Gigabyte X800 XL Silentpipe!

rei · Post by **rei** » Fri May 13, 2005 2:19 pm

hmm, still 85 load :/

rei · Post by **rei** » Fri May 13, 2005 5:26 pm

bah!

too many fans, more added noise.

here's what i am settling on:

pointing big 120mm nexus on 6-10v right at the video card, blowing air to back of case (and not at the card where i had the fb123 previous, took that off entirely)

45 idle, 70 load now, and it's quiet.

the nexus isn't held down by anything except the weight of the psu cables and rounded cable sitting on it

perhaps i should duct tape it in place or something, right now it's just standing there, no place to mount/screw it in though.

tay · Post by **tay** » Thu May 19, 2005 7:45 am

rei wrote:the nexus isn't held down by anything except the weight of the psu cables and rounded cable sitting on it perhaps i should duct tape it in place or something, right now it's just standing there, no place to mount/screw it in though.

Hang it using strings. I did that to a fan near my zalman that blows air over the top of the HD and towards the zalman. Its about 8 cms away from the zalman and helps with cooling bot the HD and the video card. The HD is sitting on the floor of the case on some rails but surprisingly gets 2-3 C cooler with a fan blowing 4 cm above it.

rei · Post by **rei** » Thu May 19, 2005 8:05 am

i wonder, with the heatpipe, is it better to cool the top or the bottom?

tay · Post by **tay** » Thu May 19, 2005 8:42 am

rei wrote:i wonder, with the heatpipe, is it better to cool the top or the bottom?

hehe I didnt look at your pics earlier, I was just mentioning what I did and looking at the pics it seems that you have done something somewhat similar. In your case, obvious towards the top makes more sense, but I think if you can clear some of the cables and mount a fan _just_ under the HD area you will still get airflow over the top. This fan might help draw in some air from the front panel as well and push the hotter air towards the back fan. Not exactly push pull, but working together. I dont know how well this would work in your case (*snicker* pun intended) but I think its worth a try especially since it costs $0 and doesnt require a lot of work. Oh, and get rid of those grills!

mr_pickles · Post by **mr_pickles** » Sun May 22, 2005 6:49 pm

Anyone know when the AGP version will be available in the states? The Gigabyte site has it listed (model #GV-R80L256V) as "Coming Soon".

Also, do you have to stick to the Gigabyte drivers if you want to keep the VIVO functionality or are there separate drivers for VIVO that can be used with whatever Catalyst drivers you want? I hope the latter since I imagine Gigabyte not keeping up to date with the latest Catalyst releases at a certain point.

rei · Post by **rei** » Sun May 22, 2005 9:42 pm

I've never touched Gigabyte drivers

Alway use reference ATI Catalyst. I play Gamecube with the VIVO using DScaler.

mr_pickles · Post by **mr_pickles** » Mon May 23, 2005 5:42 am

rei wrote:I've never touched Gigabyte drivers Alway use reference ATI Catalyst. I play Gamecube with the VIVO using DScaler.

That's very good to hear. I guess they use an ATI chip for VIVO?

Just need to wait for them to release the AGP version then. Thanks.

Ephemeral2 · Post by **Ephemeral2** » Sat Jun 04, 2005 1:48 pm

Does this X800XL take up the slot next to it as well?

The rear HS looks quite large...

rei · Post by **rei** » Sun Jun 05, 2005 10:42 pm

technically it doesn't but it almost does. i don't think i'd put anything put a small low profile nic underneath it

the bulk of the weight is above it (on what is actually the underbelly of a video card) facing upwards which can obstruct some mobo/cpu fans sometimes.

w00dy · Post by **w00dy** » Mon Jun 06, 2005 2:26 am

I am thinking of getting this card (PCI-E) but am concerned about temps.

In my BQE3700 am thinking of placing a 120mm Nexus on the inside of the drive cage (in the same position as the intake on the Sonata) to push intake air towards the X800XL at the rear of the case.

Does this sound like a plan ? Don't really want to add another 120mm with a Zalman Fan Bracket if I can help it !

Will be very pleased if this works out OK - can't stand whiney graphics card fans

w00dy · Post by **w00dy** » Mon Jun 06, 2005 2:27 am

Oops clicked twice

halcyon · Post by **halcyon** » Tue Jun 07, 2005 10:42 pm

Gigabyte Silent-Pipe Radeon X800 XL (GV-RX80L256V) PCIe Review:

GPU Observed Temperatures (°C)
Right after boot: 40
Idle: 55
Load: 92

http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=801&pageID=1590

With no direct fan flow, it can get scorchingly hot.

rei · Post by **rei** » Wed Jun 08, 2005 12:16 am

i get that -with- fan flow.

neo_tofu · Post by **neo_tofu** » Fri Jun 10, 2005 7:00 am

I was getting 55C idle and over 70C when playing games.

