Thermaltake GF4 cooler?

MGP · Post by **MGP** » Tue Dec 24, 2002 8:09 pm

i currently own a gainward geforce 4 ti 4600 golden sample which i believe has a higher-rpm fan than the nvidia stock gpu fan. Since my system stress temps kick up to 40 C, i doubt that i can use the zalman gpu heatpipe setup well and there is little space between the card and the case's side panel. therefore, i was thinking that i would just get a quieter gpu fan and i recently saw a thermal gf4 cooler that supposedly runs at 29 db. does anyone know if this is quieter than the gainward gpu fan or have any better suggestions for quieting down my video card? i would really appreciate it! btw, HAPPY HOLIDAYS AND A HAPPY NEW YEAR!

gbass01 · Post by **gbass01** » Tue Dec 24, 2002 9:26 pm

the Thermaltake G4 cooler is fairly loud. I undervolted it till it was silent, but my G4 4200 soon failed and had to be RMA'ed. Don't know if it overheated or just died a natural death. I also did not use enough thermal compound - the 4200 GPU has an indentation in it that needs to be either filled with compound or the edges need to be sanded down.

MGP · Post by **MGP** » Wed Jan 01, 2003 9:49 am

so do you think that thermaltake's claim of the gpu cooler running at 29 dB is a not true? i really would love to know as i have had many experiences where the acoustical output for a fan is totally exaggerated.

gbass01 · Post by **gbass01** » Wed Jan 01, 2003 7:18 pm

don't know about dB figures, but at 12 volts it was way louder than any of the undervolted fans in my system. After I got the card RMA'ed I kept the stock HSF on. The ThermalTake is in a box in the closet.

What I'm really interested in is a spring clip to hold a small pin-fin (1U?) copper heatsink on the GPU. Then I think I'd use an 80mm Panaflo mounted at 45 degrees to bounce air off the hsf surace and out the (open) 1st PCI slot hole. I don't mind dremeling a heatsink so it accepts a clip, but where can I get a clip like that? Someone suggested drilling the heatsink itself and mounting it with screws (no springs) thru the mounting holes. Sounds a bit harder to execute. What I'm not willing to do just yet is to use thermal epoxy. Way too permanent for my taste.

Someone else suggested taking the plexy and the fan off the Thermaltake and just using it as a heatsink. That would solve the mounting issue, but there are no pins/fins over the GPU itself (where the fan now sits) and I think that may lead to poor heat dissipation.

Any thoughts on these issues from anyone?