Dissapointing results with HR-03 Plus and 8800 Ultra

They make noise, too.

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MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Tue Jul 31, 2007 12:13 pm

cmthomson wrote:The way you describe your U120 installation makes me suspect the primary difference from the Ninja is the mounting pressure.
Makes a lot of sense. I have read a lot of other threads where people found there was a big difference in temperature between having the board horizontal and vertical. I also suspect the clips were not providing enough pressure.

The click twice thing is interesting. Checked now and mine don't seem too, unless I'm missing something. They seem to be the same as the standard Intel clips, except that the stock cooler places the base of the HSF a couple of mm lower in relation to the clips so is obviously putting on a lot more pressure.

The other really rubbish thing about the Ninja's clips is that they end up under the fins, making them very hard to undo. I have to take the board out of the case every time I want to do it. At least with the Ultra-120, no the backplate is in place I won't have to do that again.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Tue Jul 31, 2007 4:23 pm

A 25c drop in temperatures! :)

Maybe it's time to replace my Scythe Ninja too. :shock:

Did you try the bolt through method with the Scythe Ninja in the end or just go straight to the Thermalright cooler?

Just to clarify: Where I was comparing two Scythe Ninja coolers earlier in the thread they were both the Rev A which uses a backplate fitted to the board instead of push pins. :)

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Wed Aug 01, 2007 2:24 am

I just went directly to the Ultra-120 I'm afraid.

I think the put pins are the biggest weak point in the Ninja design, but generally I'd say it's not as well constructed as it could be. I'm not convinced that the heat is being transferred as well as it could be by the heatpipes from the base to the fins.

Next thing to try is a penny on the HR-03.

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Wed Aug 01, 2007 2:56 am

I stuck a 2p coin under the clamp on the HR-03. My temps dropped from 90C in ATITool to 72C, an 18C drop!

I am just astounded. I mean... the clips on most heatsinks are just rubbish! Even the Ultra-120 needs the coin to work properly. I guess manufacturers are just worried about crushing the cores they are trying to cool.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Wed Aug 01, 2007 2:42 pm

I did the same thing today with the HR-03 fitted to a Nvidia 7900GTX card.

I took it all apart, reseated the GPU core, threw away the rubber grommets that go under the thumbscrews (HR-03 non Plus only) and put a 2p coin under the spacer as pictured:

Image
HR-03 (non Plus) fitted to Nvidia 7900GTX card using a 2 pence piece spacer

The fitting seemed to be pretty solid to begin with but it's definitely well attached now. :shock:

It does seem to have made a bit of a difference: I'd guess maybe 1-2c off idle temperatures and a slightly larger drop in load temperatures, maybe 5c.*

*The load temperature reduction is only a guesstimate as I didn't have time to do a proper load test before taking it apart. :(

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Wed Aug 01, 2007 3:06 pm

Why throw away the rubber? I think it's worth keeping. If you ever need the move the machine, the rubber will help keep from damaging the board under such tight clamping.

I wish the HR-03 series used proper screw on clamps like the Ultra-120, but instead it has thumb screws. I did them up as tight as I could both before and after installing the coin.

My guess is that it's not just about clamping force. I think that the force might be flattening out the convex heatspreaders on the chips somewhat, improving contact all round.

PS. the 8800 series has a big square heat spreader. IIRC my 7800 is different... square chip with a round silver top that was visibly convex. I have a DangerDen waterblock on it, which I installed ages ago so I can't remember exactly what it looked like. Would support my theory of slightly dodgy heatspreaders though.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Wed Aug 01, 2007 3:26 pm

Without the rubber grommets it's easier to attach the thumbscrews. :)

With the original HR-03 cooler the rubber grommets are supposed to go between the thumbscrews and the bracket which holds the heatsink in place.

It's not quite the same as on the HR-03 Plus where they're protecting the card. :(

Step 9 of installation Type 1:

http://www.thermalright.com/a_page/main ... n_hr03.htm

.