I had a Gigabyte 6600GT passive.

I had to return the card because it had some problems - perhaps because of the heat? I dont' know.

I should get a new one back soon but this time I'm thinking of opening up the slots beneath the card and also running the frong Nexus 120mm fan at 12v when playing games. I don't know if that will provide enough airflow though.

Smithore · Post by **Smithore** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 7:09 am

Long-time lurker, first post. Is the consensus on this card that it needs a fan pointed directly at it? I'm putting specs together for a silent gaming PC, but I don't want to mess with anything but front and back fans.

Oliver · Post by **Oliver** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 10:12 pm

neo_tofu wrote:I was getting 55C idle and over 70C when playing games.

I had a Gigabyte 6600GT passive.

I had to return the card because it had some problems - perhaps because of the heat? I dont' know.

About your 6600gt from gigabyte/
What case did you have it in?

Did you ever hook up a tv to it to see how crisp it video output was?
I know it has HDTV out, but does it have s-video out? Was the tv really sharp or would you say the output from an ati all in wonder card would give sharper tv output?

Thanks

Slidax · Post by **Slidax** » Sun Jun 19, 2005 5:34 pm

A 120mm fan makes a lot of difference and it cools the NB as well (originally from this thread http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=22898)

heres a pic of it
http://img235.echo.cx/img235/355/newfan1ug.jpg

i took all the back panels off so the air can escape and a fanmate2 is used to keep the rpm low

Phil7C · Post by **Phil7C** » Sun Jul 03, 2005 10:37 am

How wide is this card? Or, more specifically, how thick is the heatsink on the back of the card - how far does it stick-out from the PCI-E slot?

(I want to put together an Asus A8N-SLI Premium + XP-120 and want to know if this card will fit...?!)

Slidax · Post by **Slidax** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 8:18 pm

its not too wide, roughly 20-25mm from the top of the PCB

fits the 7700alcu ok so perhaps compare its dimensions with the xp120

Slidax · Post by **Slidax** » Mon Jul 04, 2005 10:38 pm

piotrgurin wrote: I'm still trying to figure out how to measure temps on the card.

ait tool
http://www.techpowerup.com/atitool/

mine sits at 40C on idle WITH airflow around it, so if you get higher temps than that i wouldnt worry unless it becomes unstable

edit - oops didnt realise this was from the first page haha

Phil7C · Post by **Phil7C** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 12:39 pm

I've rigged a Nexus @ 12V to suck air in the opening on the side of my Antec SLK3000B and blow it straight at the GFX - now getting:

Idle: 43C
Load: 86C (using ATITool 0.24)

X2 4400+ is happy at 30/45C (idle/load) so it's not a case temp issue. And surely the Nexus should provide sufficient airflow for the GFX heatsink?

Q: has anyone tried taking the heatsink apart and applying some AS5? There's a 6600 thread here http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewto ... abyte+6600 where someone did this, although with subsequent problems...

cotdt · Post by **cotdt** » Thu Aug 11, 2005 12:48 pm

If you have to add a fan to a passive GPU cooler, doesn't that defeat the purpose?

Personally, I've used 3 different brands of fanless coolers for my nVidia 6800, and all of them push my temps past 100C before crashing. Only way to get those fanless to work is to get a lot of ventilation in the case via fans, defeating the whole purpose. Well, now I have passive Athlon64, passive PSU, passive 6800, passive everything with awesome temps and no fans. I am happy now. =)

The new 7800GT uses very little power compared to all previous generation cards like X800 and 6800. 50W less power on load than 6800Ultra and X850! This one I think you can actually cool passively.

BlackD · Post by **BlackD** » Wed Aug 17, 2005 3:43 pm

Hello boys and girls! Now it's time for a little educational story:

Once upon a time there was a Gigabyte Radeon X800 graphics card, and it was equipped with passive cooler.

http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~blackd/project_s ... ucks/1.jpg
http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~blackd/project_s ... ucks/2.jpg
http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~blackd/project_s ... ucks/3.jpg

It was nice and shiny and didn't look that bad at all. In fact, it looked decent. However, it was much lighter what it looked like. But how this thing goes apart? Maybe I'll just take a good grip and tear the front heatplate off! And what do we see? The heatplate is attached to the middle part only with tiny, thick two-sided (hopefully) thermal adhesive tape.

http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~blackd/project_s ... ucks/4.jpg

