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To void or not to void...

Cleeecooo

Cleeecooo

Cleeecooo

Soldato
Joined
8 Oct 2010
Posts
22,382
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Purley - Croydon
that is the question!

As some of you may know, I received a 580 from Gigabyte to replace my 480 SOC :D. Initially I thought it was faulty but it turns out it was just my software messing up.

Anyway, I was wondering whether or not I should liquid cool it to make it silent. I was planning to sell it and get an EVGA but nobody wants it on the MM :(

So, do I:
A) liquid cool it and if it fails try to send it back to Gigabyte as I could probably get away with it
B) Liquid cool it but accept that Gigabyte would notice it has been liquid cooled and void my warranty
C) just don't bother at all
D) sell it for £300 and get two 460's/470's

Ideally, I want a silent system so liquid cooling will be quite important to me.

Has anybody liquid cooled their card and gotten away with it? Do Gigabyte even give a ****?
And is my card a reference one? THIS is my card.


Would a mod be kind enough to add a poll please?
 
It's not quite reference, so you'd need a core-only block and some RAM sinks. To be fair though, the VRAM and VRMs don't need that much cooling.

As for removing the stock cooler, as long as you're not a moron, and use a good quality screw driver, they aren't going to notice.
 
Marvin said:
It's not quite reference, so you'd need a core-only block and some RAM sinks. To be fair though, the VRAM and VRMs don't need that much cooling.

As for removing the stock cooler, as long as you're not a moron, and use a good quality screw driver, they aren't going to notice.
Click to expand...

good to know :D Did you manage to get one through?
Sadly, I am a moron! How strict are they?
I saw some EK non ref blocks for the 580. And on their site it said that the reference 580 blocks fitted but it was only visual so I was wary :D
 
I have never owned a liquid cooled system, so forgive me if my logic is off, but how will you cool the liquid? will a liquid cooled PC really be that much quieter than air cooled? surely any fans you remove from CPU's and GPU's will just be replaced with fans on a radiator?
 
If it was me I'd be going for the evga card, or a reference card you can cool easily with a cover block. Had a similar dilemma with my 6950 and came to the conclusion I didn't wanna chance it with £200 worth of equipment.
 
Spyke_UK said:
I have never owned a liquid cooled system, so forgive me if my logic is off, but how will you cool the liquid? will a liquid cooled PC really be that much quieter than air cooled? surely any fans you remove from CPU's and GPU's will just be replaced with fans on a radiator?
Click to expand...

Yes that is true, however, I too have no idea how it works! IIRC, the radiators do most of the cooling and the fans just have to be at a low speed making them pretty much silent


I fancy boys said:
If it was me I'd be going for the evga card, or a reference card you can cool easily with a cover block. Had a similar dilemma with my 6950 and came to the conclusion I didn't wanna chance it with £200 worth of equipment.
Click to expand...

I always LOL at ur username! I'm having trouble selling my card so it may be a no-go :(
 
When you water cool a gpu it will cut the temps in half and will run close to silent with the fans turned down a little on the rad also the card will overclock higher.

Very loud and hot cards like my 6990 H2o is a must really.
 
johny dolan said:
When you water cool a gpu it will cut the temps in half and will run close to silent with the fans turned down a little on the rad also the card will overclock higher.

Very loud and hot cards like my 6990 H2o is a must really.
Click to expand...

Exactly this. My 580 isnt too loud but I would like everything to be silent and cool. No point spending £400 on nothing.
 
Marine-RX179 said:
The most straight forward, no-fuss way to bypass the noise is getting a decent gaming heatset :P
Click to expand...

This is so true. Though stereo noise-cancelling headphones are better, coupled with a good sound card. I watercool anyway, but yeah...

Cleeecooo (enough vowels?), so long as the screws are not obviously marked and you don't do something stupid like put the cooler on upside-down then they won't bother delving deeper. I had to send a 5850 back a while ago, and I'd changed the cooler before. Luckily I have decent screwdrivers, and I'd taken care with the screws, so no questions were asked and I replaced with a GTX470...

And, in response to above, which headphones have you tried?
 
