Silverstone FT02 - Ref GPU or 3rd party cooler GPU?
- Thread starter RedTop89
- Start date
Yes..thats it Jaybee you got it perfectly.
I tried to paste diagrams, but was on Mobile, thanks <3
If you look at the first picture heatpipes, they 'cluster' around and 'through' the GPU, and are very close, except for 1 which runs onwards along the length of the card itself. ( the long becomes 'useless'). And the fins are in correct orientation. The second picture which shows the Heatpipes as straight lines running length of card, which is far from optimal. And its fins as you correctly state 'block' the airflow.
Your 'Picasso' inspired paint diagram details perfectly what happens with the airflow. ( give this man a HARIBO ) Now there were complaints that certain cards were overheating, or busting the AP fan below the card. You can see how the heated airflow from the card 'feedback' into the AP fans in your Diagram. That is the culprit as it disrupts the airflow. ( note always remember to number diagrams young man ) 
To clarify, it matters significantly when your overclocking, since your trying to keep heat buildup down. The whole point of Positive airflow case, is that the airflow is going in single direction.
Your correct in that reference designs are efficient, but can be much louder and run very hot. The temp variance between a reference and a correctly picked card are minimal. But a badly chosen card for FT02 can be disastrous.
I requested Silverstone for the input previously in the thread. Whilst I really appreciated it, I found the answer a bit vague ( understandable to be honest).
Card choices: no particular order
Sapphire, MSI(twin frozr) , HIS(Iceq) and reference designs are valid for these types of cases.
The only reason I have been so OCD over this is so that future owners of these types of cases can get as full facts as possible , I hope this helps.
I pulled trigger for my Sapphire 7950 oc to arrive in the am!
I tried to paste diagrams, but was on Mobile, thanks <3
If you look at the first picture heatpipes, they 'cluster' around and 'through' the GPU, and are very close, except for 1 which runs onwards along the length of the card itself. ( the long becomes 'useless'). And the fins are in correct orientation. The second picture which shows the Heatpipes as straight lines running length of card, which is far from optimal. And its fins as you correctly state 'block' the airflow.
Your 'Picasso' inspired paint diagram details perfectly what happens with the airflow.
( give this man a HARIBO ) Now there were complaints that certain cards were overheating, or busting the AP fan below the card. You can see how the heated airflow from the card 'feedback' into the AP fans in your Diagram. That is the culprit as it disrupts the airflow. ( note always remember to number diagrams young man ) To clarify, it matters significantly when your overclocking, since your trying to keep heat buildup down. The whole point of Positive airflow case, is that the airflow is going in single direction.
Your correct in that reference designs are efficient, but can be much louder and run very hot. The temp variance between a reference and a correctly picked card are minimal. But a badly chosen card for FT02 can be disastrous.
I requested Silverstone for the input previously in the thread. Whilst I really appreciated it, I found the answer a bit vague ( understandable to be honest).
Card choices: no particular order
Sapphire, MSI(twin frozr) , HIS(Iceq) and reference designs are valid for these types of cases.
The only reason I have been so OCD over this is so that future owners of these types of cases can get as full facts as possible , I hope this helps.
I pulled trigger for my Sapphire 7950 oc to arrive in the am!
Last edited:
Stay away from reference coolers like the plague (unless you plan on adding an aftermarket cooler) they are noisy and do not keep cards remotely cool especially when you have a good case like this it kind of defeats the purpose of having quiet silverstone fans if your going to bung a hoover in there.
A reference cooled leaf blower card will be hotter and noisier than a twin/triple fanned cooled card all this stuff about airflow is nonsense what matters more is the actual quality of the heatsink and of course fan cfm blowing on to it.
It's like saying a stock cpu cooler will cool better in a case with say 1 intake and 1 exhaust than a silver arrow in a case without intake and exhaust fact is the silver arrow still wins.
Any heat dumped in to the case will go out the back/top fans and other gaps in and around the case.
