GForce4 MX440

digger760 · Post by **digger760** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 3:33 am

HI there,

I have a Creative GForce4 MX 440, I want to take the fan of it. I have seen the Pine GForce4 MX 440 has no fan.

Based on what I've read in these forums I could use a heat sink similar to the Pine or like the one that Rusty075 used on his Gforce2Ti.

The best I could hope for is to take away the fan (I presume there is a small heatsink underneath it). And the underlying heatsink might be good enough.

Is there anyone out there who has tried this.

Cheers

ChiefWeasel · Post by **ChiefWeasel** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 3:39 am

Havent tried it myself, but its worth a try. But, I would imagine the HS would be very small, and probably not able to cope without a fan. You could try pointing a 7V 80mm fan at it. Or perhaps put a Zalman VGA HS or similar on it.

If you take the fan off, be careful of the temps. If you ran something like 3DMark i would think it would crash. I doubt creative would put a fan on if it wasnt needed.

Post by **Rusty075** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 9:17 am

One most mid-level graphics cards like the MX440 the fan is there for marketing reasons more than anything else. For Creative the little fan adds market appeal (makes the card "appear" more powerful), and is cheaper and lighter than a passive heatsink.

I'd try using a passive heatsink like the one I've got. It would be a whopping $1.75 investment (from allelectronics.com). If its not quite stable you can add an undervolted fan to it. I've got a 5v Papst 80mm mounted above mine. But I also have my card overclocked heavily and I use it for lots of gaming. If you don't run 3D games for hours on end you'll probably be fine with just passive cooling.

Fastman · Post by **Fastman** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 9:49 am

What would you recommend for a gforce 2MX?

I just checked and the fan has died so it is running quite hot at the moment.
At least in the short term, I think I am further ahead to remove the dead fan.

Can I run it bare (no heatsink, no fan) indefinetely? or should I mount a passive heatsink on it?

Post by **Rusty075** » Wed Nov 20, 2002 12:59 pm

I have a geForce 2MX in my machine that runs with just the stock passive heatsink. Mine is overclocked as well, with no stability problems. And the stock heatsink is fairly puny.

The MX is card on the far left. You can see the thin blue heatsink on it. The Geforce2 Ti is on the far right. You can make out alittle of its tall black heatsink under the Papst. The thin dark blue sinks on that card are memory coolers.

There are a couple more pics of it in my article: Rusty's Quiet In-Desk PC

My advice would be to download 3DMark2001 and run it. That benchmark will tax your card harder than you are likely to ever do. If it runs fine through that, you're safe.