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Thu Aug 02, 2007 2:24 am

Ah, I see. Makes sense now. Have you thought about trying a coin on your Ninja too?

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Thu Aug 02, 2007 11:17 am

The Scythe Ninja rev A uses springclips rather than a plate.

The only way to increase pressure would be to bend the clips a bit more. :(

I think I might just buy an Ultra 120 Extreme cooler. Looking at all these threads about how good they are makes it look like the best option. :)

Is your entire PC running at reasonable temperatures now after adding coins to both heatsinks? Have you been able to turn the fans back down now? :)

cmthomson
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Post by cmthomson » Thu Aug 02, 2007 5:39 pm

Get an Ultra if you like, but I'll bet it won't outperform an original Ninja (non-Rev-B). Every fair review I've seen comparing them comes out effectively identical. Both are awesome heat sinks.

Also (although I haven't used a Rev B Ninja myself), I've seen many reports that when it is mounted with bolts or with the universal retention kit, it works as well as the original. This makes perfect sense, since the only difference is in the mounting system.

Aris
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Post by Aris » Thu Aug 02, 2007 11:51 pm

i think your expectations of silence from a graphics card that pulls around 150w at load is too high.

If you really wanted it to be silent, you would have limited your thermal threshold to under 100w, preferably around 50w.

I see this sort of issue come up a lot (more so a few years ago with P4's). People buy all the fastest things they can, throw it all in a case with "quiet" components and then wonder why it all runs so hot or not at all. You cant have your cake and eat it too. You have to pay attention to thermal heat dissapation and power consumption when buying products if your ultimate goal is silence. You could have gotten a video card that got just slightly less framerates but 2/3's of the power consumption and then not had this problem at all.

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Fri Aug 03, 2007 3:12 am

Actually, the system is now running quite acceptably and almost silently too. The loudest things are the HDDs. I think the rubber mounting system of the P182 is not quite as good as suspension.

The biggest problem with the P182 is the limited fresh air intake abilities. I need to do some experimenting with it, but I think I will probably add a second 120mm fan to the upper chamber in the unused 5.25" bays (I only have one optical drive so three are free.) I am going to see about taking the little door off the GPU level intake too, and probably the dust filter too. Might even think about taking the front door off entirely, but I'll test with it open first.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:38 am

cmthomson wrote:Get an Ultra if you like, but I'll bet it won't outperform an original Ninja (non-Rev-B). Every fair review I've seen comparing them comes out effectively identical. Both are awesome heat sinks.
I'd guess that's true for a new heatsink. I'm not so sure that the two year old Scythe Ninja rev A in my PC would do as well though. :(

If you look at post #14 of this thread the Ninja rev A in my brother's PC produces load temperatures 16c lower than the one in my PC when using the same cooling. :?

My PC has been taken apart quite a few times (every few months!) since the heatsink was purchased in summer 2005. The spring clips seem solid enough but it definitely doesn't seem to work as well as you'd expect. :(

@Aris: What graphics card with power consumption under 100w is only slightly slower than a Nvidia 8800 Ultra card?

The only possible card that's under 100w (the Nvidia 7900GTX) is over 50% slower than my (overclocked) 8800GTS 640mb card, let alone a 8800 Ultra. :(

More to the point you need all the power you can get. :)

Just try Colin McRae: Dirt at anything above low detail settings on that 7900GTX card or lower. It's virtually unplayable. :(

Colin McRae: Dirt Demo: 833.89mb

http://www.gamershell.com/download_19282.shtml

Image
Colin McRae: Dirt
Last edited by WR304 on Fri Aug 03, 2007 4:34 pm, edited 6 times in total.

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Fri Aug 03, 2007 6:01 am

Strangely enough I installed Dirt yesterday. It runs okay on ultra settings for everything but the driver models (on high) with 4xAA at 1024x768. Even then though, the frame rate fluctuates quite a bit during races, especially when there are other cars. I wish there was a way to lock it at 30fps - the fluctuations give me motion sickness :(

The utility to turn the bloom down is invaluable. By default, it looks like the drivers need to be wearing shades all the time :( Look at WR304's screenshot; it looks overexposed.

