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Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 7:30 am
by tehcrazybob
edh wrote:So bringing things back on topic, I think my Leadtek 9600GT with an aftermarket Accelero S1 and custom VRM heatsink is the best silent 9600GT so far:
viewtopic.php?p=408544#408544
Give it separate 2D/3D speeds and voltages and it would be better.
Looks nice! I've thought about cooling for the voltage regulators, and might add some heatsinks eventually, but at the moment I'm in the same situation as you - they've caused no problems at all.
However, like you said, I really wish there were separate 2D/3D speeds. Before I bought this I was also looking at the passive Sapphire HD3850, and to be honest since I spend much more time doing 2D tasks than gaming, its separate voltages and speeds would be really nice to have.
Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2008 8:04 am
by JVM
The ASUS 9600 GT Silent is now available on newegg.com:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814121244
And there is a review of that card on this site:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article821-page1.html
Gigabyte has a 9600 GT passive version listed on their
website
Posted: Wed Apr 23, 2008 5:20 pm
by lemmy
Looks like I'm going to end up with the silent Asus 9600GT card. Still no sign of life at any e-tailers here in the U.S. for the silent version of the Gigabyte card. Newegg has a rebate so the price ends up being under $150.
Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 3:32 am
by JVM
lemmy wrote:Looks like I'm going to end up with the silent Asus 9600GT card. Still no sign of life at any e-tailers here in the U.S. for the silent version of the Gigabyte card. Newegg has a rebate so the price ends up being under $150.
If you get that card, let us know how it goes with the installation, temps, and performance. There were two minor issues reported in that review I linked to above, PCI-E power connection and something about screws.
Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 9:51 am
by lemmy
JVM wrote:lemmy wrote:Looks like I'm going to end up with the silent Asus 9600GT card. Still no sign of life at any e-tailers here in the U.S. for the silent version of the Gigabyte card. Newegg has a rebate so the price ends up being under $150.
If you get that card, let us know how it goes with the installation, temps, and performance. There were two minor issues reported in that review I linked to above, PCI-E power connection and something about screws.
Oh Great - I didn't notice that. I don't want to "break" anything to install anything. It may be time to just sit and wait a bit longer for the Gigabyte model.
Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 10:24 am
by JVM
I wouldn't be too concerned about the power connection situation, but those screws that were not seated properly have me concerned as that is a quality control issue and may reflect their quality control.
The Gigabyte 8600 GT passive card has coil whine noise problem and I wouldn't jump into their 9600 GT until assured that card didn't have a coil whine issue.
You may want to consider the card mentione in this thread, which is also passive:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814134040
Posted: Thu Apr 24, 2008 5:12 pm
by Iron_Dreamer
The ECS 9600GT w/Accelero S2 is doing very well for me. In a 21C room the card idles at 45C and stabilizes at 70C after a half-hour of ATItool artifact scanning. This is in the upper half of a P182 with no intake fans, and a single exhaust fan, S-Flex @ 600RPM. There is no coil whine or other electrical noise that I could notice when I had the case open. Performance is great, just as one would expect. Not bad for $125AR at the Egg!
Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 6:13 am
by rpc180
Also vouch for the ECS 9600. At $125 from newegg its a great buy. I have mine at the bottom of my Solo with the two adjacent pci slot covers removed. Airflow is provided by an S-flex 800 exhast fan and the 120mm PSU intake which suck in air and blow them over the S2's fins. Temps idle around 36C and stabilized at 53 during an hour of gaming. Ambient temp ~24C?
Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 11:28 am
by lemmy
Thanks for the posts rpc180 and Iron_Dreamer.
Well there is no denying hands-on experience, which has changed my mind about the ECS silent version.
I've done thousands of system builds and my experience with ECS from days past left quite the bad taste in my mouth. It was so hit/miss ( many times mostly miss
) that I just couldn't bring myself to buy or recommend any of their PC components. Both CPU and MaximumPC magazine have reviewed their products the past few years and they usually can't deny the fact that ECS may have turned the corner for the better.
Well it's off to NewEgg to spend some Paypal.
Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 12:21 pm
by tehcrazybob
Lemmy: I don't know how much of this thread you've read, but I'll vouch for the ECS 9600gt as well. Like you, I've had a stack of bad experiences with ECS in the past, but the price was too good to turn away from and I don't regret my choice at all.
Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 5:22 pm
by lemmy
tehcrazybob wrote:Lemmy: I don't know how much of this thread you've read, but I'll vouch for the ECS 9600gt as well. Like you, I've had a stack of bad experiences with ECS in the past, but the price was too good to turn away from and I don't regret my choice at all.
Thanks for the information. I've been following the thread since it started.
I made a post about the Gigabyte silent version almost a month ago and also noticed the ECS version at that time as well. Hearing about the coil whine with some cards (both Nvidia and AMD) made me hesitant to buy first release. My silent Rev. 3 Gigabyte 7600GT is serving me rock solid still, but it's been almost a year and the upgrade bug has hit.
Posted: Fri Apr 25, 2008 8:02 pm
by tehcrazybob
lemmy wrote:Thanks for the information. I've been following the thread since it started.
I made a post about the Gigabyte silent version almost a month ago and also noticed the ECS version at that time as well. Hearing about the coil whine with some cards (both Nvidia and AMD) made me hesitant to buy first release. My silent Rev. 3 Gigabyte 7600GT is serving me rock solid still, but it's been almost a year and the upgrade bug has hit.
Yeah, I'd heard about the coil whine on the ECS 8800gt all over the place. I haven't heard anything about it on the 9600, though, and mine certainly doesn't.
