Looking to upgrade my graphics... quietly.

The Internal · Post by **The Internal** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:11 am

Greetings,

I don't wanna go over $400 US if possible. I'm currently running a EVGA 6800 Ultra, which isn't LOUD, but it's not quiet. It doesn't quite cut it on running Oblivion at 1920x1200 on my 24" Dell widescreen either.
I'd prefer to go with a silent card(s), but am open to quiet ones. I've read about a number of silent cards from gigabyte and ASUS, but the fastest silent ones AVAILABLE are the gigabyte 7600 GT and 7600 GS, which both recieved gold awards from Anandtech (http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=2825&p=18).
I have a number of questions that I was unable to have answered after scouring through google for reviews.
Is the 7600 GS or 7600 GT faster than a 6800 Ultra?
What sort of numbers can be expected from dual 7600 GS in SLI (or the GT)?
Should I just wait a month for the ASUS 7800 GT silent card to become available (or for the newest silent models from gigabyte and ASUS to come out)?
I'm a bang for the buck sorta guy, and am willing to wait a little longer. I know DirectX 10 parts will theoretically start shipping near the end of 4th quarter, but I'm not sure I want to wait that long for an upgrade.
Comments/suggestions greatly appreciated.
I'm currently leaning towards dual silent 7600 GTs http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814125025... or maybe just getting a "standard" card, ripping it's loud heatsink off, and slapping a Zalman on.

ziphnor · Post by **ziphnor** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 9:24 am

I believe 7900GT passive cards are already available at almost no additional cost(compared to non-passive).

Cant remember which brands right now though

The 7900GT is a much better choice for gaming performance/cost wise.

stromgald · Post by **stromgald** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 10:29 am

XFX is starting to release passive 7950GT and 7950GS models. They don't seem readily available yet, but you can drool over them here: http://www.xfxforce.com/web/product/lis ... tId=638284

If you're not willing to wait, Gigabyte has a 7900GT that has an all Aluminum Zalman VF700 as the stock cooler. That should be fairly quiet when undervolted to 5V. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814125038

Aris · Post by **Aris** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 11:09 am

7600GS or GT are definately NOT able to run oblivion at that resolution at any playable framerates. I would guess any resolution over 1280x1024 on a modern video game would be pushing it with those two cards.

For everything else though their fine. I've got a 7600GS passive running world of warcraft at 1024x768 with all visial settings at max, framerates are almost always capped at 60, only falling to around 30fps when there is an abnormally large amount of people in one area (like in orgrimar).

At that resoultion, youd have to get a 7900gt or better, MINIMUM. that is an insane resolution for that game. from the reviews ive seen, 1280x1024 is about the maximum playable resolution without dropping all the visual settings to minimum.

tursca · Post by **tursca** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 12:05 pm

XFX passive 7950GT really looks awsome! I also need a new graphic card, for my 24" monitor.

I was just wondering.... how much is gonna be the temp. on these cards? Are they gonna be overheating a lot or like some of the 7600GT models?What do you think?

Is the MSI 7900GT overheating a lot or is it quite normal. Does anybody know?

vitaminc · Post by **vitaminc** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 12:22 pm

Gigabyte 7600GT HSF on the back/top side runs hot.
ASUS EN7600GT HSF extension runs warm, but the front/bottom side runs hot.

graphics cards usually runs a lot hotter than CPU though.

s_xero · Post by **s_xero** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 1:00 pm

Hi, have started another topic with this but here you are:

XFX is going to sell PASSIVE 7950GS/T-ards, look cool and silent.

Further is my experience with XFX that the support is good and that those crads can overclock pretty awsome!

The Internal · Post by **The Internal** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 1:04 pm

those XFX cards look like the Asus 7800 silent solution... I wonder what the price point is though...

jackylman · Post by **jackylman** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 1:18 pm

If you want to play Oblivion, i would look for ATI's products and use an Arctic Cooling Silencer to get the heat out of the case.

Or you could just get an HIS X1900GT
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814161018

oakdad · Post by **oakdad** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 7:49 pm

The 7600gt is a tad better than the old 6800 ultra according to this.
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php ... &card2=385
The 7950gt will be almost twice the card you have now according to this.
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php ... &card2=445
Since Oblivion is all about shader operations then you can see why the 1950 xtx rocks.
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php ... &card2=445
and the stock cooler should rock.

merlin · Post by **merlin** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 9:25 am

If you're looking for the most power with the least amount of heat(which will obviously help you keep things quiet), I'd definitely pick either a single 7900GT or 7900GS. Even if the stock heatsink/fan is poor, you could replace it with a VF900 or any other good quiet aftermarket. Another choice is to get one of those cards with a good heatsink/passive heatsink included. Not to mention paying only $200-270 is nice

nightmorph · Post by **nightmorph** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 12:17 pm

