaper just to move to Pluto where cooling would be an easy-to-solve problem.

      How did you work that out? Since there is no air or likely any other significant atmosphere on Pluto the only way of dissipating heat will be through radiation.

      How you going to get rid of the heat? Wait until your CPU is glowing red hot?
  • Moronic, and not worth the effort.

    If you're going to go through all that trouble on extensive modifications, warranty voiding, and increased risk of failure, why not just spend more money?

  • Proper case ducting... (Score:5, Informative)

    by pigiron ( 104729 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:29PM (#13316692) Homepage
    is still one of the cheapest and most effective methods to lower heat. Few PC cases are properly designed with heat dissipation in mind. The blast-furnace temeratures of the Pentium 4 has driven many to search out inexpensive solutions. Before spending money on admittedly effective, but costly, hardware such as water cooling, it is well worthwhile to explore the benefits of proper ducting:

    http://overclockers.com/tips1193/ [overclockers.com]

    http://overclockers.com/tips1187/ [overclockers.com]

    • That's what makes the Powermac G5 [apple.com] so efficient.
      • It's not the first computer to use ducting.

        Or the Compaq Personal Workstation SP750, which was made in 1997. The computer is a dual Xeon-capable design for up to 550MHZ, multiple high-RPM SCSI drives and uses only two quiet high-flow low velocity 120mm fans, one "duct" for the CPUs and video, the other "duct" for the drives and power supply.

        I have since bought two Compaq W8000 computers. It is a computer based on the same case, but designed around the extended ATX standard. It has three ducts, drive/powe
    • You bet. But again, Macs ain't cheap. Here is a company that sells a similar product for a generic PC (the Micro):

      http://www.asetek.com/ [asetek.com]

    • this is basically what btx is about. It doesn't seem to catch on though, not sure exactly why. Maybe the manufacturers think this is primarily a bug-fix for the heat problems of the prescott p4, and otherwise unneded and thus don't want the transition from atx to btx at all (quite some components are different, new cases, new boards, new cpu coolers). Though, from a technical point of view, btx imho has quite some merit.
      • It probably does not help that because of routing restrictions on BTX motherboards, they can not be used for Athlon 64 systems. AMD is not a majority of the market but given the choice of having 2 different motherboard form factors and staying with ATX, a lot of manufacturers may forgo BTX.

  • Worthless comparison (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Philodoxx ( 867034 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:54PM (#13316780)
    The TT SI-97 costs about $45 CDN, while a VGA Silencer [arctic-cooling.com] costs about $30 CDN. I use a VGA silencer and it's a pretty nice product, so I'm curious why it was not included in the benchmarking.

    • Re:Worthless comparison (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Same here - when the fan failed on my ATI Radeon 9800 Pro, I replaced it with a VGA Silencer and it's completely awesome.

      The only problem with installation is that I had to trim one of the plastic edges a little because of a component on my particular revision of the graphics card getting in the way (which took me less than 5 minutes using scissors!), but otherwise it's been flawless. It was certainly far less hassle than having to buy a new $200 graphics card - and it actually reduced my case temperature b
    • Or for around the same price, you can get a completely passive cooling solution. I got a VM-101 [aerocool.us] from AeroCool. It's great. It only takes up one extra PCI slot (not 5) and does a pretty good job of cooling [gruntville.com] the card it's attached to. The only downside is that it takes up a good bit of room on the opposite side of the card. Unless you have a very large CPU heatsink, that shouldn't affect you, though.
    • When my GPU cooler started failing, I got recommended an Aerocool VideoMagic VM-101 cooler. It weighs only 220 grams (less than the 400-500 of a Zalman cooler, certainly) and cools my Radeon 9800 Pro stunningly. I can even overclock it by about 70 MHz easily, which I don't do, so it's most adequate.

      Uses heatpipes to bring the heat to fins on the back of the card, which is where you typically have case fans to suck air out. I bought one with adjustable speed and set it to lowest, just in case.

      Overall, recomm
    • I bought a VGA Silencer for my 6800GT (Which could already overclock to Ultra specs with the stock cooler) and it definitely allowed for a marked improvement in running temp for my card.

      I was fairly disappointed with the machining on the underside of the heatsink. It has pads that are supposed to make contact with the ram chips situated around the GPU, however when applying some Arctic Silver to the chips I found some contacted fully and some did not. I also noticed that the outermost edges of the GPU and r
  • A cooler cooler? I guess that's better than having a "hottie" cooler.

  • Dumb dumb dumb... (Score:3, Informative)

    by TeknoHog ( 164938 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @01:59PM (#13316798) Homepage Journal
    The aluminium plate is blocking half of the fan, and the remaining half is very close to the PCB, which is not very good. While destructive to airflow, such an arrangement is also much more noisy than one with a properly mounted fan.

    I've got the impression that most people/companies who build cooling systems for computers, don't have the most basic clues about fluid dynamics, and this article is no exception.

