Stupid question

[silverginger]

Ive been looking at Vega 56 graphics cards and most of the second hand ones ive seen seem to be the MSI Air Boost is there any reason for this?
Personally i would rather have a GPU with cooling fans on it is this a sound philosophy or just blinkered?

 

[heatonpkmassive]

If I have it right, that's just another name for a reference cooler. So yes, I'd avoid and try to find a good aftermarket one with a proper cooler.

 

[Woodsta888]

That is a blower style card where the air is sucked in at the centre and all the air is exhausted out of the rear of the card and not back into the case. These are good for small form factor cases but they can be noisy where the air is pushed through the grill at the back of the card. Plus there is only one fan to do the work. So many of these could be for sale as they are relatively noisy compared to ones with 3rd party cooling systems where the hot air is exhausted into the case. These require decent case cooling to remove the warm air from the card.

If you use closed cup headset whilst gaming then you may not be bothered by the noise but open cup or speakers these blower style cards can be noticable. Folk who water cool buy these cards as they remove the cooler anyway. They aren't bad cards just generally more noisy.

 

[silverginger]

Thats brilliant thanks for clearing that up

 

[Quartz]

That is a blower style card where the air is sucked in at the centre and all the air is exhausted out of the rear of the card and not back into the case.

They're also very good for rotated cases like the Silverstone FT series.

 

[Phixsator]

And much of the noise can be removed by undervolting the card which is easy and doesn't require much knowledge. Works great for reference designs of Vega where thermal headroom is limited to begin with.