Air flow improvements ( Need Advice )

[ricanflow]

The 8800GTX is an old and hot card.

Im pretty sure you have good airflow already. The best thing to do would be to sell the new 8800GTX you get from rma and move up to a cooler running card. Heck even a 9800GX2 with dual gpu's will run cooler than that thing.

G80 runs so much hotter than G92 its not even funny.

If you are worried about internal temps...the best cards would eb those with dual slot coolers. They can really throw all the heat out of the case. In my other system airflow isnt all that...but because i changed the stock coolers to dual slot coolers the cards run 67C and 57C on load.

Temps never pass 70C..even if my room is very hot.

If for some reason you wanna stay with G80...throw a massive cooler on it and you wont have to worry about temps.

 

[Gabb]

The 8800GTX is an old and hot card.

Im pretty sure you have good airflow already. The best thing to do would be to sell the new 8800GTX you get from rma and move up to a cooler running card. Heck even a 9800GX2 with dual gpu's will run cooler than that thing.

G80 runs so much hotter than G92 its not even funny.

If you are worried about internal temps...the best cards would eb those with dual slot coolers. They can really throw all the heat out of the case. In my other system airflow isnt all that...but because i changed the stock coolers to dual slot coolers the cards run 67C and 57C on load.

Temps never pass 70C..even if my room is very hot.

If for some reason you wanna stay with G80...throw a massive cooler on it and you wont have to worry about temps.

hmmm dual slot coolers fit in the expansion ports right? ( my mobo only has 1 PCI-E )

I was considering trying to sell my RMAed 8800 gtx if it doesn't perform well either ( was wondering whats the most I could get for it...prob less then 80? ) especially since the 9800 gtx is so cheap at 170 and 185 for a gtx+, only thing that started to give me doubts about those was that some don't think their exactly up to par with a 8800 gtx in terms of performance, on the wiki entry it even states its stats are more similar to a 8800 gts so I really gotta do more research and look into benchmarks, I definately don't want to downgrade.

Its almost mind boggling how 1.5 years ago I paid $530 after MIR for the 8800 gtx and now there are faster cards for $160 despite the fact the dollar value has gotten considerably lower...just mind boggling how cheap computer parts are getting...

I also never considered those snap on coolers since I heard they were never really compatible for the 8 series cards huge size and thickness

also I'm a bit worried if the hot ambient temps of 70-80 would damage other components like my nearby sound card or even maybe my entire mobo. I'm not worried about my q6600 though since the load never gets past 58 celcius in worst case scenarios so my tuniq tower is somewhat doing its job.

I think I asked before about the temperature differance between G80s and G92s and there was mixed opinions ranging from "their a lot cooler" to "their somewhat cooler"

 

[ricanflow]

The 8800GT replaced the 8800GTS 320MB/640MB and the 8800GTS 512 knocked out the 8800GTX.

8800GTX gets beat by the 8800GTS 512 in most cases...heck even an 8800GT. The only thing the 8800GTX has on them is the extra 256mb of vram and larger memory interface. But the G92 cards are more efficient both in terms of power usage and performance.

Not to mention they can overclock higher as well.

Does 55C sound cool to you? Thats how cool a G92 based card can run with a nice dual slot cooler. And thats just load...idle i get about 43C.

Ambient temps of 70 and 80 wont do anything to your components. My ambient temp can be 80 and my card still runs 60C on load. And since the card runs cooler less heat is inside the case, making all the components cooler as well.

Dual slot coolers push the heat out pretty well. With two cards inside a system its very noticeable...you can put your hand behind the case and feel all the heat coming out.

Now the 9800GTX+ is not a downgrade at all. But if you are gonna upgrade you might as well get something that will give you much more performance like a 9800GX2 or GTX 260.

And if you look around they both can be had for about $200.

You can spend money on a cooler and thermal paste for the 8800GTX but that will run you about $50 and keep you with an older hotter running card.