No I don't own an ft02 I have an ft01 but I can turn the case so I have 2 fans blowing air from bottom to top 1x 180mm and 1 x 120mm in the 525 bay makes 0 difference to my temps all that matters is the actual quality of the heatsink on the chip itself and the fans.
The days of needing to exhaust air directly out of the case on the gpu are long gone.
If anyone can provide evidence of a reference leaf blower/jumbo jet taking off style cooler being cooler than say a triple fanned jobby at the same noise level in an ft02 be my guest and I'll eat my crow.
A reference cooled leaf blower card will be hotter and noisier than a twin/triple fanned cooled card all this stuff about airflow is nonsense what matters more is the actual quality of the heatsink and of course fan cfm blowing on to it.
It's like saying a stock cpu cooler will cool better in a case with say 1 intake and 1 exhaust than a silver arrow in a case without intake and exhaust fact is the silver arrow still wins.
Any heat dumped in to the case will go out the back/top fans and other gaps in and around the case.
No I don't own an ft02 I have an ft01 but I can turn the case so I have 2 fans blowing air from bottom to top 1x 180mm and 1 x 120mm in the 525 bay makes 0 difference to my temps all that matters is the actual quality of the heatsink on the chip itself and the fans.
The days of needing to exhaust air directly out of the case on the gpu are long gone.
If anyone can provide evidence of a reference leaf blower/jumbo jet taking off style cooler being cooler than say a triple fanned jobby at the same noise level in an ft02 be my guest and I'll eat my crow.
Last edited:
I don't believe anyone is suggesting reference is ideal tbh but it is a valid option, as it works with the case and not against it. but as you correctly point out its hot and loud as hell!
Silverstone have to be unbiased and work from reference designs. I think also when consumers purchase cards some prefer to get reference designs rather than aftermarket.
The main point relates to the type of aftermarket cooler options that are efficient in allowing the case to behave as it was designed. Some aftermarket coolers are inefficient due to their cooling system in the vertical orientation,and this question does come up a lot!
I wanted there to be a 2012 thread discussing it, so that people will have up-to-date info and understanding, without having to wade through 2/3 years+ of 100+ pages of numerous threads.
The FT02 isn't a cheap case and as such it's not widely used which in turn means information on in can be a bugger to find and collate.
The first thing I did after I got my ft02 was discover from all those years gone by that everyone was grabbing reference cards.
It took wading through a lot of epeen posts ( 'hardforum', ft02 thread a 300+ post, dating back to it's release, with banal pictures of the same case with a different heatsink but all with reference cards).
I even asked here on these forums and was advised a windforce 670 3x, which by all accounts and evidence is contrary to the cases needs.
Last edited:
Associate
- Joined
- 14 Sep 2010
- Posts
- 93
I can understand why many people have bias against reference coolers as they were usually designed with size and cost constraints compared to after market ones. Before the launch of GTX 680, I would agree that you can easily get quieter options. However, after having used/tested every generation of reference cooler designs from both NVIDIA and AMD since 2004. We have to give NVIDIA credit here as their reference GTX 680 has reached a level that are on par if not better than some of the aftermarket cooler in noise output.
I would encourage you guys to give GTX 680 or 670 reference design cards a try if you haven't already, they are vastly improved compared to what you may have heard before from any of the previous generation reference cards.
I would encourage you guys to give GTX 680 or 670 reference design cards a try if you haven't already, they are vastly improved compared to what you may have heard before from any of the previous generation reference cards.
Well for me, I just purchased a 7850 as stock was starting to deplete in the models I wanted. They were also on this week only and I had to pull the trigger. After a lot of umming and arring, I got it down to basically the HIS IceQ, the Sapphire dual fan one, and the MSI twin Frozr ones.
