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New cooler for 6950/6970?

I can imagine the new Nvidia GTX5XX/AMD 69XX reference coolers being used for quite some time. This isn't because it's cheaper, but because of the efficiency of their cooling. Both manufacturers have moved on to vapor chamber cooling which is pretty damn effective at cooling these cards.

For example, look at the GTX580 versus the GTX480. Both consume 360-370w at load, but the GTX580 is a good 20 degrees (!) below that of the GTX480 (at load), and the GTX480 came with it's own heatpipe array sticking out the top of the card case.

Considering how well the current coolers fare, I'd think that for a while it'd only be the high end versions of each card that would get a custom cooler. More budget oriented third party coolers could quite possibly be worse than the reference coolers
 
http://www.techpowerup.com/live/Testing/MSI_HD_6950_Twin_Frozr_II.php

Or not...;)

Very importantly, I think I see a bios switch. My only reservation is that it is going to cost a lot more to be honest I am warming to my 6950 stock cooler; thats gonna be 270 min on release.

The vapour chambers are better but no way can slot venting coolers compete with a fully open designs for noise or temps, just practicality.
 
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el Kuarlos said:
http://www.techpowerup.com/live/Testing/MSI_HD_6950_Twin_Frozr_II.php

Or not...;)

Very importantly, I think I see a bios switch. My only reservation is that it is going to cost a lot more to be honest I am warming to my 6950 stock cooler; thats gonna be 270 min on release.

The vapour chambers are better but no way can slot venting coolers compete with a fully open designs for noise or temps, just practicality.
Click to expand...

Damn that was quick, MSI never disappoint!

Just to clarify, I never said that the vapor chambers were the best you could get, only that they are much more efficient than the previous gen, thereby forcing third party solutions to either A: Produce much better coolers or B: produce cheaper coolers.
As you said, the twin Frozr cards will be coming in at a noticeably higher price point than your standard 6950. That's usually par for the course with higher end non-reference kit, but according to MSI the twin frozr design on the 6950 is only about 8% cooler than the standard reference cooler. How much extra is that worth?
 
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The only thing really irking me is the bent over fin design AMD and taken up. When you take the shroud off rather than seeing a normal heatsink, lots of fins and the space between is open, the tops of the fins are bent over.

They started doing that with the 4890, before then, you could take off the shroud, strap on a 120mm fan costing a whole £5 and have massively better and silent cooling. My 4870x2, which is a silly hot running card, dropped from something like 60c or so idle and 85C+ load temps with quite high fan speed/noise to 40c idle, and 60C load still silent with same fan speed.

Blower fans = the sucky balls, vapour chambers don't do a heck of a lot, the 580gtx uses less power in most situations on a more efficient process(its significantly improved vs early 480gtx production) and therefore runs cooler. The 6970 averages 200W at load, not much more than a 5870, with a better process and a larger die it averages out to similar cooling/temps/sound.


Cooling with almost any gpu cooler is ALL about the fan, same sink, remove the blower stick on ANY fan and you can get silent and way better cooling.


I don't know how long I've said this for, 99.9% of all gpu's are used in single gpu systems, reserve blower coolers for a small amount of cards shipped for xfire purposes, or, almost no one that buys them and have the "standard" cooler be an open dual/triple slot cooler with a proper fan.
 
HighlandeR said:
Was hoping too see something from ac cooling, there Accelero XTREME for 5970 looks quite good but I dont think it supports the 6970 sadly....

Am sure theres one in the pipeline.
Click to expand...
AXP fits according to this review:
http://translate.google.com/transla...D6970_Arctic_Cooling_Accelero_Xtreme_Plus.htm

And according to this
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/aftermarket-vga-cooling-shaman,2797.html
Thermalright Shaman fits as well, however there is no Thermalright VRM heatsink compatible with 6950/6970 yet (but will be soon). Note that AXP doesn't provide VRM heatsinks for any GPU.

drunkenmaster said:
I don't know how long I've said this for, 99.9% of all gpu's are used in single gpu systems, reserve blower coolers for a small amount of cards shipped for xfire purposes, or, almost no one that buys them and have the "standard" cooler be an open dual/triple slot cooler with a proper fan.
Click to expand...
Couldn't agree more. They don't offer any meaningful alternatives (with rare exceptions) for a stock cooler solutions and you void warranty if you try to fix their faulty designs with proper aftermarket.
 
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Skyrocket said:
470 OC in SLI

Idle

Core:- 35 top / 32 bottom
PCB:- 27 / 26

They are anything but, cool running cards on load :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

Again nice post but for even better results try adding some logic instead of comparing apples to oranges.

To compare Apples to Apples, you would NEED to compare two of the same card models with different Idles temps and measure the difference at load at the same fan speed and same conditions.

It is a known fact that 'variation' exists between each GPU, even if they are the same model number. Often the cause of wide varying differences in temps is to do with the differing leakage levels from chip to chip.

If you take a card with very low leakage and compare it to another card of the same model, but with high leakage, the idles and load temps can be vastly different.