Or you can sell it for about $100 and with another $100 get something better.

 

[Gabb]

The 8800GT replaced the 8800GTS 320MB/640MB and the 8800GTS 512 knocked out the 8800GTX.

8800GTX gets beat by the 8800GTS 512 in most cases...heck even an 8800GT. The only thing the 8800GTX has on them is the extra 256mb of vram and larger memory interface. But the G92 cards are more efficient both in terms of power usage and performance.

Not to mention they can overclock higher as well.

Does 55C sound cool to you? Thats how cool a G92 based card can run with a nice dual slot cooler. And thats just load...idle i get about 43C.

Ambient temps of 70 and 80 wont do anything to your components. My ambient temp can be 80 and my card still runs 60C on load. And since the card runs cooler less heat is inside the case, making all the components cooler as well.

Dual slot coolers push the heat out pretty well. With two cards inside a system its very noticeable...you can put your hand behind the case and feel all the heat coming out.

Now the 9800GTX+ is not a downgrade at all. But if you are gonna upgrade you might as well get something that will give you much more performance like a 9800GX2 or GTX 260.

And if you look around they both can be had for about $200.

You can spend money on a cooler and thermal paste for the 8800GTX but that will run you about $50 and keep you with an older hotter running card.

Or you can sell it for about $100 and with another $100 get something better.

I guess I don't really understand what a dual slot cooler is and google is not really helping either. It technically lists the 8800 gtx as having a dual slot cooler which confuses me even more, since I was under the assumption a dual slot cooler was simply a fan that was installed in the expansion port. What is also confusing about this is how could a fan in the expansion port blowing air on a GPU help since isn't the GPUs cooler an exhaust fan that blows the heat away from the card which means an expansion port fan would just be counteracting the GPU cooler and blowing the heat back at the card? I could use some clarification on this

PS: I used to be able to get 55 idle and 70ish load temps with my 8800 gtx a year ago...maybe that was because it was a lot cooler and in the winter or maybe all that expand/contraction has finally worn down the cards thermal paste contact or whatever I dunno

 

[ricanflow]

When i say dual slot cooler i mean aftermarket cooling:

Scythe Musashi VGA Cooler: CrazyPC Computers

And the card pictured is an 8800GTX.

If you look at the massive size of the heatsink and the large fans...youll see how it removes heat much better than stock.

The G92 dual slot coolers are good too....but thats also cause the cards by nature run cooler.

You didnt have to rma the card. Most likely you just had lots of dust inside..you could have removed the stock cooler and blew out all the dust, cleaned off the old thermal past and re-applied mx2. That would have brought your card back to the same temps when it was new.

 

[jfenwick]

I guess I don't really understand what a dual slot cooler is and google is not really helping either. It technically lists the 8800 gtx as having a dual slot cooler which confuses me even more, since I was under the assumption a dual slot cooler was simply a fan that was installed in the expansion port. What is also confusing about this is how could a fan in the expansion port blowing air on a GPU help since isn't the GPUs cooler an exhaust fan that blows the heat away from the card which means an expansion port fan would just be counteracting the GPU cooler and blowing the heat back at the card? I could use some clarification on this

PS: I used to be able to get 55 idle and 70ish load temps with my 8800 gtx a year ago...maybe that was because it was a lot cooler and in the winter or maybe all that expand/contraction has finally worn down the cards thermal paste contact or whatever I dunno

Dual slot cooler means that the cooler INSTALLED on the card takes up a whole nother slot of the motherboard. For example my 8800gt came stock a single slot card:

Newegg.ca - XFX PVT88PYDD4 GeForce 8800GT XXX 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards

See how slim it is? When installed it only takes up the PCI-e slot, the pci card directly below it can still be used for whatever I want to stick in it.

