Lowest wattage HDMI+DVI PCIe video card?
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Lowest wattage HDMI+DVI PCIe video card?
I'm looking for a low power, fanless HDMI+DVI PCIe video card...one that will give me the lowest idle wattage possible. I don't do any 3D, so 3D performance is a non-factor.
I'm currently running a Powercolor HD3450 and it chews up 15W at idle (probably partially due to them not bothering to enable PowerPlay, which seems to be the case for most HD3450 cards).
Any suggestions?
I'm currently running a Powercolor HD3450 and it chews up 15W at idle (probably partially due to them not bothering to enable PowerPlay, which seems to be the case for most HD3450 cards).
Any suggestions?
How do you know that Power Play is not enabled?
I recently bought Sapphire Radeon HD4550:
http://www1.sapphiretech.com/us/product ... =260&grp=3
Its spec say that it should consume 25 wats under full load, don't know how would then power consumption be at idle, probably much less than 15 wats, I gues. It is fanless, of course.
Now there is a footnote:
I recently bought Sapphire Radeon HD4550:
http://www1.sapphiretech.com/us/product ... =260&grp=3
Its spec say that it should consume 25 wats under full load, don't know how would then power consumption be at idle, probably much less than 15 wats, I gues. It is fanless, of course.
Now there is a footnote:
Now the question is which HD 4550 graphics card have which features available? And how to figure that out?ATI PowerPlayâ„¢ technology consists of numerous power saving features. Not all features may be available in all ATI Radeon HD 4550 graphics card.
15W idle is not unusual for these cards. ATI 3/4350-4550 and Nvidia 8/9400 cards generally consume more power than their predecessors 2400 Pro and 7600 respectively.
Unless you find an older generation card, you're not likely to find much lower graphics power consumption from current cards, unless you go with an integrated graphics motherboard. A new series of cards with smaller manufacturing process may improve things.
Regarding PowerPlay feature, it seems like a mystery as well as clever marketing. Either ATI should make it mandatory for card partners to include it or card makers should not advertise default spec's when marketing their products.
While power frugal fanatics always want lower consumption, 10-15W is not terrible for a modern graphics card with all the features you are getting and expect.
Unless you find an older generation card, you're not likely to find much lower graphics power consumption from current cards, unless you go with an integrated graphics motherboard. A new series of cards with smaller manufacturing process may improve things.
Regarding PowerPlay feature, it seems like a mystery as well as clever marketing. Either ATI should make it mandatory for card partners to include it or card makers should not advertise default spec's when marketing their products.
While power frugal fanatics always want lower consumption, 10-15W is not terrible for a modern graphics card with all the features you are getting and expect.
4670 reviewed by SPCR was an ATI manufacturing sample. Perhaps "handpicked" for best performance efficiency wise if we are to be cynical. As we cannot know for sure, this is what many users inferred after finding out commercial versions of 4670 did not idle as low as expected.
To be fair to ATI, sample variances is very common and differences of a few watts is to be expected. Consider also commercial versions of cards may differ from the manufacturing blueprint and include more features, higher clock speeds and brand specific firmware which may impact on power consumption.
For owners of 4670, this may be of little comfort as they expected much better power frugality from their card, comparing with the results of SPCR.
As I said before, perhaps if companies like ATI are to avoid this anomaly in the future, they should make it mandatory for card partners to include such sought after features as PowerPlay in their products.
To be fair to ATI, sample variances is very common and differences of a few watts is to be expected. Consider also commercial versions of cards may differ from the manufacturing blueprint and include more features, higher clock speeds and brand specific firmware which may impact on power consumption.
For owners of 4670, this may be of little comfort as they expected much better power frugality from their card, comparing with the results of SPCR.
As I said before, perhaps if companies like ATI are to avoid this anomaly in the future, they should make it mandatory for card partners to include such sought after features as PowerPlay in their products.
I used RBE (Radeon Bios Editor) to look at the profiles on my Powercolor HD3450, and they're all set at 1.1v. Wasn't able to change it either. Only thing the card does is drop the GPU speed from 600Mhz to 300Mhz during idle.ZaphodB wrote:How do you know that Power Play is not enabled?
If there's a known way to set your own voltages on cards that have fixed voltage, I'd love to try that out first instead of get a new card.
What are the voltages at idle and load? And can you use RBE to further tweak the settings?psiu wrote:I bought a Powercolor 4350 from Newegg and it has Powerplay enabled (clock speeds change--it says voltage changes). Of course an interesting problem. Run it at any HD-specific resolution, and it runs at full speed.
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Re: Lowest wattage HDMI+DVI PCIe video card?
15 watts at idle is rather low, actually. There are some low end cards that might manage less than 10, but I don't really see how that savings of 5 or so watts will be of much value. The average cost of electricity in the US is currently around $1 per watt, per year, so even if you left your computer on for 24 hours a day, every day, a 5 watt difference would only save you around $5 a year, unlikely enough to justify a replacement video card. I suppose there's the potential benefit of reducing heat in the case a bit to keep fan speeds down, but again, I don't see 5 watts making a very perceptible difference.davidh44 wrote:I'm looking for a low power, fanless HDMI+DVI PCIe video card...one that will give me the lowest idle wattage possible. I don't do any 3D, so 3D performance is a non-factor.
