Nvidia patents a turbofan to cool the upcoming GPU

[Confused Stu]

A GPU company comes up with a type of fan that cools better and is quieter than the norm? Excellent idea, good on them. Here's hoping it leads to quieter, more powerful and better cooled GPUs in future (from both camps would be nice if AMD can come up with a similar solution).

 

[LtMatt]

A GPU company comes up with a type of fan that cools better and is quieter than the norm? Excellent idea, good on them. Here's hoping it leads to quieter, more powerful and better cooled GPUs in future (from both camps would be nice if AMD can come up with a similar solution).

Agreed.

AMD are going to redesign their stock cooler. Be interesting to see what they come up with and how it compares to the Nvidia counterpart.

 

[Orangey]

AMD are going to redesign their stock cooler.

Is that a fact?

 

[arc@css]

Page 1 could also do with a clean up.

 

[LtMatt]

Is that a fact?

That's what I've heard. "We won't make that mistake again".

Page 1 could also do with a clean up.

Page 2 as well, in my opinion anyway.

 

[PhysicsMan94]

I'll be interested to see how this new fan will improve upon the current reference coolers on high-end Nvidia cards. My 2 reference 780s are already pretty quiet, efficient and look damn good in a windowed case, if they can improve even further upon this then we'll be looking at some seriously tasty ref cards - might not even be any reason to use aftermarket coolers, but we'll see in the coming months.

 

[Ian Evey]

Amd or nvidia should aim to use this fan design. No more bickering about a fan

*** There will however be bickering about using hotlinked images *** - Will Gill

 

[arc@css]

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

That's what I've heard. "We won't make that mistake again".



Page 2 as well, in my opinion anyway.

I still wonder if it's a good thing for us.
I mean surely it'll add to the cost as either company will want to make that money back as they're both business and in it for the profit. From their point of view I'm surely they can increase prices a bit, explain that it's got an improved cooler and then make even more money. So I get why they doing it.

I'm sure they board partners aren't overly thrilled at the idea that the stock coolers will be better so they'll have to put lower numbers on their marketing (10dB quieter instead of 20dB or -6ºC cooler instead of -15ºC).

But why would you buy a reference board?

1. You plan to watercool and so don't want to pay more than you have to for the cooler.
2. You plan to run multiple cards and the blower design is best. What you want is a blower design cooler, not a reference cooler specifically (e.g. HIS IceQ)
3. You can't wait a month or 2 for the custom cooled cards.
4. You're pushing your budget and want the best card you can afford.

So for 1) this just raises the cost of the card.
For 2) generally reference is the only option for blower coolers, but if there were other options (HIS IceQ) then you might go for that anyway, so this makes little difference. Trouble being the lack of custom blower coolers.
For 3), guess there's not much that can be done for people like us
For 4), well they might increase the price meaning reference is now out of reach. And looking at prices now, some of the custom cooled cards aren't that much more than reference (for AMD at least).

 

[LtMatt]

I still wonder if it's a good thing for us.
I mean surely it'll add to the cost as either company will want to make that money back as they're both business and in it for the profit. From their point of view I'm surely they can increase prices a bit, explain that it's got an improved cooler and then make even more money. So I get why they doing it.

I'm sure they board partners aren't overly thrilled at the idea that the stock coolers will be better so they'll have to put lower numbers on their marketing (10dB quieter instead of 20dB or -6ºC cooler instead of -15ºC).

But why would you buy a reference board?

1. You plan to watercool and so don't want to pay more than you have to for the cooler.
2. You plan to run multiple cards and the blower design is best. What you want is a blower design cooler, not a reference cooler specifically (e.g. HIS IceQ)
3. You can't wait a month or 2 for the custom cooled cards.
4. You're pushing your budget and want the best card you can afford.

So for 1) this just raises the cost of the card.
For 2) generally reference is the only option for blower coolers, but if there were other options (HIS IceQ) then you might go for that anyway, so this makes little difference. Trouble being the lack of custom blower coolers.
For 3), guess there's not much that can be done for people like us
For 4), well they might increase the price meaning reference is now out of reach. And looking at prices now, some of the custom cooled cards aren't that much more than reference (for AMD at least).

I understand what you're saying but i think all they need to do is jazz it up a bit. The actual design is decent and works well in crossfire mode. They just need to lower the noise and improve the cooling ability slightly.

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

I understand what you're saying but i think all they need to do is jazz it up a bit. The actual design is decent and works well in crossfire mode. They just need to lower the noise and improve the cooling ability slightly.

If they can do it with no price increase to us then yes, great, go for it.

