Gigabyte GTX 460 1GB, this one any good?

I'm about to buy 2 of these cards for SLI, so I really appreciate your hard work because I was also worried about the noise this thing produces under load.
As far as I'm aware this is the quietest of the gtx 460 1gb cards.
There is a way to eliminate 40-70 % fan speed limitation but it requires you to flash the BIOS of your card.
http://forums.vr-zone.com/8356770-post81.html
 
I personally like it that the fan does not ramp up to 100% under load :) If I were to unlock the speed, I'd sooner unlock the speed below 40%.

Also, I checked loudness of my current card Sapphire HD5850 with non-reference cooler. On 40% GPU-Z reports 1500RPM and the card is quiet, so gigabyte on 1500 RPM also should be.
 
Do anyone have the measurements of this card? I am planning to get it but am afraid my case be alittle tight for it. Currently it is tight with the 8800GT
 
It is the size of an 8800 GT. Much smaller than a GTX 260/275/285

Which 8800 GT do you have, I might be able to tell you if it is bigger than your current card.
 
I can give you exact measurements in the morning, if you need them still, for the Gigabyte GTX 460 1GB.
 
Get the exact measurements if you want to be absolutely sure but I looked at it and compared it to the gigabyte 460 and they should be about equal in length, perhaps the 460 is a little shorter, even.
 
I'd like to thank requiem99 for his great help in this thread. Gigabyte 1GB OC is indeed effin awesome :) Cool, silent, overclockable, you name it.
 
yujie said:
Do anyone have the measurements of this card? I am planning to get it but am afraid my case be alittle tight for it. Currently it is tight with the 8800GT
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The official length of the stock GTX 460 is 8.25". This in confirmed in several reviews, and also on Nvidia's site:

Standard GTX 460 Graphics Card Dimensions:
Height 4.376 inches (111 mm)
Length 8.25 inches (210 mm)
Width Dual-slot

The official length of the stock 8800GT is 9", but several non-reference models were made with 8.25" lengths.

So, either way you're covered, as the shortest 8800GT made was the exact same length as the longest GTX 460. But if you want more breathing room, there are also even shorter models of the GTX 460: the Palit PCB is custom, and is only 7.5" see the comparison of stock versus Palit PCB here:

http://www.techspot.com/review/299-palit-inno3d-geforce-gtx-460/page4.html
 
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Gigabyte is longer than palit and has power sockets at the back of ther card, not on the side, which means you need a bit of additional space for the cables.
 
Simplex said:
Gigabyte is longer than palit and has power sockets at the back of ther card, not on the side, which means you need a bit of additional space for the cables.
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8800GTs also had their power connector on the back, not the side. I remember seeing my first GTX 260 and thinking, oh damn, how am I going to fit one of those... oh nice, 6pin powers are on the spine. :)
 
I have 2 of these cards in SLI and they're fantastic. I haven't run any benchmarks, but I don't see any reason to considering the amount of reviews on this card anyway. Also, on idle, I can barely hear any fans even with the side panel open, including the fans on these cards.
 
Just for the sake of it - this is a comparison of Palit Sonic (non referene PCB shorter than reference GTX460 PCB) to Sapphire HD5850 (non reference PCB longer than reference 5850 PCB):



To add insult to injury, 5850 has power sockets on the back ;)
 
Is there a way (via bios flashing I suspect) to change the lower speed limit from 40% to, say, 30%? I don't want to increase the upper limit from 70% to 100% but I'd be happy to have the idle fanspeed at less than 40% (right now my idle core temp is just 29 degrees Celsius (84 F) so there's room for lower speed).
 
Simplex said:
Is there a way (via bios flashing I suspect) to change the lower speed limit from 40% to, say, 30%? I don't want to increase the upper limit from 70% to 100% but I'd be happy to have the idle fanspeed at less than 40% (right now my idle core temp is just 29 degrees Celsius (84 F) so there's room for lower speed).
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I've been having the same thoughts - my stock cooler on the Sparkle GTX 460 is also limited to 40%. But I have to admit, with my current case configuration, the GTX 460 at 40% is quieter than my two 120mm Scythe FDB 1200 RPM fans (at 800 RPM) plus the stock Intel heatsink.