Upgrading from a 7600gt, though? I was coming from a 7600gs. You're in for a treat; that's no small speed boost, especially at higher resolutions. For a single quick performance number, it'll run RTHDRIBL full-screen at 1600x1200 at 60 FPS.
Posted: Wed Apr 30, 2008 5:27 pm
by JVM
tehcrazybob:
Did you use the driver from ECS or the latest from nVidia, 174.74?
Posted: Wed Apr 30, 2008 9:53 pm
by tehcrazybob
I grabbed the latest from NVidia. Laptops are the only situation where I'd use the bundled driver.
Posted: Thu May 01, 2008 5:16 pm
by JVM
tehcrazybob wrote:It's arrived! It installed with no problems, and runs beautifully. There's not even a hint of coil whine, the build quality looks good, and the performance is breathtaking (it replaces a 7600gs).
Installation was no more difficult than any other expansion card. My cables are pretty well-managed, but unless your computer is complete chaos, I'd say you're not likely to run into troubles.
I've got an E6550 under a Ninja and the 9600gt/S2 both running passive in the flow provided by a single Nexus at 9v. My temperatures are fantastic; the processor runs 32°C idle, 38°C load and the new card runs 45°C idle, 56°C load. I could easily drop the fan to 7v, but since I'm using a resistor cable it's not completely straightforward. Still, I might do that in the future (once I've seen how it runs in the summer heat).
I could be mistaken but it looks like you left in the bracket beneath the video card as opposed to removing it and leaving open. Have you thought about this, or is there a particular reason why you didn't remove the bracket?
Posted: Thu May 01, 2008 5:46 pm
by tehcrazybob
Do you mean the PCI slot covers? I left them all in place, because there's already a bit perforated section next to them, because the temperatures are fantastic already, and because I don't like the looks of missing covers.
Posted: Mon May 12, 2008 4:59 pm
by Mikey
tehcrazybob wrote:Hammer: You don't have any coil whine with that card? I remember reading that their 8800gt had a huge coil whine problem.
After reading this thread, i was put off buying the Sparkle 8800GT. I was recently offered one cheap, so gave it a go.
It does produce a high-pitched low-decibel screaming noise at high amounts of load - ie AtiTool artifact scanner. I have found though that i could not hear this while the case lid was on however, and as such it's probably acceptable to most people as-is.
Running it inside an Antec Fusion FWIW.
Posted: Tue May 27, 2008 3:59 pm
by JVM
I bought the ECS 9600 GT and put it in my new build. This card runs amazingly cool for the level of performance it gives--quite an achievement!
I had a Gigabyte 7600 GT Silent Pipe 2 in my previous build, which ran warmer than the ECS 9600 GT in my present build. Comparing the two cards, the ECS 9600 GT performs significantly better. No doubt about it, this ECS 9600 GT is definitely worth the $125 dollars I paid; in fact, I can't imagine a passive video card costing less that performs as well.
If not for this thread, I probably never would have considered an ECS card. So, my thanks to the person who started this thread, and also to tehcrazybob for providing the much needed information.
Cheers!
Posted: Wed Jun 04, 2008 11:14 am
by Teh Lurv
Newegg has the Gigabyte Passive 9600GT now on sale. In addition, the rebate and mark-down on the ECS 9600GT has expired, so both cards are currently comparable in price. Anyone try the Gigabyte card yet?
Posted: Wed Jun 04, 2008 11:27 am
by JVM
I don't know if anyone has tried the Gigabyte card, but I don't think the ECS Accelero S2 version can be beat. I wouldn't care if Gigabyte and ECS are same price, for I would still go with ECS, mainly because the Accelero S2 works! And, no coil whine.
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 2:35 am
by Matt1986
I have had the Gigabyte GV-NX96T512HP passive 9600gt for a few weeks now. This morning whilst playing Medieval Total War 2 my screen went blank. I rebooted and checked the VGA core temp using Gigabyte's Gamers Hud. It had reached 105C.
Since this event I've been keeping a closer check on it. It seems to hover around 70-75C when doing basic tasks, web browsing etc.. which is what I mainly use the system for. System temp = 36C, 4 cores range from 34C to 37C (Speedfan) again during basic tasks.
I am using a Silverstone SGO3 SFF case with two Noctua 120mm intake fans as the only case fans, one of which has a clear air path through to the VGA card.
Hope someone finds my experience useful.
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 5:18 am
by JVM
I think you should have an exhaust fan, and that would likely help your video card temperature.
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 6:50 am
by lemmy
Wow, that temp is crazy. Have you checked to make sure the cooling unit is making good contact with the gpu?
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 8:33 am
by Ant6n
whats crazy is the 50$ price increase on the ecs card. How can a card come out at around 125 (AR), and now go for 175?
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 10:07 am
by JVM
Ant6n wrote:whats crazy is the 50$ price increase on the ecs card. How can a card come out at around 125 (AR), and now go for 175?
It was $125 dollars with the rebate! Rebates don't last forever.
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 10:44 am
by Ant6n
often rebates are an indication of where prices will go; but instead it went up the rebate amount...
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 11:28 am
by Fallsroad
Wow, that is really high.
I have the ECS 9600GT also, and it idles around 39-42C and tops out at about 62C under extended full load. This is in an Antec P180B case with a slow 500RPM font fan, and two low RPM (800) exhaust fans.
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 11:38 am
by JVM
Quite surprising the ECS 8800 GT is $145 dollars and $30 less than the ECS 9600 GT. So, I don't know if it makes any sense to buy the 9600 GT.
ECS 8800 GT at $145 dollars:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814134035
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 12:52 pm
by Fallsroad
Wow - low price for an 8800GT.
Is that an S2 on it?
Posted: Thu Jun 05, 2008 1:12 pm
by JVM
No, it is an S1.