Anyone have any recommendations for a passively cooled, fairly modern, video card that does not suffer from the high pitched whine so many new video cards seem to have these days?

The cards I currently use is a Geforce 8600GTS and on a second computer a Geforce 7950GT. Both have had no whine whatsoever for several years. It did try a passive Geforce 9800GT card a few years ago, but it made this really annoying whine so I sent it back, then gave up on the whole idea of a new video card. But well... its time for a complete system upgrade... but I havent really paid attention to the computer market since core 2 duo was new so I am not so updated... Apparently you can even get graphics from your CPU these days? Maybe thats an option too for a passive whine-less video card? Or maybe that type of onboard video isnt very good at all?

Anyway, I dont really need anything too fancy, but something a step up from my now really old cards would be nice though.

So... suggestions?

I previously found that my 9600GT whined in 3D when it was connected to an Enermax PSU. Now with a Seasonic PSU it does not whine. Possibly it depends on the PSU as well as the graphics card so as to whether a graphics card whines or not.

Electronic noise in gfx cards is pretty hit/miss depending on your particular system. When you say you are looking for a step up...is it for gaming? If so, what games, monitor resolution, picture quality levels, etc? At the moment, the top end passive is the AMD HD7750. There are some very quiet fanned cards as well if you need more of a performance bump.

If you are considering to replace your CPU sometime soon - the integrated GPU in the current gen of Intel and AMD CPUs are faster than your 8600GTS and use in the neighborhood of 10-20W vs the 70W of your card.

I see... yeah I am beginning to understand it can be pretty complicated stuff this... I like my current PSU, its passively cooled and has worked well without any noises at all for some time. But I do have another one so if I experience whine I'll definitely remember to check with a different PSU. Thanks for the suggestion.

Thanks for your reply. Yeah the plan is to replace my CPU and motherboard as well. So the integrated GPU's are that good? You know which integrated GPUs are best? And how does it work? I assume the actual connectors are on the motherboard? Can you get two-screen output from those too? I suppose I should google some on that, but it's always nice when someone explains it...

Well, actually, I am running a Hackintosh that I use for my work, which is video editing and After Effects/Photoshop work so, thats the most important part. However the newest OSX versions have real trouble with older Geforce cards... so thats the main reason I'd like a more modern card. So no, I am not looking for a heavy gaming card really, but when I am upgrading it would be nice with something a little better, if I can run Civ 5 with a decent framerate I'd be happy. My 8600GTS can barely manage it, but the framerates are pretty bad... But like I said, since I made my system so silent that downside of that is stuff like high pitched whine gets really noticable and annoying. So mainly I wanna get rid of that problem in my new system.

I looked at the Sapphire HD7750 and figured out, like you said, that it seems to be the best passive card in terms of performance, although the review here does say it comes with a little whine, but maybe not much. I might go for a CPU with good integrated GFX and then try a few video cards as well... and return them if they make some annoy noises. Not sure... I'll definitely need to learn more about integrated GFX. Its new to me. I am thinking about an i5 or i7... but if AMD have better integrated GPU then maybe I'll consider AMD. In the core 2 generation it used to be that Intel was generally the best CPU, and also came with less power consumption and heat output. Not sure if that's true today as well?

If you are going to run a Hackintosh then you definitely want to go Intel. It's possible to use AMD for a Hackintosh but it's more work as no real Mac has AMD CPUs.

Intel CPUs are still the higher performing as well as better performance/watt than AMD CPUs. AMDs do have better integrated GPUs.

Oh right. AMDs and Hackintosh is of course not a great idea. Yeah no, AMD isnt really an option then. Intel CPUs with HD 4000 seems to currently be the best CPUs with the best integrated Graphics... right?

It's not that simple. Yes, the fastest (not necessarily best) CPU that also has integrated graphics has the HD 4000. That is the i7-3770K. However, there are much slower CPUs that also have the HD 4000. There are faster CPUs that have no integrated graphics. Then of course power consumption and price can change what "best" means for a particular situation.

Counting AMDs there are CPUs with faster integrated graphics than the HD 4000. The CPUs are all slower than the 3770K.

washu: Its never simple.

Well, yeah if I was only running windows I'd definitely consider an AMD for their better CPU graphics. But that's not really an option. AMD and Hackintosh seems more problematic if it even works at all. Seems like any CPu with HD 4000 is probably my best choice. Then I can run decent graphics from the CPU, but I can also add a dedicated video card of I want to.

The i7-3770K does seem like the best choice, I dont upgrade my computer often so I might as well get one of the better CPUs. And i5 with HD-4000 is a possibility too of course, but i7 arent that much more expensive anyway... Although power consumption and heat seem is another thing to consider... guess Ill have to google that too and see of my power supply and cooler is up for it.