The IceQ looks really tacky imo and is in tests, slightly noisier than the sapphire and MSI ones. The sapphire one went out of stock as I went to buy last night (plus some people complain of it not overclocking well) so in the end I went with the MSI Twin Frozr III and NOT the MSI Power Edition Twin Frozr IV model for £8 more as the 7850 overclocking thread reveals this to be a worse overclocker for some.
Overall MSI comes with a 3 year warranty and is reknown for the twin frozr having a great cool and quiet design. The fin orientation suits the FT02, and there are no reference cooler designs currently stocked by OCUK that I would want to buy. I really like the look of the blower style custom cooler that is on the HIS IceQ 7950, but that's above my budget being a 7950. It chucks it all out the back, but still does it quietly with a massive custom blower style exhaust cooler. Looks slightly ugly to me though!
I have been running a 5770 reference for a year or two and yeah it does chuck the heat out the back, but the very fact it does this is quite noticable. i.e. the heat coming out is hot and heats the room up. It's very loud during gaming (idle is fine) and I think the whole thing just runs hotter due to the blower anyway. So it's kind of counter productive. I feel the dual cooler designs still work fine in this case and as some of the smoke tests show, a lot of the air gets chucked straight out the "top" of the card which in the ft02 would be slamming straight into the window/side panel of the case, and the AP181 fans will easily shove it all out the top anyway. I can't see it impacting cpu temps that much as my cpu cooler gets an AP181 right under it with direct flow anyway as does most in this case.
So conclusion, just buy the card with the best cooler for the cash and don't worry. It will still work fine. Ideally get one with fins that go ALONG the card so will be vertical lines when card is rotated 90 degrees.
As for chosing a 7850 based on which ones overclock. The OC thread for 7850 shows that it really is just a lottery, and there are no patterns to a particular brand/manufacturer overclocking better than others really.
The IceQ looks really tacky imo and is in tests, slightly noisier than the sapphire and MSI ones. The sapphire one went out of stock as I went to buy last night (plus some people complain of it not overclocking well) so in the end I went with the MSI Twin Frozr III and NOT the MSI Power Edition Twin Frozr IV model for £8 more as the 7850 overclocking thread reveals this to be a worse overclocker for some.
Overall MSI comes with a 3 year warranty and is reknown for the twin frozr having a great cool and quiet design. The fin orientation suits the FT02, and there are no reference cooler designs currently stocked by OCUK that I would want to buy. I really like the look of the blower style custom cooler that is on the HIS IceQ 7950, but that's above my budget being a 7950. It chucks it all out the back, but still does it quietly with a massive custom blower style exhaust cooler. Looks slightly ugly to me though!
I have been running a 5770 reference for a year or two and yeah it does chuck the heat out the back, but the very fact it does this is quite noticable. i.e. the heat coming out is hot and heats the room up. It's very loud during gaming (idle is fine) and I think the whole thing just runs hotter due to the blower anyway. So it's kind of counter productive. I feel the dual cooler designs still work fine in this case and as some of the smoke tests show, a lot of the air gets chucked straight out the "top" of the card which in the ft02 would be slamming straight into the window/side panel of the case, and the AP181 fans will easily shove it all out the top anyway. I can't see it impacting cpu temps that much as my cpu cooler gets an AP181 right under it with direct flow anyway as does most in this case.
So conclusion, just buy the card with the best cooler for the cash and don't worry. It will still work fine. Ideally get one with fins that go ALONG the card so will be vertical lines when card is rotated 90 degrees.
As for chosing a 7850 based on which ones overclock. The OC thread for 7850 shows that it really is just a lottery, and there are no patterns to a particular brand/manufacturer overclocking better than others really.
Soldato
This is not about heat being dumped into the case. An ft02/rv02 will force it out anyway like you said. The problem is heatpipe and fin orientation.
My 680s are cooler in the rv02 vs my old 600t when at stock, but when I o/c they are hotter, to the point where I can't even reach the same maximum o/c as in the 600t. If I add extra volts in the rv02 (max o/c benching) the cooling genuinely can't cope and I end up in the 90c range. The majority of the heatpipes 'transfer' heat 'below' the core in this config which isn't great when hanging at 90 degrees, a good 60-70% of the heatsink is below the core on my cards.
