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Super slim but gooooood

WatchTower

WatchTower

WatchTower

Soldato
Joined
9 Jan 2005
Posts
4,427
Location
Stoke-On-Trent
Who makes the best graphics card for a media centre pc. At the moment I have my old 7900GTO in my new PC. Man that air cooler makes her bum look big. Very cramped

Is there any good cards that won't actually take up so much space that it's the only thing that will go in? :eek: Every card I see has a massive ugly air cooler I want a card that's been working out. Strong but slim.:D

The PowerColor ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT Extreme Silent 512MB GDDR4 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI looks outstanding for the money.
 
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Depends what you want from it.

3850 Pro or 8800GT if you want gaming ability, but personally I find the 8800GT runs very hot.

If you just want good decoding ability, the something like the 2400 Pro would suit you fine.
 
WatchTower said:
The PowerColor ATI Radeon HD 3870 XT Extreme Silent 512MB GDDR4 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI looks outstanding for the money.
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Despite the name, I'm told it's anything but silent! Not what you need for an HTPC. Then again, slap an Accelero S1 on it. I've just bought a standard 3870 and will be doing just that.

Actually scrap that - just realised you said that size is in issue. Doh!
 
Flying Gribble said:
Despite the name, I'm told it's anything but silent! Not what you need for an HTPC. Then again, slap an Accelero S1 on it. I've just bought a standard 3870 and will be doing just that.
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Actually i've never heard any reports about them being noisy. Is it just particular makes?

I'm interested as I was looking at the 3870X2 in a couple of weeks, does this mean that it's going to be a really noisy and hot card? :eek:
 
It's specifically the PowerColor Extreme Silent - the one with the 'Zero Therm' cooler. Allegedly it has a fixed speed fan. Can't say where I got that from - it's in a review on a competitor site.
 
Ah right okay, that looks like the Zalman they were putting on the X1950 Pro cards a few months back - and there I was thinking they were quiet! :o

I'm pretty sure ATi's reference cooler design is very quiet, if not silent. The OcUK brand one seems to be the best option as this point anyway. :)
 
SBD said:
If you have the cash an 8800GT is very good does run hot but this model has one of the best air coolers on it so will run much cooler!

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-035-GI&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1008
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Looks nice. In the description it also reports that the GPU uses less energy consumption does that me it will be kinder on my Antec EarthWatts 430W PSU? I'd have put in my better 600what Enermax PSU in my new PC but with the Antec Fusion media centre case you get a special version of the Antec EarthWatts 430W PSU which has a odd connection to power the front LCD on my case.

While browsing the 8800 serise cards I notice some of the GTS cards like the Ultra also have a 320bit memory interface does this mean they'll be a lot faster than the 8800 with only a 256bit memory interface?
 
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