Sapphire HD 4850, non reference design, best way to cool!

They make noise, too.

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smilingcrow
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Sapphire HD 4850, non reference design, best way to cool!

Post by smilingcrow » Tue Mar 31, 2009 2:36 am

I’ve just picked up a Sapphire HD 4850 which has a dual slot non reference design so I’m wondering what after market heatsink will fit it. Any ideas?

Mats
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Post by Mats » Tue Mar 31, 2009 4:41 am

The cooler is non reference, but the card is reference design, right? If that is the case, then I guess you can use any cooler that's supposed to fit a 4850.
There are non reference PCB's made as well, but not by Sapphire AFAIK, here's one example.

Tzupy
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Post by Tzupy » Tue Mar 31, 2009 5:34 am

No, the card isn't reference design, it has the VRM to the left of the GPU, not to the right.
So the GPU socket is shifted to the right, and any aftermarket cooler is going to be shifted to the right also, by 3-4cm I guess.
If you'll use the AC S1 and Turbo module it might be a tight fit within the case. My HIS 4850 with S1 has 4 cm to the HDD cage in P150.

maf718
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Post by maf718 » Tue Mar 31, 2009 5:34 am

The Sapphire card is non reference design, but the usual accelero s1 fits, although the placement of the GPU causes it to extend past the end of the card towards the HD cage area in the typical PC.
viewtopic.php?t=51246&highlight=sapphire+4850
(edit - agh, should have clicked "submit" 10 seconds earlier)

smilingcrow
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Post by smilingcrow » Tue Mar 31, 2009 6:04 am

Thanks for the input. I realised that it’s a non reference design board after reading a review at FiringSquad; I didn't make it clear that I meant non reference board and not just cooling.
I’m going to have to measure how much clearance there is in my case although I’m partial to just removing the fan if possible and strapping an 80mm Nexus on there. :shock:

Mats
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Post by Mats » Tue Mar 31, 2009 6:42 am

smilingcrow wrote:I’m going to have to measure how much clearance there is in my case although I’m partial to just removing the fan if possible and strapping an 80mm Nexus on there. :shock:
If you have a spare fan, just try it.

Khabarakh
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Post by Khabarakh » Tue Mar 31, 2009 10:21 am

I have this card running with a AC S1 w/ Antec Tricool 120mm.
On Idle the card runs just fine without the fan but increases until system crash when doing some heavy gaming.

It just fits in the Antec P182 lengthwise as long as there is no fan installed behind the upper drive cage (that would actually fit as well if not for the fan mounting clamps). Single problem: the power connector ist overlapped by the cooler so that removing the cable requires pliers or a plug with the hook removed.

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Post by smilingcrow » Tue Mar 31, 2009 11:20 am

I managed to easily cool a 512MB HD 3850 O/C Edition using the stock heatsink and a Nexus 80mm at about 550 rpm which was silent. It did come with a good quality dual slot cooler which had a large copper heatsink which no doubt helped. The heatsink on the Sapphire HD 4850 in question has a copper core and the rest is aluminium so it doesn’t look half as good. I still have the copper heatsink from the 3850 as I was sent a replacement unit when the fan started rattling so maybe it would fit! I figure the non reference design may mitigate against that though. I’ll play around when the card arrives tomorrow.

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Post by smilingcrow » Mon Apr 13, 2009 10:47 am

The non reference card turns out to be too short to accept the heatsink from the 3850. :(

The reference design should be fine accept for one issue; there is circuitry at the far end of the card near the power connector that is cooled by the reference cooler. This means that in swapping the cooler with the copper one from the 3850 I'll lose cooling for that part of the card. I suppose the answer is to stick some small heatsinks on there. Any thoughts!

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