Last edited:
How is that possible when the 600t front fan is so bad ? anyway I dont like the design of the raven the bottom 180mm is probably blowing warm hdd air in towards the far left gpu.I think it's pretty much been agreed ages ago that the ft02 / raven series really isn't the case of choice for dual card setups if only because it gets pretty cramped around the far left gpu.For sure If I had sli/xfire in mind I would go for something noisy but good for that setup like a haf x.
Last edited:
Caporegime
My HDDs don't get that warm, and I only have my top 5.25 bay populated, so it isn't an issue for me.
Soldato
How is that possible when the 600t front fan is so bad ? anyway I dont like the design of the raven the bottom 180mm is probably blowing warm hdd air in towards the far left gpu.I think it's pretty much been agreed ages ago that the ft02 / raven series really isn't the case of choice for dual card setups if only because it gets pretty cramped around the far left gpu.For sure If I had sli/xfire in mind I would go for something noisy but good for that setup like a haf x.
It's possible because the heatpipes are oriented differently! lol, that's what I was saying!
I replaced the 600t front fan anyway. I've never seen temps in the 80s, let alone 90s in my 600t. I have the rv02-e with the air penetrators so it's not an airflow issue, I can feel the air pushing out the top.Hdds are barely warm and I don't use any. My far left gpu has ~1inch more clearance from my 600t custom psu plate on it's 'lower' fan and about 7 inches extra up top into the opticals.
The temperature situation I outlined was the same for a single card. I can bench heaven at 1377 core in the 600t but only something like 1340~core in the rv02.
Doesn't really matter to me as I'm waiting on waterblocks, but others with this motherboard layout should be wary of non-ref gpu coolers and choose carefully imo.
Have you tried stopping the fan below the affected card ? if this theory is correct the temps would reduce right as it wouldn't be messing with the cards cooler and is it the far left lower pci slot btw the one closest to the drive cages ? have you tried with just that card in there alone what are the temps when running a single card ? if they are lower then I think I am right and it's the cramped area around the lower card and added hdd warmer air being swooshed around the card.
How comes so many have no such issues with non reference coolers in ravens and ft02's
How comes so many have no such issues with non reference coolers in ravens and ft02's
Last edited:
Soldato
Here's what I just did
looped heaven at stockclocks stock fan with case fans on max. I'm using a framerate limiter set to 120fps (helps a lot to keep temps down but knackers benchmarks)
max temp ~64c
turned case fans off
max temp ~75c
turned case fans back on to max
temp would not go back below ~71c
That was 5 minutes ago and the right card is still idling at 44c now which is ~10c more than it was idling before I opened heaven. Basically, it heats up, it can't dissipate the heat effectively.
As for why others don't have issues, idk, bare in mind that the above is fine for general use but I like to overclock, add extra volts etc, which it can't handle. Maybe they've got coolers that are ok this way round, maybe they're running at stock or mild o/cs, or maybe they're just oblivious.
looped heaven at stockclocks stock fan with case fans on max. I'm using a framerate limiter set to 120fps (helps a lot to keep temps down but knackers benchmarks)
max temp ~64c
turned case fans off
max temp ~75c
turned case fans back on to max
temp would not go back below ~71c
That was 5 minutes ago and the right card is still idling at 44c now which is ~10c more than it was idling before I opened heaven. Basically, it heats up, it can't dissipate the heat effectively.
As for why others don't have issues, idk, bare in mind that the above is fine for general use but I like to overclock, add extra volts etc, which it can't handle. Maybe they've got coolers that are ok this way round, maybe they're running at stock or mild o/cs, or maybe they're just oblivious.