I'm just wondering if that will dissipate any heat from core to heatplate.. But maybe the other heatplate is designed better? At least there are two heatpipes attached to it. Let's find out by taking those screws off:

http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~blackd/project_s ... ucks/5.jpg

Oh my god! There really is some thermal paste! But someone who applied it was careless. Not enough, and really uneven layer. Doesn't look too good anymore. And what about the part that should make contact with core? Carefully applied Arctic Silver (sorry, no pic of that ugly pink stock thermal "paste") shows that someone has done wrong measurements. Luckily the core still manages to make contact with heatsink.. but what a contact. One corner hasn't even touched the heatsink. It seems that I did a mistake and didn't tighten the heatsink enough. No way, no mistakes by me!

http://www.ee.oulu.fi/~blackd/project_s ... ucks/6.jpg

It's all because of this lousy backplate and tiny spring-screws. Even if you tighten it all the way down, it's still too loose. Oh what a shame, it seems that this cooler just sucks. I'm not wondering anymore why the core climbed to unbelievable 105C temp under load. And at the same time measured with thermal probe front heatplate was 55C and back heatplate 65C. The heat just stays on the core with this cooler. Then I took Zalman fan bracket and attached Antec Tricool 120mm fan over graphics card. I gave full 12V voltage to Tricool and enormous airflow wiped over Gigabyte cooler. Still 85C at load.

So what's the education in this story? If you buy Gigabyte X800 or X800XL, quickly throw that stock cooler away and get something decent before your card dies!

rei · Post by **rei** » Sun Aug 21, 2005 8:58 am

hi blackd, was it hard to remove the heatpipe?

Aleksi · Post by **Aleksi** » Sun Aug 21, 2005 9:22 am

Hi BlackD,

I reported with pictures on the fanless Gigabyte 6800 thread. It seems these two cards use almost if not identical heatsinks. Just for the record, my heatsink didn't even have those thermal tapes...

The passive Gigabyte 6800 is currently running passive in my case. Fitted with a Zalman ZM-80D. Somehow I decided the 100C load temps weren't healthy. Even after applying AS5 the temps eventually rose to about 90C. Which somewhat proves, that the heatsink isn't good enough for these kind of power dissipation figures.

Gigabyte has some serious design and production line issues to fix before I can recommend one of their passive cards to anyone.

BlackD · Post by **BlackD** » Sun Aug 21, 2005 9:48 am

rei wrote:hi blackd, was it hard to remove the heatpipe?

Actually it was quite a task. After removing the screws you'll have to get the front heatplate off. As I stated earlier it's attached with adhesive tape so it can be difficult. First time I tried to open it I actually bent the heatpipes so that I could slide the card out. Afterwards I noticed how it was attached and simply used force to remove it. Maybe it could be done while the card is still inside?

aleksi wrote:It seems these two cards use almost if not identical heatsinks. Just for the record, my heatsink didn't even have those thermal tapes...

Uh, if your heatsink didn't have any tape how it stayed at its place

As I said those tapes are the only thing that attaches front plate to rest of the cooler. I wonder if pressure from the screws can be enough to hold cooler attached.. well that explains why you said it's very easily detachable/attachable

rei · Post by **rei** » Sun Aug 21, 2005 10:03 am

yes, you detailed it quite well, i meant if you personally felt it was troublesome/difficult. i guess that would be 'yes'.

i was going to try to salvage my x800xl and put a vf700-alcu on it but it looks like way too much trouble. i'm just going to get a more generix x800xl and mod it.

Aleksi · Post by **Aleksi** » Sun Aug 21, 2005 10:07 am

Well, it didn't have thermal tape... You could actually pull the heatsink with heatpipes out of the card while the top heatsink would still be held in place.

I actually tried that too...

I think the yellow heat transfer pad on the GPU part of the heatsink is supposed to be sticky enough to hold it in place.

My heatsink has an X-shaped backplate with four screws. These screws are supposed to cause enough pressure on the GPU heatsink-plate to make proper contact. But the above explains why there have been reports of people with crooked heatsinks displaced in transit.

You can check my pictures here: http://forums.silentpcreview.com/viewtopic.php?t=23493

scrawnypaleguy · Post by **scrawnypaleguy** » Tue Aug 23, 2005 12:01 pm

Yeah I'm also worried about my temps with this cooler (90C under load), since I have very little airflow going through my Wavemaster, but I don't want to add any noise. How loud is that zalman VF700Cu? If I run it at 5v, is it quiet enough to be considered "silent"?

Gigabyte X800 XL Silentpipe!

A couple questions...

Width?