Yep. Enough vowels.
What screwdrivers in particular will I need?
So far I have tried Bose ones and there was also some other premium brand. Ive tried Sony and a few other cheapish ones.
 
I thought that cooler was pretty quiet when I got my 480 SOC.

I personally wouldn't risk it, but I am more of a tool than the screwdriver :D
 
Dont get an evga, theyre warranty isnt worth the paper it's printed on, terrible customer service, gigabyte are better, uk based centre.
 
johny dolan said:
When you water cool a gpu it will cut the temps in half and will run close to silent with the fans turned down a little on the rad also the card will overclock higher.
Click to expand...

You can't really make such statements, as these things are down to so many variable factors.

What you say is essentially right but very misleading. Watercooling is just a way of getting a much bigger heatsink area than you would have with air cooling - the surface area of radiators is phenomenal, and water takes an awful lot of heating but loses that heat relatively quickly making the system efficient. also, radiator heat isn't usually extracted into the case like a heatsink is so case temperatures should be lower.

With a big enough radiator you can run fanless, or with comparatively little airflow making the large fans that are fitted to radiators slow and therefore quiet. Water does not automatically mean silent.

W/C allows more overclocking because the system can deal with a load more heat than a heatsink. Component temperature does have an impact on the speed at which it can work but at these levels it's relatively negligable, unless you're a real mhz weenie.

What watercooling does allow is the old "every 7c you knock off a component's operating temperature, doubles its theoretical lifespan" theory so your stuff will last longer, the closer it gets to room temperature. I've got an ancient socket A athlon XP (typing this on it) which is still overclocked 100% over its original speed 5 years later (and this pc is on pretty much 24/7).. because it's spent its entire life 3-5*c above room temperature, it's still going. that's watercooled using a complete bodge homemade system because any off the shelf systems sold back then were utter garbage, and probably still are... could be wrong but i'm not usually.

Having said all that, watercooling is a PITA and unless you like being inside your pc at regular intervals messing about with water, stick to a heatsink.
 
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Im talking from experience of water cooling my 6990 gpu it did cut the temps in half ran silent and over clocked higher when i water cooled it.

The 6990 stock cooler hits 90c load and sounds like a hoover.

I cant of coarse say other would get exact same results but its a pretty good assumption imo.
 
Setter, why do you say EVGA are bad with CS?

Skree, im getting a 480 rad and a 240 :). I dont mind doing regular maintenance every month or two. I am mainly liquid cooling so i can oc my CPU nad make my gfx card silent. My computer is literally next to my ear so silence is extremely important. Its good to know the lifespan of my components will be so long, but I dont plan to keep them thag long. I upgrade my CPU every two yrs and gfx every year.
 
EVGA EU warranty doesnt cover changing the cooler, and also isnt lifetime (10 years on premium products, 2 on the rest).

It may have changed, but Id check it first. Zotac cover you for changing the cooler, or at least used to, most companies dont.

As long as your careful you should be fine, be careful with full cover blocks without spaces/sprung screws and dont over tighten anything. Check out the EK cooling configurator to see if there is a block for your card, visual is fine for verification that it fits, it means they have got an auto cad model of it and the block and stuck them together etc.
 
Ch3m1c4L said:
EVGA EU warranty doesnt cover changing the cooler, and also isnt lifetime (10 years on premium products, 2 on the rest).

It may have changed, but Id check it first. Zotac cover you for changing the cooler, or at least used to, most companies dont.

As long as your careful you should be fine, be careful with full cover blocks without spaces/sprung screws and dont over tighten anything. Check out the EK cooling configurator to see if there is a block for your card, visual is fine for verification that it fits, it means they have got an auto cad model of it and the block and stuck them together etc.
Click to expand...

EVGA do let you do it as long as the card isn't physically damaged. I didn't know Zotac allowed it aswell! I might pick two of the 470's up and SLI them:)
10yrs is more than enough!
http://www.coolingconfigurator.com/step1_complist?gpu_gpus=432
How would I know about whether the full cover blocks have spaces or not? How difficult is it to install a waterblock without doing any damage at all?
 
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