Even a 7600GT will beat your 6800. I'm planning on getting an aftermarket (NV Silencer 6) cooler for my 7600GT and that will still be less than the cost of every other 7600GT on the market. I'd get a 7600 and use the rest of your cash to get another monitor while still staying under the $400 limit. You could get a card, cooler, and 19" LCD and still pocket some change.

cobalt · Post by **cobalt** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 3:28 pm

If you can stand to wait, the prices will be even better when DX10 graphics cards come out. It looks like the interim GPU market until DX10 is released is HDCP compliance and HDTV support (1080i). It makes sense, in that there are now single cards powerful enough to push 1080i for HD video playback. So the appeal for HTPC users will persist after DX10 has arrived. However, they will pretty much lose the gaming market over the next year or so.

I'm personally planning on picking up an XFX 7950GT, which should be available later this week. There are two models, one overclocked slightly. The 7950GT platform as a whole is supposed to start around $300. I don't know if HDCP compliance would drive the cost up significantly.

Unrelated note: it was kind of weird how multiple websites unveiled the 7950GT with the 7900GS, and then had to retract the announcement and focus entirely on the 7900GS instead.

vitaminc · Post by **vitaminc** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:04 pm

All the known DX10 cards run hot and needs tons of gatorate to fire up.

nightmorph · Post by **nightmorph** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 7:48 pm

Er, what known cards are these? They haven't actually been released. Actually, does anyone know when they might plausibly be released?

cobalt · Post by **cobalt** » Tue Sep 12, 2006 10:55 pm

I'm just saying that the release of DX10 cards should make all DX9 cards less expensive. And also unleash a number of DX9 cards on the used market.

But that said, when Vista is released, DX10 will be released, AFAIK.

smilingcrow · Post by **smilingcrow** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 5:19 am

Since you have a monitor with such a high native resolution, I would look at running a 7900GS SLI setup. These offer a lot more performance than the 7600GTs and are very good value at the moment. They start at $200 but there is also $20 mail in rebates, so you are looking at $360 for the cards. Quiet heatsink/fans for the cards will cost up to an extra $80, which does take you above your budget.
But the performance increase compared to dual 7600GTs is very large and the current price difference compared to two silent-pipe Gigabyte 7600GTs is small.
I doubt youâ€™ll get better performance from a single VGA card in the same price range.

vitaminc · Post by **vitaminc** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 8:26 am

nightmorph wrote:Er, what known cards are these? They haven't actually been released. Actually, does anyone know when they might plausibly be released?

There's no card out yet, and the DX10 GPUs drinks gatorate for power. ATI's R600 and NVidia's G80/NV60 to be more specific.

They should be announced in the November-December timeframe.

QuietOC · Post by **QuietOC** » Wed Sep 13, 2006 10:06 am

smilingcrow wrote:Since you have a monitor with such a high native resolution, I would look at running a 7900GS SLI setup. These offer a lot more performance than the 7600GTs and are very good value at the moment. They start at $200 but there is also $20 mail in rebates, so you are looking at $360 for the cards. Quiet heatsink/fans for the cards will cost up to an extra $80, which does take you above your budget.
But the performance increase compared to dual 7600GTs is very large and the current price difference compared to two silent-pipe Gigabyte 7600GTs is small.
I doubt youâ€™ll get better performance from a single VGA card in the same price range.

I'd also say the 7900GS SLI setup is a very good deal, and they could be quiet cheaply with a little work. No reason to spend $80 for quiet heatsinks. I would drill and tap two cheap/old CPU heatsinks onto those and duct them out the rear of the case with some large fan(s). Make sure to get a SLI board with lots of room between the two SLI slots. This is ultimately a much better solution than aftermarket heatsinks that just recirculate the hot air back into the case.

Properly setup this might allow the inexpensive 7900GSs to be overclocked past 7900GTX speeds. This could be a very fast SLI setup. Faster (and much quieter) than single or dual GX2s for most real games, and all for a fraction of the cost!

I like that ATI's top-end cards expel all the hot exaust air. Too bad they have small, slightly noisy blower fans. The 7900GTX has a nice, quiet heatsink/fan combination but only half the hot air is exhausted!

jjwa · Post by **jjwa** » Tue Sep 19, 2006 1:29 am

http://www.xfxforce.com/web/product/lis ... tId=638284
Take a loot at the XFX GeForce 7950 GT 512MB DDR3 HDCP ExTreme
(PV-T71J-YHE9). Completely passively cooled and stock overclock

. 7950GT is in between 7900GT and 7900GTX performance-wise.

Looking to upgrade my graphics... quietly.

Looking to upgrade my graphics... quietly.

Re: Looking to upgrade my graphics... quietly.