Videocard (HSF) height/depth

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Gawd
Joined
Oct 11, 2011
Messages
591
I've been wondering, why is only the length of cards / HSFs increased (to such an extent that they no longer fit in all cases) while the heigth/depth remains the same?
Many cases have quite a lot of spare spaces to fit cards with a greater depth. It'd also allow bigger / quieter fans to be used.
 
I understood your question right then it would be due to expansion slots. Bigger cards such as the Asus DC2 might kill of some of the lanes in a motherboard, so from a marketing standpoint would be less desirable than a long gpu for the customer (potential upgrades and such). The length of the gpu keeps increasing since theres a correlation between length and the cost of a card, and if you can afford a $400 gpu then I'm sure most buyers can afford/own a decent case with an adequate amount of length for the gpu. (and even budget cases nowadays are offering 12+ inches for the gpu, where the expansion slot issue still remains dependent on the motherboard)
 
No, I meant the third / other direction. Like low-profile network/video cards, but then the inverse, 'high-profile' or so.

If you're upgrading and not intended to buy a new case, the length might still be a problem. Yes, some (budget) cases allow long videocards but in a lot of cases it's quite a problem.
 
Because it violates the PCI-express physical specification. Under the spec, cards can be up to ~12.28" long, but are limited in height to what we have. Nevertheless, there are a few cards that are taller than standard height - e.g., the ASUS Mars cards.
 
Isn't that a bit silly? An exception for high-end videocards might allow better HSFs to be used.
 
There are plenty of wide cards. Look at the EVGA calssified 580s. Theyare wider than "normal" cards, as are a few third party coolers using larger fans.

There are a few problems with it which become obvious when looking at the evga card. The SLI/Crossfire bridge. All the cards have to line up, otherwise youd have to use all of the same type in a multicard solution, otherwise the bridge would not be flat across all three. Watercooling slied/crossfire cards with different horizontal height would be more problematic too, as you couldn't use straight SLI bridges with different cards.

Perhaps if all manafactuerers agreed ona new standard. There had been some times when a manafactuerer has added extra height, like the quad sli daughterboard for that ASUS board. But generally it's less of a PITA to just work within the spec.
 
I would prefer they be wider rather than longer, honestly,,, but it also probably has a lot to do with how their fabs are set up. It would be worth it to have the larger coolers because of the noise/temperature difference, to me.

I thought the accelero being about an inch bigger than the stock cooler might be an issue in some cases, but I think in most cases it should be ok, although it did cause me to have to lose one of my noctua case fans in the wife's SG02.. but man is it quiet.

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