Some people say Fermi's are toasters, some say they run pretty cool and quiet, most say they run pretty hot. IMHO these mixed accounts are likely more often due to differing leakage levels than 'air-flow' etc.

So in summary, YES from my experience and from other accounts on the inter-webs, cards that run cool at idle, also run cooler at load.

P.s. your 470's run cool at idle because they are massively down clocked so don't sup much juice (A large die also helps here). It's a different story at load, but this difference in power consumption from idle to load is due to architecture, clocks and chip size.
Personally I would have gone with a 580...
 
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My HIS 6970 is definitely quieter than the Sapphire 5870 stock cooler especially under load , but its still too noisy like most stock fans.

I reckon my VF3000 from the 5870 will fit ok onto the 6970, but i also need some more VRM heatsinks which i'm still waiting for a week later. Overclockers please start selling these !
 
appletree said:
AXP fits according to this review:
http://translate.google.com/transla...D6970_Arctic_Cooling_Accelero_Xtreme_Plus.htm

And according to this
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/aftermarket-vga-cooling-shaman,2797.html
Thermalright Shaman fits as well, however there is no Thermalright VRM heatsink compatible with 6950/6970 yet (but will be soon). Note that AXP doesn't provide VRM heatsinks for any GPU.
Click to expand...

thats good to hear, I love the thermalright shaman soloution and its 140mm silent fan... I think I need to pair that with the cheapest 6950 soloution ;)
 
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HighlandeR said:
I love the thermalright shaman soloution and its 140mm silent fan...
Click to expand...
I have one of these fans in my case and it is in no way silent. I had to attach it to a zalman fanmate set to the lowest setting to keep it quiet. The akasa apache fans are quieter than the thermalright.

The marketing spin on all fans, psu's being 'silent' is shocking imo.
 
tommybhoy said:
I have one of these fans in my case and it is in no way silent. I had to attach it to a zalman fanmate set to the lowest setting to keep it quiet. The akasa apache fans are quieter than the thermalright.

The marketing spin on all fans, psu's being 'silent' is shocking imo.
Click to expand...

If by "no way silent" you mean that you were running it @12V and 1300rpm this should be indeed loud. However according to this review
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article1131-page5.html
it should also be reasonably quiet if it runs at 8V or below. So of course you don't want to run it at full speed - but you usually need to undervolt even 120mm fans to keep them quiet e.g. I don't know any 120mm fan that I could consider even remotely quiet @1300rpm and typically the larger the fan the loduer it sounds on the same rpm. On the other hand with larger fan you can expect much better airflow on the same rpm so in the end 140mm fan should be (in theory) able to provide the same cooling performance with lesser noise (on much lower rpm). That is of course assuming Thermalright haven't done something horribly wrong with the fan design.

I've ordered the Shaman and hope it can keep reasonable temps on my GTX 580 @6-7V undervolted fan. Not sure how it will go before I test it though.

Btw if you want quiet PSU without modding try Seasonic X series with hybrid fan. It is dead silent at idle because the fan doesn't spin.
 
My 570GTX idles quite high around 44c and my case is an Antec P182. All the heat is drawn out of case aswell as I have full water loop apart from SB which has a Zalman cooler fitted.
My load temps go up to 89c this is on auto fan.
 
appletree said:
If by "no way silent" you mean that you were running it @12V and 1300rpm this should be indeed loud. However according to this review
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article1131-page5.html
it should also be reasonably quiet if it runs at 8V or below. So of course you don't want to run it at full speed - but you usually need to undervolt even 120mm fans to keep them quiet e.g. I don't know any 120mm fan that I could consider even remotely quiet @1300rpm and typically the larger the fan the loduer it sounds on the same rpm. On the other hand with larger fan you can expect much better airflow on the same rpm so in the end 140mm fan should be (in theory) able to provide the same cooling performance with lesser noise (on much lower rpm). That is of course assuming Thermalright haven't done something horribly wrong with the fan design.

I've ordered the Shaman and hope it can keep reasonable temps on my GTX 580 @6-7V undervolted fan. Not sure how it will go before I test it though.

Btw if you want quiet PSU without modding try Seasonic X series with hybrid fan. It is dead silent at idle because the fan doesn't spin.
Click to expand...

I was just wondering this also since tommybhoy said that 14cm TY-140 PWN Fan is not silent, yet its rated the most silent 14cm in xbit labs review ?

I think either way 12/14cm fans to me arent that silent and also need a volt mod, I may just order some of these :

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FG-006-GE&tool=3

or I may get some of these:


Zalman RC100 (5V) Noiseless Resistor Cable


Zalman RC56 (7V) Noiseless Resistor Cable

I think they would reduce the noises by half and make it silent even more :)
 
I have just bought a new 6970 from Overclockers on Tuesday and although I'm happy with the speed bump I'm not so happy about the fan noise. My last card was a 5870 and playing games was fine. Yes I could hear it but it was so low that it did not bother me. With this new 6970 it's a hell of a lot louder. Does anyone know how I can kill the noise a little when playing games ? The other half says she can hear it in the bedroom !! :-0
 
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