Passive video card in Antec NSK2400 / Antec Fusion? (HD6670)

They make noise, too.

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klankymen
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Passive video card in Antec NSK2400 / Antec Fusion? (HD6670)

Post by klankymen » Sun Aug 14, 2011 5:20 am

Hiya!

I have decided it is time to buy a new video card for my PC. It is more or less an HTPC / media server, you can see details and pictures of it in this thread.

As you can see, space is very tight in this case, but there is enough room to put an expansion card in the pcie slot. I was originally planning to put a sound-card there, but current tendencies have me leaning towards a video card. I don't / didn't ever game much, however lately I started some fps gaming again. I'm not playing crazy video intensive games, but I've realized I need more performance than my on-chip graphics offer.

For this reason I'm looking for a mid-range / low-end video card, up to approximately 100$ in price. I already have my eyes set on the Radeon HD6570 or HD6670 chips, as they are said to offer the best performance in this price range.

Furthermore, I currently have 2 screens attached, and would consider a third screen, which the advent of EYEFINITY technology would let me attach.

I read in this article about Eyefinity that in order to use Eyefinity, at least one connector has to be a DisplayPort connector. The problem here is that many low end cards don't have a DisplayPort connector at all.

This HIS HD6570

Image

would appear to be almost perfect, due to it's stock passive cooling, low price, and also compact single slot form factor. However it will only support 2 outputs at the same time, and even if it supported more, I wouldn't even want to use VGA in this digital day and age.

In fact, it doesn't appear that any 6570 cards offer 3 digital outputs, whether they are passive or active.

So if I want to have 3 digital outputs, it would appear my only option is to look at 6670s.
This is great for several reaons, for one I would get superior gaming performance, and for another, strangely enough, spcr measured that this card has LESS power draw, meaning it is easier to cool.

Once again, there is a card that would appear to be almost exactly what I need, the Sapphire HD6670

Image

It's passive, has 3 digital outputs, supports Eyefinity... however the problem is that the heatsink extends higher than the card itself, and due to the low height of the NSK2400 case, I only have room for a card that is 5mm taller than the metal slot mount backplate, which is to say, exactly as wide as the PCB on that card. In addition, the heatsink continuing on the backside of the card would cause a collision with my Minja CPU heatsink.

So, in conclusion, I have discarded every stock passive card, and am looking at getting a fan-cooled card, and silencing it myself.

Same as alexb in this thread I'm considering the two different Sapphire cards, the "ATI Design" and the "Sapphire Design".

In addition there is this card by HIS

Image

Which only has a single slot backplate, and also offers HDMI, DVI, DP connections.

For all 3 of these fan-cooled HD6670s, space restrictions are not a problem, the card is about 5mm wider than the backplate, which means it fits the case heightwise, and with the 17cm PCB, card length is not a problem either, as it's just as long as my motherboard already is.



To make a long story short, I'm looking for feedback and advice whether and how I can passively or silently cool an HD6670 without the heatsink extending any higher/wider than the PCB.

My ideas are:
  1. undervolt (hardware or software, depends) the stock fan:
    - This is the easiest thing to do, but I'm not sure how quiet I can get the fan
  2. remove the stock fan, simply run passively:
    - Given the size of the tiny passive heatsink on the aforementioned 6570, and considering the fact that the power draw of the 6670 is lower (or the same, there's obviously sample variance), this should offer close to enough cooling, albeit perhaps with some case fan ducting.
  3. remove the stock fan, and jerryrig a Yate Loon 80mm or 120mm fan on 5V:
    - Like option 1, this still introduces an extra fan into the case, which I don't want, but it will be very quiet, most likely quieter than stock undervolted.
  4. replace the entire stock HSF with an aftermarket passive cooler:
    - Biggest problem here is finding a cooler that doesn't have heatpipes that extend beyond the PCB. Nice stuff like the Accelero S1 or the Thermanright HR-03 all have heatpipes that make much too large of a curve to fit. And the Prolimatech MK-13 is way too long.
Thanks in advance for any feedback or ideas that are helpful.

Reports of usage of these Chips (preferabaly passively) with temperatures would also be much appreciated.

fuzzymath10
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Re: Passive video card in Antec NSK2400 / Antec Fusion? (HD6

Post by fuzzymath10 » Sun Aug 14, 2011 11:58 am

I don't think the lower end cards can be undervolted easily (my 5750 cannot), but double check.

See my link here: viewtopic.php?f=19&t=62194. As you can see, I managed to convert a noisy half-height dual-slot 5750 into a quad-slot passively cooled half-height 5750.

Since you have a full-height slot to work with, you should theoretically have no trouble modding the S1, at the cost of your expansion slots.