If you spec out your system components here, we can tell you whether your PSU can cut it/ how much power you'll need. FYI, a stock i5 and i7 have a 77W TDP. Figure 30W for the mobo and 20W for drives, etc. So, <130W without a discrete Gfx card.

Hackintosh: Probably ought to hit up some Hackintosh sites to see what mobos work well this year. I seem to see a lot of Gigabyte boards mentioned. If Asus works, great - as they have very good fan control.

Apps and the CPU: Take a look at Anand's CPU Bench. Compare your current CPU to the i3's, i5's, and i7's to see how much of a bump you'll get in processing speed for these $130/$230/$330 CPUs. Might be that the i5-3470K is good enough and you can save $100.

GPU: The H77 and Z77 mobos have multiple video outputs and will support 2 displays....just need to see if they have the outputs you need/come with an adapter/need to buy an adapter.

If you do decide on a discrete card, check the Hackintosh sites for gfx card compatibility...as Apple seems to switch back and forth between AMD and NVidia each model year or two...you may need to pick the mfgr that is used with the Ivybridge CPUs...which is NVidia. <shrugs>

Steve: Thanks for your info. I used some power output calculation site and seems I like I should be fine.

My system if I go for an i7 would be: A regular ATX motherboard, i7 CPU/GPU, 8 or 16GB RAM, 2 SSD disks, one 5400 rpm disk, probably one USB disk connected most of the time, DVD-RW, and perhaps a passive radeon HD 7750 video card, or a similar passive Geforce. Two 120mm low noise low rpm fans. No overclocking.

My current PSU seems to be 580W, the site I used suggested that a 350W PSU would be enough, and my output would be much lower than that, 200-something.

I've been a frequent visitor of Hackintosh sites since Leopard was new, and used a Hackintosh for both work and entertainment the last 4-5 years. So yeah, its definitely a good idea to check out those sites, and I will absolutely do it to make sure the stuff I pick has been tested and worked for someone else. But its a gamble either way, you never really know what combinations of parts will work, and what types of hacks or drivers you end up needing. I've always had ASUS mobos and they have always served me well, and my current board has worked flawlessly with OSX for years so I am kinda ASUS biased I guess. It's also the reason I've stuck with my now pretty gold system, since OSX has worked so well and I know how hard it is to get it to work before you learn what works for your system... but well, stuff is getting a bit sluggish and old, and I just cant get Lion/Mountain Lion to work with my current setup. So I guess Ill just have to do it, and I need an upgrade either way. Which is why I am thinking an i7 is the best choice, not because I really need it now, but I probably wont upgrade for a while, so if I go for an i7 I probably dont need to upgrade too soon again... one would assume. And from what I understood i5/i7 doesnt matter much in games, but in the type of work I do (graphics/video editing) that needs a lot of calculations, encoding and multitasking i7 simply is faster.

I think I figured out the mobo output thing, most seem to come with at least 1 displayport, 1 DVI and 1 HDMI output, which is probably good enough for me. And I could always use a dedicated video card if I need more than that for some reason... Or? Can you use both your CPU-GPU and a dedicated card at the same time?

If the s/w uses hyperthreading, then yes, the i7 can be faster. It just depends on the s/w.


sure.

Is there a list of video cards that are well known to cause coil whine?

I'm afraid it's not that simple. As I said earlier in this thread, whining of components can be related to the PSU that they're running on. When people say some component or other whines it's not necessarily inherent in that component, it could be down to other reasons.

Is it possible to enable/disable the dedicated card in BIOS or similar? Say I only play games on Saturdays and then want a powerful dedicated card, but the rest of the week I want to have a silent word processor with only CPU-GPU that does not while at 20% fanspeed in idle. (My current dedicated card has started to whine, that is why I am thinking of alternatives for my next build. I don't play a lot of games but would like to keep the possibility to do so every now and then and I could live with doing a BOIS change before and after I go for a playing spree.) Would that be possible?

/g

how long were you using that card and how many mth. it has been before it starts to whine?

Many motherboards have an option for detecting the onboard graphics or graphics card first. I don't think this is a good way of doing what you're asking though. Modern graphics cards have tiny power consumption under 2D usage so it will be close in terms of power consumption to onboard graphics. You would also have to deal with the problem that most fan cooled cards run the fan at a high speed until the driver is loaded, therefore if you were using the onoboard graphics with the distcrete graphics card disabled you would have MORE noise.

A bit over a year now.

That's too bad. Maybe I should just bite the bullet and accept the costs involved with building a gaming rig and a quiet rig.