It's like I wouldn't be pleased if the next CPU I bought came with an improved air cooler in the box (maybe CoolerMaster 212 level) and the CPU cost and extra £50.

 

[Gerard]

AMD charge £2600 for the FirePro W9100 which is roughly on par with the Titan-Z's DP compute performance.

Yup but as said that's a pro level card and is branded as such much like the quadro board's NVidia make. "Geforce" as I've said before is their gaming brand and the card is marketed as being an enthusiast card so the pricing to firepro isn't really comparable, titan z's direct competitor is the 295x2.

 

[LtMatt]

If they can do it with no price increase to us then yes, great, go for it.

It's like I wouldn't be pleased if the next CPU I bought came with an improved air cooler in the box (maybe CoolerMaster 212 level) and the CPU cost and extra £50.

They're on record as saying they won't copy the titan cooler because they want to keep the cost down, so i wouldn't expect a price hike. Its not unreasonable to expect a better cooler for the money we pay though and hopefully they deliver one.

 

[pgi947]

I understand what you're saying but i think all they need to do is jazz it up a bit. The actual design is decent and works well in crossfire mode. They just need to lower the noise and improve the cooling ability slightly.

Aye, AMD are due an overhaul tbh, in one way or another they've been using the same PCB layout and same cooler since the HD5800 series - so they've certainly had their moneys worth.

Taking that into account, it may not raise costs by much if at all, perhaps an all new cooler etc... would pave the way for it to be modified to suit cards for the next 4-5 years! Money saved in the long run.

 

[Gerard]

They're on record as saying they won't copy the titan cooler because they want to keep the cost down, so i wouldn't expect a price hike. Its not unreasonable to expect a better cooler for the money we pay though and hopefully they deliver one.

They're also on record years back saying multiple gpu systems were crazy and not necessary before they came out with crossfire, pinch of salt needed when it comes to these 2 companies and their statements regarding what they may or may not be up to

 

[LtMatt]

They're also on record years back saying multiple gpu systems were crazy and not necessary before they came out with crossfire, pinch of salt needed when it comes to these 2 companies and their statements regarding what they may or may not be up to

True and when i heard 'that' they could've been referring to the 295x2 cooler...but i still expect a new improved reference design when the R9 390 launches. Time will tell.

 

[Final8y]

They're also on record years back saying multiple gpu systems were crazy and not necessary before they came out with crossfire, pinch of salt needed when it comes to these 2 companies and their statements regarding what they may or may not be up to

Who was on record and is the same person still working there ?

 

[Gerard]

'
True and when i heard 'that they could've been referring to the 295x2 cooler...but i still expect a new reference design when the R9 390 launches. Time will tell.

Its about bloody time they put some effort into their coolers instead of essentially recycling the same designs with minor tweaks from 5 plus years ago. People have been complaining about amd stock coolers for years but it always seems to fall on deaf ears, 6990 and 7990 promo vids had the same guy waffling about how the cards ran cool and quiet, 90+c with a pretty audiable fan is cool and quiet?

As said its one area they lag behind NVidia who seem to put more effort into their designs, about time amd followed suit instead of seemingly designing the cards then reusing the cooler from a previous design hoping it does the job.

Who was on record and is the same person still working there ?

It was from literally just after NVidia had came out with sli, I can't recall the guys name but he did say sli solutions were crazy. Of course that was before amd came out with crossfire so obviously a bit of deflecting going on.

 

[humbug]

True and when i heard 'that' they could've been referring to the 295x2 cooler...but i still expect a new improved reference design when the R9 390 launches. Time will tell.

It just needs to be more substantial with a more efficient blower fan.

AMD are running about $150m a year profit, It wouldn't hurt to give $5m to someone like HIS to design a really good Reference cooler for them.

 

[GoogalyMoogaly]

True and when i heard 'that' they could've been referring to the 295x2 cooler...but i still expect a new improved reference design when the R9 390 launches. Time will tell.

I shall wait and see if the 390 launches at ~£330 like the 290 did.

I'm not saying it would be bad, just that it's nice to have the choice of a cheap cooler or a good cooler (the custom cooled cards).

The other thing that might be interesting is how the board partners respond. With the exception of Asus, MSI and Gigabyte (think that's it) none of them have had to produce a cooler to compete with a decent reference cooler for a while.
That's not to say the custom coolers we currently have aren't good, but I think 2 of the best (Sapphire Tri-X/Vapor-X and the PCS+) are both larger than 2 slots solutions (I believe). If the reference cooler is decent and 2-slot that's a slightly different scenario I'd imagine.