I'm going to try and see how quiet the rest of my system can be before I wish for lower GTX 460 fan speeds. Now that my HD 4850 is not the dominating sound at idle, I may need a 3rd-party CPU cooler, and have a look at running my Scythe fans even slower :D

We fucked around with all sorts of things on the HD 4850 - I flashed my BIOS just to get the lower idle clocks that only one manufacturer was shipping at the time, and if you wanted to, you could permanently change the fan profiles. I'm sure there will be opportunities to flash the GTX 460.
 
I'm trying to figure out how some people can't leave well enough alone. 40% can't be heard already, what's the problem? You want to save a seventieth of a watt of power? You want to align your fan speed to your birthday so you don't forget how old you are? You are afraid that the 40% limit has been imposed by Skynet and you, for one, do not welcome our new robotic overlords?
 
requiem99 said:
I'm trying to figure out how some people can't leave well enough alone. 40% can't be heard already, what's the problem? You want to save a seventieth of a watt of power? You want to align your fan speed to your birthday so you don't forget how old you are? You are afraid that the 40% limit has been imposed by Skynet and you, for one, do not welcome our new robotic overlords?
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Nah, people just want to know what's causing the noise in their cases. Remember, you're in the [H], the land of perpetual tweaking :D

Now, don't get me wrong: although I'd like to see if my system can be quieter, it's not a high priority task. It's just something that comes to the front of my mind on a weekend morning when I wake up and the only thing on in the house is the PC. Only then do I hear the true noise of the system, and get a bit of an itch to improve it. Under normal conditions (fan on in the room, AC on), the system cannot be heard.

I'm probably not going to have the free time to do something like this for at least a month, and I doubt I'll take the task very seriously :D
 
I don't see any system already containing at least 1 fan that could audibly display a difference between 40 and 25 percent with this video card.
 
I just wanted to see for myself if lowering the fanspeed would change "loudness" of my rig. If it would not, I would leave the default 40%.
(regardles, I do not welcome our new robotic overlords ;) )
 
Sorry for doubleposting.

defaultluser said:
I've been having the same thoughts - my stock cooler on the Sparkle GTX 460 is also limited to 40%. But I have to admit, with my current case configuration, the GTX 460 at 40% is quieter than my two 120mm Scythe FDB 1200 RPM fans (at 800 RPM) plus the stock Intel heatsink.
I'm going to try and see how quiet the rest of my system can be before I wish for lower GTX 460 fan speeds. the GTX 460.
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There's your answer, I suspect the stock intel HSF may currently be the loudest component of your computer, mine was so I replaced it with a third party one (SilentiumPC Spartan, can only be bought in Poland :D)
 
Simplex said:
Sorry for doubleposting.


There's your answer, I suspect the stock intel HSF may currently be the loudest component of your computer, mine was so I replaced it with a third party one (SilentiumPC Spartan, can only be bought in Poland :D)
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Damn, even at idle the sound is noticeable, eh? Guess I might need to invest in a cooler,. when I get a free moment (might not be till September).
 
If you overclock, then the stock cooler may be loud even on idle.
You can check it easily - stop the cooler by blocking the blades or just disconnecting it from power for a while (CPU should not get toasted because all modern cpus have throttling and other anti-overheat measures) - if you notice that the computer is quieter, then the stock cooler is your culprit :)
 
Just picked one up, can definitely say it is quiet!

Even at 100% fan its barely audible in my room.
Has played everything I've thrown at it so far, then again my gtx260 was able to do the same thing. I'm going to wait till after the 475 comes out before I decide I want to SLI but it's nice to know that I picked up a good card.

Much better than the Palit equivalent in every regard.
 
