VGA Silencer on an AIW 9800 Pro - my experience

FJC · Post by **FJC** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 5:52 am

I received my backordered VGA Silencer from SVC last night, and it was a revision 1 model. So, I took my dremel to it and in a couple minutes had milled out that section, effectively turning mine into a Rev 2, so it would work on my AIW card.

Of course the rear bracket didn't match up with the outputs on the AIW card. The rear bracket included with the VGA silencer is not required (it does not support the cooler in any way), though it's recommended that the cooler be grounded, and one way to do that is to use the bracket.

I took some tin snips and basically cut out everything on the left side of the bracket, above the DVI connector hole (as that hole was the only one that lined up). It's not terribly pretty, but it works. Does the Rev 2 version come with additional different brackets?

I had zero problems mounting it on my card. The ATI heatsink/fan came off very easily (you pull two pins on the heatsink side, then the plastic pins that go through the video card can be easily squeezed and pushed through the holes). The holes lined up perfectly with the pre-threaded holes in the heatsink, and it all screwed together with little effort. I used a bit of Arctic Silver 5 rather than the silcone stuff they included with the cooler.

On the low setting, the air coming out the rear is moving pretty slowly but is pretty cool as well, when just at a Windows desktop. The heatsink itself was slightly warm to the touch. I fired up 3DMark and let it run for a while, and the air out the rear of the cooler became very much hotter. The heatsink was now hot to the touch, but not overly so. I never ran into any tearing or other signs of too hot of a video card during the tests. When I flicked the fan to high, it can be heard, but it moves a lot more air. I'll be keeping it at the low setting, as that seems quite sufficient.

It definitely blocks that PCI slot next to the AGP port, but I'd take that one further and say you don't want anything in the SECOND PCI slot, either (or if you do put something there, it should be a small half-height card). I had my Audigy soundcard there, and while it would fit, the sound card would pretty much be blocking most airflow from reaching the VGA Silencer fan. Keep this in mind if you're short on PCI slots.

Overall, I'm quite pleased. Definitely nice to get that little ATI screamer of a fan out of my case!

wgragg · Post by **wgragg** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 6:51 am

Heh, you beat me to it. I was going to relate my experience with it last night, though I installed it on a 9800np, so I didn't have to do any modding.

My experience was much like yours. It did go together fairly easily. I had a little bit of trouble getting the holes lined up so the screws would bite, but nothing major.

I had to do a lot of cleanup of the gpu core. It looked like someone had slathered the thermal paste on. It was not only on the core, but all around it and even in some of the solder joints.

The biggest thing that makes me wonder about the silencer is that quarter inch or so gap between the back of the bracket and the slot opening. I wonder if any of the warm air being forced out is sneaking back into the case?

I tried both settings and honestly, I can't hear it on either one, though I can feel the difference in air output. I think either my PSU fan or my hsf is drowning it out. One real nice thing is I am not getting the high pitched whine I was getting before. That ATI stock hsf was noisier than I realized.

This thing did what I was hoping. It lowered my case temp by about 3 degrees at idle and by 4-5 degrees under load. Also, my cpu temp never went over 47 under load. I woke up this morning and for the first time found my cpu idling at 38, which is a first for me. Before, my lowest idle was 41 and peaked at 50 under load, so I guess the hot air from the vid card was really making a temp difference.

Anyway, I so far give this thing a 2 thumbs up!

Wendell

GamingGod · Post by **GamingGod** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:17 am

Glad to hear that no one else is having trouble with it. I think mine was a fluke. I was having trouble lining up the holes too, but mainly because the screws on mine wouldnt go but 1-2mm into the hole before they would stop. They could be moved a few turns deeper but only if you really turn the screwdriver hard. I could never get the scerws tightened anywhere near tight enough to be flush with the card.

FJC · Post by **FJC** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 9:57 am

I don't think mine got anywhere near flush before I decided it was quite tight enough (I didn't want that plastic "shield" for the spring/screws to press too hard on the board). But they're definitely in deep enough to make it locked on good and tight.

It sounds like yours is a fluke, and likely that they didn't tap the threads deep enough.

foothoss · Post by **foothoss** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 12:48 pm

Are any of you using the black Saphire Radeon 9800?

Is there a difference between this one and the others?

I know GamingGod had a problem and he has this card. I just dont want to waste the money, or screw up my card trying add the new cooler.

Thanks

GamingGod · Post by **GamingGod** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 1:27 pm

Ill hopefully be getting a replacement ACVGAS soon, I just rma'ed mine. When I do ill tell you how it works out, but thats probably gonna be a week from now.

sthayashi · Post by **sthayashi** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 1:57 pm

Hey, this is useful information. This answers (and raises) some questions I had in this thread

The question raised is whether the ACVGAS actually needs to be mounted to the mounting bracket. MikeC said in my thread that it does, but you guys say that it doesn't. Which is it?

BTW, FJC and wgragg, since you were able to get it working on an AIW, then I think it's likely that the ACVGAS can be made to work on an X2.

FJC · Post by **FJC** » Thu Dec 11, 2003 3:03 pm

The heat sink does not mount at all to the bracket (in fact many of us have some concerns that it's a good half-inch from the bracket, so there's no "seal" to make sure the air goes out the rear).

From their installation instructions:

STEP 4 - For all ATI boards the old bracket is to be removed. THis is (sic) can be done by removing the screws beside the VGA outputs and the Philips screw on the board. For Nvidia boards, where the new bracket does not fit the original bracket can be used. In this case the bracket next to the graphic board on the computer rear wall must be removed, so that the warm exhaust air can be blown outward.

and

STEP 6 - If the supplied bracket is not used, the fan speed switch must be removed with pliers as shown in the picture.

Just make sure the heatsink is grounded to the case, or you suffer the wrath of this badly-translated warning:

Without proper grounding of the heatsink it can come in rare cases to system crashes.

I fully expected to see "All your base are belong to us" in there somewhere...

GamingGod · Post by **GamingGod** » Sun Dec 21, 2003 7:47 pm

Well new ACvgaS came in and this one went on easy. The first ones holes must have been crooked or something? Dont know, but this time everything lined up perfectly and went together easily. Im running it at 5v and it is very much silent, but the heatsink is getting very hot. After playing unreal 2003 for a little while i opened the case and stuck my finger on the heatsink as close as i could get to the gpu and it was almost too hot to touch. I dont seem to be having any graphic problems but how hot can the thing get before i need to worry? And also how hot are your 9800pros getting with it at 5v? The problem might be that the duct isnt flush with the back of my case and the hot air is being sucked back in (i think)

Lord09 · Post by **Lord09** » Mon Jan 05, 2004 10:45 am

I have AIW as well and the noise is pretty annoying, do you have any pics of your modded silencer?

Thanks,

DP