  • Stupid. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Eric_Cartman_South_P ( 594330 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @02:03PM (#13316811)
    Great idea. Keeps the video card ice cold, but you need to free up 5 PCI slots, and take out the motherboard, powersupply, hard drive, and CD-ROM to make room. Worth every penny!

  • Spyware scum supporters (Score:4, Informative)

    by quazee ( 816569 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @02:11PM (#13316835)
    TFA had at least two huge banners for me that pointed to known malware sites:
    http://www.spywarestormer.com/ [spywarestormer.com]
    http://www.errorguard.com/ [errorguard.com]
    (the sites are very similar, btw)
    That's ain't 'cool'.

  • I Wish... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by RAMMS+EIN ( 578166 ) on Sunday August 14, 2005 @02:37PM (#13316925) Homepage Journal
    This thread may not be the most appropriate place for my wish...but I still wish some company would just focus on making components that do not require active cooling.

    As I recall, ATI's Radeon 9600 could be run without any fans, and makes a fine graphics card. I reckon that, with the advances in technology, we should be able to get much better performance today.

    A similar argument applies to CPUs. The G4 in my iBook performs fine, and the fan is almost always stationary. This CPU is a a number of years old now, surely today we can do even better.

    And I'm sure there is a market for fanless systems. The number one complaint I hear about hardware these days is that it's noisy. The only noise I hear coming out of my computer is from the CD drive (and the hard drive when I listen carefully).
    • Amen.

      Sadly, most people's idea of measuring progress just means faster clockspeeds at the cost of all else. It's the same mentality that permits people to buy Hummers and Escalades rather than an economy car that's a few years old. While gas prices have forced people to consider (or even notice in some cases) efficiency, the same value is not yet being placed on the levels of noise we endure. The preferred remedy (ironically) usually involves purchasing louder speakers.
    • I have a 6600GT passive cooled. Heatsink only - now it is a huge heatsink, and the card does run hot. Idles at 68c after its been on for a bit. Peaks at 110c, which is stupid-hot!

      I spoke to gigabyte, who make the card - and they said that its good to 150c. Even fan cooled vers run at 70-80c peak - thats a lot of waste heat.

      I am limited in oc'ing with it, but I may attach a silent 80mm fan. I have no objection to a quiet fan, but I do hate the whiney 60mm/6000rpm fans they use on most coolers.
    • You may be interested in SilentPCReview.com [silentpcreview.com]. It's a Web site that is dedicated to removing PC noise. I have been using it to find recommendations for hardware components when I build new machines. Although there are plenty of hardcore people who will modify the hell out of cases/fans/etc. just to get one less Decibel (dB), I find that just buying some smart components can significantly reduce the noise computers make, such as:
      • low noise fans, such as the Nexus 120mm
      • hard disk drives, currently Samsung ha
    • I thought every gamer had a good sound card and speakers that will blow you away. Even with a ton/louder fans, how do you still hear your computer over that? Got a jet engine in there or something?
    • Currently all the lower-end cards in any given year are passively cooled.

      You do have to accept the slower cards, because the fast ones will always be pushing the envelope and therefore make use of active cooling.

      I run a 9800Pro with the Zalman passive cooler, seems pretty fine.
    • Gigabyte makes an entire line of cards that are passive, from FX5200s all the way up to X800XLs and 6800GTs. You'll pay more for the high end cards than other manufacturers, but you get silence in exchange.

  • I did this... (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I did this when I got a free Geforce 4 TI4600 that had it's heatsink and fans removed.
    So I built a spare Sphire Orb (that's the name as far as I can remember) CPU fan on the GPU with some thermalfluid between it and it works great. I'm still using it today (in this pc).
  • I did this years ago with my ati 9800 pro. It's a little loud, but I'm able to overclock to 465/395 without problems. So this isn't really news.
  • ...is for someone to convert a water cooler into a graphics card cooler. Now, that would be impressive.
  • I and MANY MANY other people have been doing this sort of thing for a LONG time.

    In fact I started doing it back in the TNT2 Ultra days.

    Use a 1U CPU cooler and you won't block more than 1 PCI slot at most.

    Here are a few examples: (This from my old GF4 ti4200)

    http://wyrdone.org/casemods/DCP00783_t.jpg [wyrdone.org]
    http://wyrdone.org/casemods/DCP00784_t.jpg [wyrdone.org]

    I've since done the same for my Radeon 9800XT 256MB card.

    Using the Thermaltake Volcano 10 Cooler ( http://www.thermaltake.com/coolers/volcano/si/a167 1.htm [thermaltake.com] )
    the c
  • Not really but a while back when my trusty Geforce 4 Ti 4200 died after it sat in my BSD gaming router for ages ( from the copious amounts of dust that gathered in the stock HSF ) I modded a ThermalTake fan that was supposed to be use for a Barton / Sempron 2600+ and up.

    Not all that hard and it ran the card loads cooler. I zip tied the thing into place on top of the GPU and went to work soldering the thing into place making sure not to touch any of the circuitry and whatnot, took about 10 minutes and was pa

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