VGA coolers.

[leecho7]

Well, after experiencing the weird grinding like noise from my graphics card when OC'd, I decided to get a better fan/heatsink for my card. The noise almost sounds like a harddrive working at full load. So I'm guessing it's the fan that's causing the problem. Right now I'm running at stock speeds, and it works flawlessly.

Well anyways, I'm looking for some good VGA coolers out there but I'm not too sure what to look for. I have a Geforce 6800XT. I'm also looking for a cooler that is easy to install, since this will be my first time doing something like this.
Any suggestions are welcomed.
Thanks!

 

[Greg King]

You cant go wrong with any cooler by Zalman. Also, the Arctic Cooling Silencer line is a good way to go as well. I would check for compatability with the NV Silencer and your XT. I have owned both companies coolers and they are by far the tops when it comes to VGA cooling.

 

[Jakal]

The Zalman would be a better choice since it wouldn't interfere with your other NB47J heatsink. Some don't include ram sinks but those are fairly cheap as well.

 

[sbrehm72255]

I think I'd go with Arctic Cooling if I were ever to go back to air cooling on my main rig. I still have a original VGA Silencer running on on of my systems............

 

[leecho7]

I got myself a Zalman VF700 or something. Installed it with a breeze, hopefully I didn't damage it somehow or something. I couldn't get all of the thermal grease off before putting on some artic silver 5, but I got about 85-90% off. Haven't tested it yet, cause I'm waiting about 24 hours for the ram heatsinks to cure and stick on.

 

[werty316]

I would go with Zalman since you have a NB47J. Its pretty much impossible to use both unless you mod that NB47J.

 

[leecho7]

OK just installed the zalman fan and heatsink, and it's working like a charm. Right now at idle, my temps are 46c idle, 56c load clocked at 478/1254. No grinding noise, in fact the only noise I can hear right now is my cpu fan, which I will be replacing soon.
I noticed a marginal increase in cooling, my idle stays about the same, but my load has dropped about 7-9c. Plus the arctic silver 5 isn't nearly cured yet. So I'm hoping this'll be able to handle my clocks for now, until I save up for a better card.

 

[Jakal]

Nice! The AS5 should reach it's max thermal efficiency around 50 hrs. You may see another drop of 1-2C.

 

[leecho7]

The only gripe I have with this fan, is the fact that it exhausts into my system instead of out the end like my old fan/heatsink. But it's ok, it only raised my mobo temps about 2c. Plus it's hot in my room. Two small windows, two computers all cramped in a small space with carpet, and the AC is busted. It's about 85 degrees right now.

 

[Jakal]

I know the feeling. Most of the time the AC does nothing to help me. I've always had the hottest room in the house. I've mentioned this to Rob; I'd like to see case manufacturers offer a fan at the bottom rear of the case. That would help tremendously for atx boards and removing the hot air that the video cards inhale. Maybe one or two small 40mm fans. As it is now, the air has to be exhausted at the top, but there's a dead spot at the bottom and it seems a lot of heat gets trapped there, in many cases.

 

[sbrehm72255]

A fan on the bottom sort of like what I did to my old Lian-Li way back when I had my old NF7-S ......................

 

[leecho7]

I actually have a PCI fan that I can probably use to help exhaust some of the heat. But I'm too lazy to open up my old computer, and my new computer and switch it at the moment.

Quick question, if you want to monitor your fan speed settings, do you do that in BIOS? Or is there a seperate program to do that?

 

[sbrehm72255]

SpeedFan works great for monitoring most of the fans. But that also depends on your MoBo fan headers if they support fan speed monitoring on all the headers or just a few. My Abit supports monitoring on 4 of the 5 headers I think where my DFI only supports 3 monitored headers.

 

[leecho7]

Ok recently got a Zalman 7000-CU for my processor. When I removed my old heatsink and fan, I noticed there was a small chip in the silver/metal coating on my processor. Is that ok?

I decided to put on the Zalman anyway despite the small chip in my processor. Put the Arctic Silver 5 on as well, and bam, temps dropped about 4c, and it's really really hot in my room. Plus my computer is nearly completely silent.

 

[dlfcobra]

just bought the Zalman VF700-Cu VGA cooler and i'm highly impressed with this cooler just installed it and my card temps went from 56C to 51C while gaming..