Reply 13820 of 56708, by kanecvr
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wrote:wrote:I generally have no interest in AGP video cards w/o win98 drivers, so when I was looking for 7xxx cards, I settled for a pair of […]
I generally have no interest in AGP video cards w/o win98 drivers, so when I was looking for 7xxx cards, I settled for a pair of XFX 7950GT EE. Payed 20$ for them and they run great. I'm not running them passive tough - a 120mm fan blows in between both cards, otherwise they go over 80c.
Why did card manufacturers ever think passive-cooled high end video cards were a good idea? There is no way these coolers are sufficient and the fact that they need a case fan blowing air straight at them kinda defeats the purpose of a 'silent' PC...
They don't NEED the 120mm fan, as evidenced by the fact that both cards are alive and kicking today. Better yet, this model has good availability. One reason is that XFX was late to transition to RoHS lead-free solder, using traditional solder for their products up until 2005?. That coupled with the fact that this passive heatsink is actually MASSIVE, greatly increases the card's longevity.
The whole idea is a regular CPU cooler can blow air onto the radiator on the back of the card where the heatpipes lead:
This is more then enough to keep the card in high 60's low 70's. Two cards in SLI is another matter together. The lower card does not benefit from airflow coming from the CPU cooler, so unless you have a side panel fan, it can go up to 85c. That coupled with the fact that the machine I have them on uses a Tuniq Tower 120 witch pushes air towards the back of the case and not the video card, compelled me to use a quiet 120mm fan to cool both cards.
wrote:I bought two 7600 GT AGP cards (both Club3D) for 10 euros yesterday, one had two bulged caps but worked well (even with games), but changed them to good ones and all is ok. As a bonus got FX5900XT, Ti4400 and Radeon 9500 (that can be turned into 9700) for free. All worked.
That is a great deal. It took me quite a while to source a working 9500 / 9700. I'm still looking for a ti4400 too - I have two 4600 cards (had, traded one together with a P4 build for my Amstrad 1512) and quite a few ti 4200 (including an AGP 8x version and a 128mb version) but no 4400...