(please excuse the image quality, it was my phone and I anxious to get installing)
Hey folks, I was getting damn annoyed with the cooler on my X1950 Pro, it was a big dual slot lump and it did my head in when it was on, especially as I'm temp without speakers
.
So I decided to buy the Accelero S1 as I liked the idea of silent cooling, and there was always the option of adding on the turbo module if the heatsink wasn't up to it alone.
Today I received a nice box, containing the cooler, and my first impressions were of the sheer size of the beast!
Obviously the next step was to take the card out of the PC, which occured with some annoyance at the PCI-E holding clip which seemed to be quite a failure on my DS3. Anyway, eventually it came out, so here's a shot of the cooler and the card next to each other, for comparison.
Removing the stock heatsink came as rather more of a challenge than I expected, the screws were tiny, and obviously done rather tightly. I ended up using a small screwdriver twisted with some pliers to get the backplate, and cooler off.
After, I cleaned up the remarkably mucky core with the usual tools, and then things started to get a bit tricky.
Arctic cooling supply a voltage regulator cooling plate, to replace the ones that are apparently on reference X1950pros. Mine is not reference, apparently, as the place where this was intended to sit had a nice capacitor in the middle, and a strip heatsink attached already. I looked on the net and found that this wasn't a "required" cooling device, and therefore I ignored it, and carried on without.
The next instruction also gave me trouble, another "strip" heatsink was to be attached to another part of the voltage regulation system, and would be secured by two holes already in the card.
On my card, only one of these holes existed, so a bodge job was in order. I put the first screw through the hole, and for the second...well, the image speaks for itself
Ramsinks next, nice and simple, went on without a fuss, and they look acceptably sticky to stay on for long periods of time.
And now time to lower the card onto the heatsink, probably the easiest part of the installation actually! just line up, and screw away. There was some plastic clips to attach to the board and metal, but it can do without them, I attached only one of those.
Finally, I slotted it back into my case, which was a bit of a struggle due to the increased size, but didn't really take that long.
Now to the more interesting part, temperatures!
With the stock cooler my old idle temp was: 40c
With the S1 installed, my idle temp is: 32c
Under load, my stock cooler was holding the card at: 66c
Link, as image is large
But with the S1 installed, load temp was a remarkable 47c
Link, as image is large
The temps speak for themselves, an 8 degree reduction at idle, and a 19 degree reduction under load, and this is completely fanless, in a system with 2 Yate Loon 120mm fans.
I'm incredibly impressed, especially for the price, and the only downside would be the installation, which takes longer than expected, and is problematic should you have a non standard card.
Not much else that can be said!
Cheers
Hey folks, I was getting damn annoyed with the cooler on my X1950 Pro, it was a big dual slot lump and it did my head in when it was on, especially as I'm temp without speakers
.So I decided to buy the Accelero S1 as I liked the idea of silent cooling, and there was always the option of adding on the turbo module if the heatsink wasn't up to it alone.
Today I received a nice box, containing the cooler, and my first impressions were of the sheer size of the beast!
Obviously the next step was to take the card out of the PC, which occured with some annoyance at the PCI-E holding clip which seemed to be quite a failure on my DS3. Anyway, eventually it came out, so here's a shot of the cooler and the card next to each other, for comparison.
Removing the stock heatsink came as rather more of a challenge than I expected, the screws were tiny, and obviously done rather tightly. I ended up using a small screwdriver twisted with some pliers to get the backplate, and cooler off.
After, I cleaned up the remarkably mucky core with the usual tools, and then things started to get a bit tricky.
Arctic cooling supply a voltage regulator cooling plate, to replace the ones that are apparently on reference X1950pros. Mine is not reference, apparently, as the place where this was intended to sit had a nice capacitor in the middle, and a strip heatsink attached already. I looked on the net and found that this wasn't a "required" cooling device, and therefore I ignored it, and carried on without.
The next instruction also gave me trouble, another "strip" heatsink was to be attached to another part of the voltage regulation system, and would be secured by two holes already in the card.
On my card, only one of these holes existed, so a bodge job was in order. I put the first screw through the hole, and for the second...well, the image speaks for itself
Ramsinks next, nice and simple, went on without a fuss, and they look acceptably sticky to stay on for long periods of time.
And now time to lower the card onto the heatsink, probably the easiest part of the installation actually! just line up, and screw away. There was some plastic clips to attach to the board and metal, but it can do without them, I attached only one of those.
Finally, I slotted it back into my case, which was a bit of a struggle due to the increased size, but didn't really take that long.
Now to the more interesting part, temperatures!
With the stock cooler my old idle temp was: 40c
With the S1 installed, my idle temp is: 32c
Under load, my stock cooler was holding the card at: 66c
Link, as image is large
But with the S1 installed, load temp was a remarkable 47c
Link, as image is large
The temps speak for themselves, an 8 degree reduction at idle, and a 19 degree reduction under load, and this is completely fanless, in a system with 2 Yate Loon 120mm fans.
I'm incredibly impressed, especially for the price, and the only downside would be the installation, which takes longer than expected, and is problematic should you have a non standard card.
Not much else that can be said!
Cheers
