I currently have a gtx 285 and it's been (more or less) quiet enough for me, but lately it's starting to struggle with newer games causing the fan to rev up till it's noisy as hell.

So now I'm thinking about getting a new gfx card and comparing all the idle/load noise levels got me wondering what would make the most sense:
- getting a less powerful quiet card that has a lower load noise level but is more likely to hit full load
- or getting a powerful card that has a higher load noise level but might not get to that level until more demanding games come along
Could a powerful card actually be quieter on the same gfx settings?

And on a related note I found this: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Pali ... bo/26.html. Seems to be extremely quiet for this sort of card (without getting a custom cooler), to good to be true? I notice it says this on the testing method: The 3D load noise levels are tested with a stressful game, not Furmark. Does that mean same game, same settings, or just everything pushed as far as each card will go, or same fps? What's the most likely method used here?

Sorry if these are all stupid questions, I don't usually think about stuff like this until its time to upgrade my pc
Any insights would be appreciated.

If you can find a Galaxy GTX 580 58NLH5HS3PXZ, is probably the fastest GPU atm (until the 7970 is out), the galaxy has some good things though, they are using Acelero Xtreme and seutp to idle at 30% fan speed (around 900rpm) where i personally don't hear it, some have flashed the bios to have it idle at 20% fan speed and you just pick around 5C more at idle, on load the card is still very quiet, without MSI afterburner the card will remain at 30% until hitting 73C, where it start to ramp up, under SC2, LOL, HON i havent been able to take it there. I use MSI after burner, and even at 50% fan speed is fairly quiet to me (this might vary to each person), but at this speed playing SC2 for 4 hours the highest temp i seen is around 64C, i think you could even mantain it at 30% fine, but really will depend on your ambient temp and your case airflow, etc. Its been a great card in my experience, and wont change it until i see GTX780 with similar fan performance.

I have the exact same card. Had to mod it to 10% to get it quiet at idle. After a while the bios decided 20% was the minimum fan speed for some reason. This was way too loud for me. In the end I strapped on 2 Nexus fans on it at 7V (with tiedbinds).

Best thing you can do is IMHO buy this card and get the 2 extra fans for 15 euro and youve got a beast of a card which is basically inaubiable, even at load. It tops at 84C under heavy load (Furmark, Witcher 2 with ubersampling etc) at the same inaubiable speed. Idle is 28C.

Why buy still buy this card? I has a quality build with an excellent backplate for extra heat dissapation and - best of all - has a big cooling block for the Vrams. It's massive, so no fiddling with getting the tiny aftermarket ones of the AXII on it.

It is indeed a great card IF that test is correct. There are very few cards that only get an extra 2db on full load, so I doubt the test is 100% correct.

Also keep in mind this version has only 1GB of mem which is IMHO not enough. I have 1,4 on my 580GTX and it's often maxed out (on Civ5 for instance).

Would be interesting to see, thats if you have some pics of it

I'm not really interested in mods as that wasn't really the point for this thread but I'll keep it in mind.

So far I only see the most powerful cards mentioned, does that mean you would choose the second option from the first post? (= power over quiet under load but weaker)

I found another noise test for the palit: http://www.guru3d.com/article/palit-gef ... e-review/9 but, looking at the other cards on the chart, this doesn't seem reliable. According to this it's louder than a stock 560 ti and even a 560 ti in sli ...
edit: And another one http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/4371/p ... dex17.html mic right up to the card, hmm

Ill put some up later.

Mods are less scary than you think. Was trying to convince you can have the best of both worlds if you put in some effort. Like all things in life

A more powerful card would probably be quieter if you tax it as much as a cheaper card can go, simply because the card would be designed to handle its maximum power output. I recently got hold of a GTX480, and with an aftermarket cooler it is the most silent card I've had. Before I got lower midrange cards mostly and they were louder, with smaller coolers of course. I even got 5°C lower temperature by reversing my CPU cooler to suck air away from the board, I'd guess the PCB design of the GTX480 has something to do with that too. edit: Seems to help only of the PSU dumps its heat also into the case.

Before buying this cooler, or other cards before, I read noise reviews too. It seems to be very dependend on the test procedure, because none of my cards before were anywhere near silent as suggested by the reviews. On the other hand, I saw mixed reviews about my new cooler, and some suggested that it wasn't very silent, contrary to my experience.

I don't know, maybe aftermarket coolers really depend on a good PWM signal too, as suggested by tanassi:

And to answer the OP (almost forgot that): most games nowadays are shameless console ports. They never max out a hight end card on a 1080p resolution. But they will max out a low/mid card and thus make the gpu cooling fans work harder. GPU coolers are usually 92mm wide and the smallest, noisiest fan in your case. Better is using the airflow in your case created by much quieter 120/140mm fans.

That is why i prefer high end cards that dont have to work so hard, cooled by a gentle flow instead of mid\low cards at full load with frantically spinning 92mm fans. (this only goes for gaming at the same settings: resolution, AA, etc).

Even better: a high end card with 120mm, but I've said that so often now I'll drop it all the same

True, so far I've only had trouble with in-game cinematic bits where they turn up the effects etc and parts with lots of particles etc. I bought the witcher 1 & 2 in a steam sale and witcher 1 was mostly ok except for some locations (druid grove) but the witcher 2 is just to much even with most effects turned off.

Heh, looks like we're in the same boat kermith ! Did you find what you were looking for ?
Got a gtx 285 here that's whining like crazy with new games, and you know what the card still performed well, just high temps.

So I've tried installing an aftermarket cooler yesterday (zalman vf3000n), to make a long story short it was either the AS5 shortcircuting the board, the nvio heatsink mismatch or the pathetic ram glue not holding up but I think I've fried the card.
Had problems with aftermarket videocard coolers in the past, where it died after a few months, They might be quiet but I really don't trust those anymore.

I think I'll do my research from now on and look for a card that has good cooling from the get go.
Am looking at the same cards as you do now as well, the 560Ti, seems a nice price, good cooling and performs as good as a 285.
imo the current gen nvidia doesn't warrent spending 400-500$, I'll post if I find anything interesting.

I decided to wait and see what's going on with the next gen cards. The 7970 is already here, won't be to long before the 7950 and word is we'll see a new geforce in feb or march (no way to know for sure though). If they are all as expensive as the 7970 I'll probably still get an older card, but hopefully at a reduced price.

Smart move, I heard nvidia skipped a generation and will release 7xx which supposed to be a killer - it would be really silly to buy a graphic card atm.

Anyway I gotta find something I can use for work in the meantime, no luck so far - everyone says 560 is hot as hell and therefore noisy ..
Man, it really annoys me forking 400$ every 2 years for a video card, those things just don't last ..
Aftermarket coolers are quiet, but after 2 failed tries it's not an option .. I think the glued heatsink design is just terrible there are plenty of screwholes that should have been used instead ..