Associate
- Joined
- 14 Oct 2004
- Posts
- 979
One key requirement is to upgrade the supplied exhaust fan. I'm using a Scythe Gentle Typhoon 1450 that is speed controlled by case temp. When only the graphics card is at load (so the cpu below it is barely above ambient), the case exhausts a lot of hot air through that fan. The stock fan didn't do nearly as good a job. Despite being a positive air pressure case, when the thing heats up you still need a lot of exhaust airflow.
Soldato
I have to say that the Asus 670 directcu2 cooling fins run the length of the card. And not the width. (in the pictures I have seen).
So the person that said they are not suited to the Raven/Fortress style case is wrong.
I should be the end of the weekend have moved from my FT02 to a FD R4. So I should be able to post some temp differences.
So the person that said they are not suited to the Raven/Fortress style case is wrong.
I should be the end of the weekend have moved from my FT02 to a FD R4. So I should be able to post some temp differences.
Maybe Asus have changed cooling?
Is your card OC'D?
Look at pics in post #40
-the top pic is optimal for non-reference coolers
-the bottom pic is -non optimal
Could you compare your card to the pics and confirm;
-Which fin orientation out of pics?
-Which heatpipe version out of pics?
Cheers
Soldato
Looks more like the top one. When Im swapping the stuff over I will try and take pics. And yes CPU and 670 are clocked.
Soldato
I would have posted some screen prints but they seem to not have the correct info.
But here are my finding since changing from an FT02 to a FD R4.
I ran Heaven in both cases with my CPU set to stock and my 670 clocked.
GPU 1254 Vram 1774 (Power Target 122% GPU Clock offset +170 Mem Clock Offset +543)
Manual fan setting.
Running Heaven as set out in the bench test thread on these forums.
In the R4 the 670 was on Avg 6c lower. And the fins on the cooler run length ways.
Sorry again about the lack of screen prints.
But here are my finding since changing from an FT02 to a FD R4.
I ran Heaven in both cases with my CPU set to stock and my 670 clocked.
GPU 1254 Vram 1774 (Power Target 122% GPU Clock offset +170 Mem Clock Offset +543)
Manual fan setting.
Running Heaven as set out in the bench test thread on these forums.
In the R4 the 670 was on Avg 6c lower. And the fins on the cooler run length ways.
Sorry again about the lack of screen prints.
Are you sure that's not just the drop in temps we have had lately ? it's hard to tell when one day it's 18-20c and the next 14c outside just one degree or two can make a difference imo.
Guess i'll keep my trusty silverstone ft01 (was going to get a raven 3 but still might as i love the internal design) amazes me hardly anyone rates it imo it's the best mid case out there still just run the top fan as exhaust and the filter problems solved.
I guess the jist of this thread is that on some coolers if they are ran in this orientation it's the actual heatpipe design that doesn't allow the heat to move along the pipe the way it should be and therefore doesn't matter which fans blowing on it.
If this theory is true then turning the ft02 on it's side so the card sits like it does in a normal case would see a massive temperature drop.
Guess i'll keep my trusty silverstone ft01 (was going to get a raven 3 but still might as i love the internal design) amazes me hardly anyone rates it imo it's the best mid case out there still just run the top fan as exhaust and the filter problems solved.
I guess the jist of this thread is that on some coolers if they are ran in this orientation it's the actual heatpipe design that doesn't allow the heat to move along the pipe the way it should be and therefore doesn't matter which fans blowing on it.
If this theory is true then turning the ft02 on it's side so the card sits like it does in a normal case would see a massive temperature drop.
Last edited:
Soldato
Its hot in our house. We rent a new build, and its like 22c+ all the time (Its cheap to heat.)
Caporegime
Just for reference, my MSI TF3 7950 runs nice and cool in my RV02 (now that I know that having dual display to my tv upds temps, so I disable it when not in use).
Idle around 37-40ºC, loads temps playing ME3 at 1440p never broke 60ºC with 55% fan speed
Idle around 37-40ºC, loads temps playing ME3 at 1440p never broke 60ºC with 55% fan speed