In tests, having the filter and inner door removed with the outer door open reduced GPU temps by 5C. I can hear the HDDs seeking though, not that I really mind. It's the broadband motor noise that is loud on the WD5000AAKS.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Fri Aug 03, 2007 2:19 pm

Those Australian stages in Dirt are a real nightmare. You almost need to wear sunglasses whilst looking at the screen. 8)

Bloom and HDR in current games is like a few years ago when every game used lens flare effects wherever possible. :(

The problem with the frame rate jumps is that you have to try and react whilst the screen has stopped.

It's always as you go into braking zones with lots of particle effects and contact between cars. The Rally Raid and Rallycross stages are worst I found. :(

It is quite a good example of why you'd need to upgrade to newer hardware though. Playing the Dirt demo on a 7900GTX made me realise it was time for a new graphics card. :?

cotdt
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Post by cotdt » Fri Aug 03, 2007 6:38 pm

go to watercooling. quiet air cooling is only effective for systems that don't produce as much heat. your system produces way too much heat. a 120.2 watercooled system running 800RPM fans will get you there.

Aris
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Post by Aris » Fri Aug 03, 2007 6:45 pm

an 8800GTS 320mb pulls right around 100w.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/ ... html#sect0

and will give very similar performance to a stock 8800 ultra with 2/3 the power consumption.

Anything over 60fps is waisted anyhow on an LCD since thats the most framerates an LCD can output. Even if your still on a CRT, i dont know of many CRT's that allow a refresh rate much above 75hz, so that would limit you to 75fps. So even though your game says your getting 150fps, thats not what your actually viewing since your display is now the bottleneck. Also if your on an LCD, your stuck at a native resolution of 1280x1024 since all the good gamming LCD monitors are at 19" which means your excess framerates mean even less since slower graphics cards can perform just as well at the lower resolutions especially since your framerate is capped at 60fps.

The bleeding edge GFX cards are really only for people who feel the need to brag about synthetic benchmark results to their friends. :roll:

cotdt
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Post by cotdt » Fri Aug 03, 2007 7:52 pm

if you play games like oblivion at full settings and good resolution, you will need a fast overclocked system, and even then only get 20 FPS. i think the Geforce 8800 is still too slow.

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Post by Aris » Sat Aug 04, 2007 12:55 am

cotdt wrote:if you play games like oblivion at full settings and good resolution, you will need a fast overclocked system, and even then only get 20 FPS. i think the Geforce 8800 is still too slow.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/ ... html#sect0

1280x1024, which is the native resolution of all good gamming LCD's. Minimum framerate OUTDOORS with all eye candy turns on and 16x Aniso AND HDR is still above 30FPS.

8800GTS 320mb is plenty fast enough.

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Sat Aug 04, 2007 1:09 am

cotdt wrote:go to watercooling. quiet air cooling is only effective for systems that don't produce as much heat. your system produces way too much heat. a 120.2 watercooled system running 800RPM fans will get you there.
My other system is watercooled. Was quite hardcore at the time (7800GT, X2 4200+)

I have been thinking about it. The main issue is how to install a rad in the P182. I could get a single 120mm rad and mount it on top or at the back, but I'm not sure it would be enough to cool everything. Could have two rads I suppose.

Thing is, that's looking at around £200 worth of gear for waterblocks and a rad. It would be more if I didn't already have a pump, res and tubing.

Air is doing fine for me at the moment. As I mentioned, the HDDs are now the loudest things in the system. The fans (120mm Nexus, 120mm Papst) are inaudiable in the P182. The biggest thing is that the system really throws out a lot of heat when stressed, which heats my room up, but that can't be helped even with water.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Sat Aug 04, 2007 6:02 am

Aris wrote:an 8800GTS 320mb pulls right around 100w.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/video/ ... html#sect0

and will give very similar performance to a stock 8800 ultra with 2/3 the power consumption.