I really doubt removing the fan is going to work. I tried that with my 5750 (admittedly a hotter card), and the temps shot through the roof. I added a 60mm fan from Silenx using rubber bands, and that was a temporary solution which worked in a pinch (quieter than the stock fans).

You have a lower-TDP card and more room. If you cannot get a passive HSF to fit comfortably, I would probably just attach a quiet fan with zip ties and/or rubber bands and be done with it. At least you have enough room to fit an 80mm; I recommend Noctua; the NSK1480 you see in my link is cooled with 3 of them (1 for PSU, 2 exhaust).

klankymen
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Re: Passive video card in Antec NSK2400 / Antec Fusion? (HD6

Post by klankymen » Sun Aug 14, 2011 12:43 pm

fuzzymath10 wrote:I don't think the lower end cards can be undervolted easily (my 5750 cannot), but double check.

See my link here: viewtopic.php?f=19&t=62194. As you can see, I managed to convert a noisy half-height dual-slot 5750 into a quad-slot passively cooled half-height 5750.

Since you have a full-height slot to work with, you should theoretically have no trouble modding the S1, at the cost of your expansion slots.

I really doubt removing the fan is going to work. I tried that with my 5750 (admittedly a hotter card), and the temps shot through the roof. I added a 60mm fan from Silenx using rubber bands, and that was a temporary solution which worked in a pinch (quieter than the stock fans).

You have a lower-TDP card and more room. If you cannot get a passive HSF to fit comfortably, I would probably just attach a quiet fan with zip ties and/or rubber bands and be done with it. At least you have enough room to fit an 80mm; I recommend Noctua; the NSK1480 you see in my link is cooled with 3 of them (1 for PSU, 2 exhaust).
Thanks, very inspiring reply, much more than I was hoping for!

I was in fact wondering whether the S1 could be bent. The problem with me is that I can't really bend toward my expansion slots, as I already have a hard drive there.

The fact that you are more or less successfully cooling a card with 20W more heat than the one I'm considering, in a case which is even flatter than my own, is very helpful to know.

Yeah, the Noctua fans are good, but there was a time several years ago when Yate Loon DSL fans were the gold standard here on spcr, and since I still have a few of those, I shall definitely use one of those. I have two yate loon 12cm fans as case exhausts right now, and they're pretty much inaudible. Adding another one inside the case shouldn't make a big difference.

Could you tell me how you managed to bend the heatpipes?

I have to measure the clearance with my cpu heatsink tomorrow, but I think I shall order one of the active 6670s as soon as possible.

fuzzymath10
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Location: Toronto

Re: Passive video card in Antec NSK2400 / Antec Fusion? (HD6

Post by fuzzymath10 » Sun Aug 14, 2011 1:30 pm

To answer how I bent the heatsink, I slowly pressed down on it bit by bit on my floor, working my way from the top to the bottom. This seemed like the least risky way, rather than using my hands to bend it directly (and also made the bend more uniform). I had to mount it to the PCB first since after the bend, accessing the screws was made much trickier (I had no idea if it would work so I would have had to unbend it if my experiment failed).

I noticed you have a ton of hard drives in your system, and that, being an NSK2400, it mounts horizontally (mine has vertical stands which I use). This suggests using a fan for sure, because I have found that my temps were worse when oriented like your case, which would make an already extreme situation even worse. Also, without a fan, the hard drive + GPU would probably get very hot.

I have had no problems running at stock speeds, but when running the 5750 overclocked I eventually crashed unless I boosted my exhaust fans to 1300rpm (from 800-900). Since the temps being reported appeared reasonable, everyone seemed to think it was VRMs. Since you have more leeway (cooler GPU, more vertical space, more exhaust ventilation), I doubt you'll run into this issue. I was probably being greedy anyway!

I assume you have also undervolted your CPU; that makes a huge difference for temps/heat. My i5 2400 (in the NSK1480) is set to 1.02v (0.99v idle), and my Q8200 in my living room (in a Lian-Li A04) runs stably at 0.98125v. I imagine your i3 should be able to run at around 1.00+/-0.02v (no experience with that generation).

CA_Steve
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Re: Passive video card in Antec NSK2400 / Antec Fusion? (HD6

Post by CA_Steve » Sun Aug 14, 2011 3:25 pm

At first glance, it looks like one of the Sapphire cards and the HIS card use a variant of the Arctic Cooling L2/L2 Pro. But, the height of the L2 Pro is 52mm by itself, and the single slot HIS card is only 40mm high.

Considering you can use the L2 Pro on a 5770 (108W TDP) and cool it quietly, using a cut down heatsink for the 66W TDP 6670 seems like it'd work ok. Use either CCC or MSI's Afterburner utility and drop fan speed down to 20-30% and it should be pretty quiet. Look to see if these cards come with VRM heatsinks (comes with the L2 Pro). Don't know if you neccessarily need them...but at reduced airflow, you might.

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