I've had mine for about 5 days now and I am loving it. Performs great, runs cooler, and is quieter than my previous EVGA 8800 GT (which was also very quiet). I just overclocked it now, and I have got it to 830/1660 MHz stable. It's not as high as others have posted, but it's good enough for me. I haven't tried overvolting, and I'm not sure if I will, I'm a little scared to try...

I knew any gtx 460 would be a good choice, but I wanted the one with the quietest cooling, and a factory OC'ed for hopefully better overclocking results. I liked the Gigabyte reviews, so i bit the bullet and i have no regrets. I was between the MSI and EVGA as well, and I'm sure those are still great choices.
I think it's very quiet, and even as fan speeds went up during stress test, it wasn't very much louder (card got to 95 C on OCCT), don't know what fan % speed though.
 
What other companies sell a 1GB model with the reference fan? The Sparkle is out at newegg.
 
zeroARMY said:
What other companies sell a 1GB model with the reference fan? The Sparkle is out at newegg.
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None that I can think of, sorry. You might try another dealer. Or, you can wait impatiently :D

The stock cooler is excellent (I own a Sparkle 1GB GTX 460): 30C idle, and the load never tops 60C. The heat sink is so amazing that the fan doesn't ever have to spin above 40%, even at full load.

If you can't buy the Sparkle, lots of people on this thread have had a good experience with the Gigabyte cooler.
 
I just got my card and it's quite quiet. The only problem is overclocking the card. I keep getting texture glitches when I OC above 740 which is odd compared to everyones norm. Can trying other drivers fix this or is my card a OC dud? Max temp is around the high 60-75 when OCing.
 
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Vegtro said:
I just got my card and it's quite quiet. The only problem is overclocking the card. I keep getting texture glitches when I OC above 740 which is odd compared to everyones norm. Can trying other drivers fix this or is my card a OC dud? Max temp is around the high 60-75 when OCing.
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Sounds like you got a dud. But that doesn't mean you're out for the count: try adjusting the voltage using MSI Afterburner. A higher voltage can mean higher frequencies, at the cost of increased power consumption (and decreased life of the chip).

As always, proceed at your own risk. Voltage adjustment can kill a card if you're not careful.
 
defaultluser said:
Sounds like you got a dud. But that doesn't mean you're out for the count: try adjusting the voltage using MSI Afterburner. A higher voltage can mean higher frequencies, at the cost of increased power consumption (and decreased life of the chip).

As always, proceed at your own risk. Voltage adjustment can kill a card if you're not careful.
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I'm just going to get it replaced then. Thanks for the info.
 
You're going to replace something that doesn't overclock as well as you'd like? I don't care how many times I see this, I simply shake my head every time I do. Fucking entitlement generation.
 
Hi All

I've just installed these cards & couldn't be happier. these cards are dead silent. Kudos to Requiem99 for his work & letting folk know about this card. I had previously purchased EVGA's GTX 460 EE, but those cards were to loud for my taste. The Gigabyte card is the cats meow.
Only downside is that I had to go over to on board sound as my sound card is PCI & these beauties block my PCI slots. Other than that I'm very pleased.
 
I've upgraded to the Gigabyte GTX 460 1GB OC from an original BFG 8800GT (G92 single-slot cooler). The 8800GT would overheat and throttle in OCCT GPU!!

I'm extremely happy with the upgrade. Even dual-screens the GTX 460 goes into its most aggressive power-save in idle, 50MHz core, 66MHz memory, and 100MHz shader, 0.8750V. I'd had problems with an ATI and getting power-saving to work with dual-screens, flickering, grey screens etc.

PC power usage comparison in idle (both dual-screen):

8800GT = 167W idle
GTX 460 = 140W idle

So I'm saving 27W in idle. I'm very pleased with that! :)
 
I just upgraded my 8800GTS (92) SLI setup to a Gigabyte GTX460 1GB SLI setup. It blows my old setup away in everything I throw at it. My monitor is capped at 1920x1080 resolution, probably time to upgrade that now! :)
 
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