The bleeding edge GFX cards are really only for people who feel the need to brag about synthetic benchmark results to their friends. :roll:
The 8800GTS is a good card. One of the reasons I went for one instead of the 8800GTX was because it doesn't use as much power.:)

At stock speeds it's still a room heater though. :(

If you're thinking of getting an 8800GTS be prepared for how much hotter it is than the older GF7 cards.

Benchmarks don't tell the whole story with these cards either. When you see them reviewed by websites they always seem to use Intel Core 2 Duo X6800 processors at 3ghz+ or AMD FX-60's. If you match the 8800GTX/Ultra card with a slower processor than that you can lose a lot of performance. You really need to budget for a quick processor at the same time to get the full benefit of the upgrade.

A lot of games that are popular but not used as benchmarks are often CPU limited. Medieval 2 Total War and GTR2 are examples where you need to make sure the whole PC is up to speed to get good performance.

A good example of that is my mate's PC: He has a 8800GTS 640mb card but matched with an old Intel Pentium 4 2.8ghz Socket 478 Northwood CPU. It runs games at just 1/3 of the speed the same card manages in my PC. :(

It's quite easy to reduce the 8800GTS card to a crawl in some current games even at 1280x1024. Colin McRae: Dirt is a good example but another one is Rainbow Six: Vegas. At 1280x1024, full detail and forced 16XAA, 16XAF it runs as slow as 11FPS in places on my PC.

Have you seen how choppy the frame rate is in places on the Crysis gameplay movies too? Hopefully they'll sort it out before release but it looks like it will bring a current high end system to a grinding halt without any difficulty. :shock:

As newer games come out over the next few months there are sure to be plenty more games where the 8800GTX/Ultra cards are a worthwhile investment too.:)

t1000
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Post by t1000 » Fri Aug 17, 2007 1:38 am

OP, there is something seriously wrong.. perhaps a defective HR-03 Plus ? I have mine strapped to a 8800gtx with a 120mm nexus cable-tied to it (very ice job if I do say so myself) and I idle at 43c and under load I've never seen it exceed 67c.

The ULTRA does run hotter than the vanilla 8800gtx from what I understand .. but the temps you've quoted are on tilt mate. Have you tried swapping it out for another ? If not, maybe you should try more thermal paste... I did mine by LIBERALLY coating both the GPU and the HS with Artic Silver 5.. then adding an additional dab in the centre of the GPU before I attached the HSF (the dab being just a little larger than a grain of rice per the standard AS5 installation to a Intel CPU).

1000

MoJo
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Post by MoJo » Fri Aug 17, 2007 8:42 am

t1000, I am starting to agree with you.

I have spoken to XFX but they are very slow and don't seem willing to RMA the card. The place I bought it from is out of business, so no support there.

I recently put the stock cooler back on, with a home made duct. Good news is that it is inaudiable inside the P182, bad news is that idle temp is 67C and load temp 95C.

WR304
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Post by WR304 » Mon Sep 03, 2007 7:42 am

cmthomson wrote:Get an Ultra if you like, but I'll bet it won't outperform an original Ninja (non-Rev-B). Every fair review I've seen comparing them comes out effectively identical. Both are awesome heat sinks.

Also (although I haven't used a Rev B Ninja myself), I've seen many reports that when it is mounted with bolts or with the universal retention kit, it works as well as the original. This makes perfect sense, since the only difference is in the mounting system.
I finally got round to getting a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme cooler. :)

Overall it's a bit disappointing though.

The base finish was terrible: It was badly convex and also lopsided slightly. It took ages to lap properly.

It has quite a qood contact with the core now and I used a 50p as the shim for pressure.

The problem with it is that it just doesn't work that well with low airflow.

The heatsink needs a fan right next to it (touching) and at low speed the air seems to flow around it rather than through the narrow vanes. With the CPU clocked at 3.33ghz+ the heatsink gets so hot you can't touch it. :(

At least it showed that there's nothing wrong with the Scythe Ninja. It must just be that the older Core 2 Duo CPU is hotter than the newer one purchased this year. :)

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