I'm currently running a Powercolor HD3450 and it chews up 15W at idle (probably partially due to them not bothering to enable PowerPlay, which seems to be the case for most HD3450 cards).
Any suggestions?
One thing that might be worth trying is to see if you can reduce the card's power consumption using software like ATI Tray Tools to underclock it further in 2D mode. You'd probably need to use an electricity load meter to see whether it's noticeably reducing power draw though.
Sorry for the late response to this:davidh44 wrote:What are the voltages at idle and load? And can you use RBE to further tweak the settings?psiu wrote:I bought a Powercolor 4350 from Newegg and it has Powerplay enabled (clock speeds change--it says voltage changes). Of course an interesting problem. Run it at any HD-specific resolution, and it runs at full speed.
It has the following standard clocks:
165/250 at 0.9
300/400 at 1.0
600/400 at 1.1
the clocks for UVD though:
600/400 at 1.1 for all load levels.
when set to an "HD" resolution it runs in UVD mode
(ie 1280x720p, 1920x1080i or any setting tweaked off of those)
I might be able to change the UVD settings in RBE. Need to read up and flashing this thing first...don't want to break it
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Not to hijack the thread, but I'm also in the market for a new low power video card as I'm building a second box. I have a 2900XT in my current machine and it seems to work fine I guess. Is there a place to compare the capabilities of say the 2900pro, 3450 and 4350? They are all close to the same price, but I'm not sure on power draw or say video hardware decoding and so on and so forth.
Thanks,
Chris
Thanks,
Chris
Re: Lowest wattage HDMI+DVI PCIe video card?
Hi,Cryoburner wrote:
15 watts at idle is rather low, actually. There are some low end cards that might manage less than 10,
Have you got any reference for graphic card that might manage less than 10W?
(other than Radeon X300, 7300 GS)
Thanks
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Have you tried changing the settings in Catalyst Control Center by editing the XML configuration file in a text editor? I have a Radeon HD3650, and this works for me - and the clock speed/voltage can differ from what is set in the video BIOS.
I run at 1920x1200@60Hz, and at idle it runs at 110MHz - this is under either XP or Vista. It really does perform like crap under XP at this speed though, and scrolling is so sluggish that you can see the screen redraw from top to bottom. 300MHz is much snappier, although under Vista (with Aero) this doesn't seem to matter. Aero@110MHz = GDI@300MHz in terms of perceived performance.
It looks like you need to be careful when comparing ATI cards - my 3650 (ASUS EAH3650) only adds around 10W to idle power consumption over the onboard 690G. I can't give an exact figure because I'm only using a Kill-a-Watt type device (European version from Maplin) but it's nowhere near 20W.
I use this to measure power:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?moduleno=38343
I run at 1920x1200@60Hz, and at idle it runs at 110MHz - this is under either XP or Vista. It really does perform like crap under XP at this speed though, and scrolling is so sluggish that you can see the screen redraw from top to bottom. 300MHz is much snappier, although under Vista (with Aero) this doesn't seem to matter. Aero@110MHz = GDI@300MHz in terms of perceived performance.
It looks like you need to be careful when comparing ATI cards - my 3650 (ASUS EAH3650) only adds around 10W to idle power consumption over the onboard 690G. I can't give an exact figure because I'm only using a Kill-a-Watt type device (European version from Maplin) but it's nowhere near 20W.
I use this to measure power:
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?moduleno=38343
Last edited by CX23882-19 on Tue Apr 13, 2010 9:09 am, edited 1 time in total.
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This thread has mostly talked about ATI cards, but what about low power Nvidia cards?
I'm interested in their cards because of VDPAU under linux, but I find it is difficult to find a card that fits my requirements which are almost exactly like the thread starters, but with the condition that it has to be nvidia.
I haven't found any 8400 GS with HDMI, so I'm guessing it doesn't support that, and I'm having trouble seeing any real difference between 9400 and 9500. What would you recommend?
I'm interested in their cards because of VDPAU under linux, but I find it is difficult to find a card that fits my requirements which are almost exactly like the thread starters, but with the condition that it has to be nvidia.
I haven't found any 8400 GS with HDMI, so I'm guessing it doesn't support that, and I'm having trouble seeing any real difference between 9400 and 9500. What would you recommend?
generally the ATI are more power efficient - the 8*** of Nvidia are hotter.
you need a card that has a HDTV port and can play HD.
my 8600gts - silentpipe3 is a dx10 card shows HD but it doesn't have a specific port for hdmi - it has sort of s-video connection (looks like it anyway, didn't try to connect s-vid cable) with a connector ( that comes with the card) that has a s-video connection, and component connections that are suppose to be hd.
you should check comparison sheets in manufacture websites. check if the card are overclocked from the factory - it makes them hotter obviously.
tomshardware is a good site and the site that was posted here for wattage.
you need a card that has a HDTV port and can play HD.
my 8600gts - silentpipe3 is a dx10 card shows HD but it doesn't have a specific port for hdmi - it has sort of s-video connection (looks like it anyway, didn't try to connect s-vid cable) with a connector ( that comes with the card) that has a s-video connection, and component connections that are suppose to be hd.
you should check comparison sheets in manufacture websites. check if the card are overclocked from the factory - it makes them hotter obviously.
tomshardware is a good site and the site that was posted here for wattage.