8800GT coolers....

Hey guys i've heard a lot about buying aftermarket coolers for the 8800GT, and i plan to buy an 8800GT in the next month, is it really that important? and how do i know what to buy, and what would be the best air cooler available for it atm?

people just can't get used to the idea that a single slot cooler will be sufficient.

I am sure Nvidia test the product to extremes that will most likely not be reached inside your case unless you are putting in in a shuttle.

Also most poeople that get after market coolers do it for noise reductions, or if they are over clocking it like crazy.

Seeing as the overclocked versions from third parties go as high as 700 with stock cooling solutions you should be fine.

Another thing to remember... No one actually has this card right now, so wait for a few days and you'll know if it really get hot enough to warrant the swap.

Note: I know I don't have it either... But speculating is fun

Well actually I found the Cooler on my Asus 7950 GT to be a loud hot heap of crap and I am very forgiving compared to many people.

To the OP, It is reported basically any cooling solution that fitted on the 7900GT/7950Gt etc will fit on the 8800GT which is great. I will probably re-cycle my Zalman VF-900, but I will tests the reference cooler first, always like to give product its day in court.

The stock cooler should be sufficient for some overclocking, but if it doesn't work as well as I'd like on my pair of cards, I will grab these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835106090

Don't waste money on an aftermarket HSF if you're only buying one 8800 GT. Just grab an 80mm or 92mm fan and some double-sided adhesive, and remove or unplug the default shitty small fan along with the "shroud" of plastic shit it is encased in.

That way you spend maybe $12 instead of wasting $10 on shipping and $30 or $40 more on some overpriced HSF. Slap the fan onto the bare heatsink and hook it up to a motherboard header or a fan controller. Works like a charm.

If you're using two cards, a default 80x15 or 92x15 fan might be too fat and you may need to get 80x10 size fans instead. But in that case with double the heat you probably need the aftermarket HSFs which can actually exhaust the air not just blow it around for a rear case fan to exhaust.

[H] posted its review today, temps were roughly 60/90C with the machine outside a case. Wether that's enough higher than older cards to become an issue with OCing or cooling inside a closed box is still TBD.

so the swiftech waterblock that I'm using on my 7900gt can be reused on my 8800gt? That's nice to know.

Originally Posted by GoldenTiger

The stock cooler should be sufficient for some overclocking, but if it doesn't work as well as I'd like on my pair of cards, I will grab these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835106090

Honsetly, I think thoes coolers arent too well designed. The heatsink contact with the VRAM has about a 1mm-2mm gap, which is filled in with big ol' thermal pads...

Originally Posted by WhiteZero

Honsetly, I think thoes coolers arent too well designed. The heatsink contact with the VRAM has about a 1mm-2mm gap, which is filled in with big ol' thermal pads...

Huh? It's a completely flat heatsink... if you mean the plastic cover over the core to protect the thermal paste, that comes off as I'm sure you know .

vf900 apparently fits according to that preview by expreview or whatever site that was.

the easy thing to do to decrease temperatures is to first remove that plastic cover that is on the heatsink to expose the heatpipes, then blow some sort of fan in that area, whether it be one of those PCI exhaust fans or some other fan ( I have fans mounted to the side of my case) .. that usually gets the job done fine.

Originally Posted by GoldenTiger

Huh? It's a completely flat heatsink... if you mean the plastic cover over the core to protect the thermal paste, that comes off as I'm sure you know .

Nope, thats not what I mean. I'm not sure if Thermaltake has improved on the design, but my Arctic Cooling AV Silencer has the exact same looking design and it's VRAM contact is terrible.

People said that the heatsink fins are closed on the 8800GT, so taking off the plastic cover and having a fan blow on those fins will make a difference, but not much.

del.

One of the reviews mentioned that the mounting holes are in the same locations as the 7900 series, I wonder if Nv Silencers would fit because those coolers are my favorite.

Originally Posted by blazingrig

The 8800GT has the exact same screw points as the 7900GT/X. Therefore any cooler which is compatible with the 7900GT/X will work fine with the 8800GT...

not necessarily, I mean just because the holes are in the same place doesnt mean the ram chips,caps and other pcb mounted du-dads are. There could be clearance issues all around. So until someone has tried these older 7900 coolers and knows for sure they will fit without shorting things out or causing other problems I wouldnt spend a dime on an aftermarket cooler for the 8800gt

Originally Posted by Matrices

Don't waste money on an aftermarket HSF if you're only buying one 8800 GT. Just grab an 80mm or 92mm fan and some double-sided adhesive, and remove or unplug the default shitty small fan along with the "shroud" of plastic shit it is encased in.

The "plastic" shroud is actually metal.

Originally Posted by [H

Review]The GeForce 8800 GT is a single-slot video card utilizing a heatpipe heatsink underneath the shroud which covers the entire video card this time. The heatsink makes physical contact with the memory modules and power circuitry, and with the fan creates an active cooling system for the entire video card. The shroud itself even aids in heatsink duty since it is metal and in contact with the heatsink itself, so heat will transfer throughout the entire shroud, and it does get very hot at full load.

I liked the review

yeah I'm getting lazy in my old age, going from wanting to water cool, to having good air cooling, to now being too lazy to bother with ramsinks and sinks for the mosfets and such.. don't feel like removing that stock cooler unless it's absolutely necessary. If it dies, it can be RMAed anyways assuming it would ever die before I'd upgrade it.

My concern is not stability but noise. Compared to the GTS this HSF is a step backwards design-wise. In fact the GTS is a ridiculously quiet GPU, the first graphics card I didn't even touch.

Back when I had the Geforce 4 Ti4600 I epoxied a CPU HSF onto it. For the 6800 I epoxied a 1CU copper cooler. For the 7800 I kept the heatsink but ripped off the shroud and placed a Panaflo 80mm on the heatsink.

All these solutions were quieter and cooler and overclocked better than the ridiculous 40 or 60mm fans and silly shroud "designs" that did nothing.

Unfortunately the GT reverts to this position. [H] should have done sound testing and should have offered an audio comparison with the GTS. Instead they glossed over the whole thing.

Originally Posted by stain.

The "plastic" shroud is actually metal.



I liked the review

Thanks for digging out the actual quote, I was going to point this out as well. Not only is the shroud part of the cooling (and metal), but notice that the heatsink itself contacts the RAM and the power circuitry, not just the GPU. Any aftermarket solution would have to make good contact with all of the same elements or you'd be taking a step backwards. RAM contact is fairly common, but what about the power circuitry?