My 9800gtx+ is a dual slot card, that means that the cooler on it is so large it takes up the pci slot space directly below the pci-e slot:

Newegg.ca - XFX PVT98WYDFH GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards

If you look at the images you'll see how much fatter this card is over the 8800gt and when you install it it will take the two slots instead of one. In both cases we are talking about the coolers installed on the gpu, not pci slot coolers that just blow air onto the gpu.

The fans on the dual slot cards, atleast mine, suck the air onto the heatsink, the physical heatsink design then funnels that air out the back of the case as it heats up, relieving the heat from the sink.

[edit]bah, you beat me to it...i type too much [/edit]

 

[Gabb]

Dual slot cooler means that the cooler INSTALLED on the card takes up a whole nother slot of the motherboard. For example my 8800gt came stock a single slot card:

Newegg.ca - XFX PVT88PYDD4 GeForce 8800GT XXX 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards

See how slim it is? When installed it only takes up the PCI-e slot, the pci card directly below it can still be used for whatever I want to stick in it.

My 9800gtx+ is a dual slot card, that means that the cooler on it is so large it takes up the pci slot space directly below the pci-e slot:

Newegg.ca - XFX PVT98WYDFH GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Desktop Graphics / Video Cards

If you look at the images you'll see how much fatter this card is over the 8800gt and when you install it it will take the two slots instead of one. In both cases we are talking about the coolers installed on the gpu, not pci slot coolers that just blow air onto the gpu.

The fans on the dual slot cards, atleast mine, suck the air onto the heatsink, the physical heatsink design then funnels that air out the back of the case as it heats up, relieving the heat from the sink.

[edit]bah, you beat me to it...i type too much [/edit]

Ah thanks guys that really clears a few things up, I guess that most definately means my card has a dual slot cooler since it pretty much would block any PCI-E card ( and it did block the other PCI-E port sorta when I installed it in my prior ASUS mobo which had sli capability ). Its kind of puzzling because don't a lot of people do SLI with 8 series cards and such but this is the first time I've ever seen a picture of a 8 series card that didn't have a dual slot cooler and was so slim...hmmm? How do you even do SLI with a dual slot cooler if its even possible?

Oh and are you sure the dual slot cooler cards is a intake fan rather then an exhaust fan? I can't stick my hand in there to check since the space is too small, but your comment makes more sense, I just never realized where the heat would be transfered too since the back doesn't really feel that hot.

You didnt have to rma the card. Most likely you just had lots of dust inside..you could have removed the stock cooler and blew out all the dust, cleaned off the old thermal past and re-applied mx2. That would have brought your card back to the same temps when it was new.

This has been suggested to me before in these forums about a year ago when I had a defective 8800 gtx that idled at 75 celcius and couldnt do a 3dmark06 run without shutting down. The EVGA tech support guy even suggested doing this or that I just RMA it ( I RMAed it obviously ). I guess similar to the reason why I never lapped my tuniq tower, I'm just not that comfortable with doing this sort of physical stuff ( even though I have MX-1 thermal paste ) and already tried dusting it as best I could. Added to the fact I'm also paranoid and heard of material defects in the 8 series card ( has to do with constant expansion/contracting due to temperatures that cause the parts to start breaking down ), that I think its probably just best to RMA the card and hope for the best.

 

[Gabb]

I made a crummy diagram already explaining my current setup and what i may plan

 

[meat_helmet]

Is there any way you can make a hole in the back of the desk, on the desktop, or move the desk out a bit? That way you could put a fan above that fan you already have set up to extract hot air out the top - cause hot air rises.

 

[baron5]

unless its already hot in ur room, the card should not be getting that hot, in which case ur should rma it. Ull prob get back a newer card anyway becuase i doubt they have 8800gtx's lying around.external fans wont do ****. unless they are full size fans becuase ur gonna need huge cfm/loud fans to do the job 1/2 effectively. the gtx is a hot card and usually gets about 80c in load but should egt too much higher than that, so i say rma it. the other solutions are not worth ur while.