VGA cooling idea

They make noise, too.

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Scooby
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Joined: Tue Nov 11, 2003 12:37 pm

VGA cooling idea

Post by Scooby » Wed Nov 19, 2003 11:03 am

After problems with an arctic cooling vga silencer that didnt fit my radeon 9800pro 128mb I had an idea of how to cool the graphics card quietly. Dont know if this has been thought of before or how effective it will be...any opinions would be appreciated. Having a Pc where the only card is the graphics card is invaluable for this idea..I'd have to reconsider when I get any add on cards (sata, etc)

Its very crude, in effect its a 92mm fan (taken from an antec truepower 380w psu) at 5v supported by 4 3" decking screws. My theory is to unplug the whiney ati fan on the heatsink (but leave it connected to the heatsink) and put this under the graphics card, blowing air onto the ati heatsink. Its just a rough idea at the moment, if its of any use I plan to replace the screws with bolts ( longer than the existing screws to get nearer to the graphics card) and bolts to make a more secure fixture. Then stick some soft padding to the bolt heads to eliminate any vibration.

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Zyzzyx
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Post by Zyzzyx » Wed Nov 19, 2003 11:09 am

Looks like it should work. Just another variation on how to mount a fan there. Looks like it could end up being sturdier than a Zalman fanmount, or a bent PCI slot cover.

gbass01
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Joined: Sun Oct 13, 2002 7:41 am
Location: Virginia

Post by gbass01 » Sun Nov 23, 2003 8:27 pm

This is looks very much like the setup I've been using for the past 3-4 months. You will need better vibration dampening at the bottom. I used 2 3-inch #8 machine screws. Only 2 are needed to hold the fan up, and that way this fan stand can fit around PCI cards in the 2 lowest PCI slots. I used a plastic fan filter holder as a base for the machine screws. I also had an extra metal fan grill lying around so I screwed that on top of the filter holder for extra stability. Put a square of 2mm foam sheet under the base and velcroed the whole deal to the case floor with 2-inch vecro strap. Caution: the loop part of the strap does shed a few bits of nylon every time you undo the velcro.

I also used a speed-monitored 92mm Panaflo L1A, so now I can make sure the fan is actually spinning (I guess the card would fry if it didn't)

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