DIY GTX 460 video card cooler.
11-09-2012, 11:53 AM
#1
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DIY GTX 460 video card cooler.
So for a while i've been chasing a problem of my video card crashing. Got monitoring software etc. Saw it ran up to 82c at 100% and 45-50c or so at idle. Thats quite hot. The original 1 fan wasnt doing justice and i wasnt going to shell out 70 bucks for a cooler when a new card costs 100. Anyhow this was my solution.
End result?
34c at idle, 60c max at 100% usage. I am running 2 video cards and this also helped keep the card under this one cooler also. Before it was at 55c on average, now its down to 49c.
Ways to improve on this? Use slimmer fans that are open on one side. Currently the fans are pretty close to the 2nd video card which i'm sure negates air flow. Maybe 1/4" away now.
End result?
34c at idle, 60c max at 100% usage. I am running 2 video cards and this also helped keep the card under this one cooler also. Before it was at 55c on average, now its down to 49c.
Ways to improve on this? Use slimmer fans that are open on one side. Currently the fans are pretty close to the 2nd video card which i'm sure negates air flow. Maybe 1/4" away now.
Last edited by triple88a; 11-09-2012 at 12:24 PM.
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11-09-2012, 12:40 PM
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They are 80mm fans i pulled off from my old computer. They are currently driven off 12 volts directly. There is a connection on the card that i left open. If i was to buy new fans i'd get the pwm fans and connect them to the video card plug.
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11-09-2012, 12:50 PM
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Ok, that makes more sense. So there is no PWM input to the GPU and it does not care?
When PWM fans first came out on factory Intel CPU coolers, we would unplug the PWM pin and the motherboard would run ALLOFIT on the fans 24/7. They were not quiet, but they cooled substantially better. I tried this on my Nvidia 7600 GT years ago and Bad Things happened, so I never tried it on a graphics card again.
When PWM fans first came out on factory Intel CPU coolers, we would unplug the PWM pin and the motherboard would run ALLOFIT on the fans 24/7. They were not quiet, but they cooled substantially better. I tried this on my Nvidia 7600 GT years ago and Bad Things happened, so I never tried it on a graphics card again.
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11-09-2012, 01:06 PM
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Yeah i was expecting the card to say something but nope, on the gpu meter it says 0 rpms and its running like a boss, i guess it only cares about the temp.
On the other hand if you leave 1 of the 6 pin connectors for the power off right away it tells you that it doesnt have enough power and will only run at 50%.
But yeah i have the fans running at 100%. Hot wiring pwm fans is simple. Just splice all of them color by color but leave the 3rd wire on the 2nd fan disconnected which is for the speed sensor.
1 GND Black
2 12 V Yellow
3 Sense Green (leave only 1 fan connected here)
4 Control Blue
Or you can use a harness.
Newegg.com - Computer Parts, PC Components, Laptop Computers, LED LCD TV, Digital Cameras and more!
On the other hand if you leave 1 of the 6 pin connectors for the power off right away it tells you that it doesnt have enough power and will only run at 50%.
But yeah i have the fans running at 100%. Hot wiring pwm fans is simple. Just splice all of them color by color but leave the 3rd wire on the 2nd fan disconnected which is for the speed sensor.
1 GND Black
2 12 V Yellow
3 Sense Green (leave only 1 fan connected here)
4 Control Blue
Or you can use a harness.
Newegg.com - Computer Parts, PC Components, Laptop Computers, LED LCD TV, Digital Cameras and more!
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11-09-2012, 02:56 PM
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Pssht! What are you, some sort of 1%er elitist?!
Scotchlok tap FTMFW! If I can use it to install Powercards, why can't I use if for my critical PC cooling solutions!!1!
Scotchlok tap FTMFW! If I can use it to install Powercards, why can't I use if for my critical PC cooling solutions!!1!
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11-09-2012, 03:26 PM
#7
Thats one thing I agree with when it comes to THAT design, I have no idea what the hell they were thinking placing a small fan dead center in a CLOSED plastic case, it can only vent one direction meaning one half of the card isnt getting the air it needs. Much to Joe's dismay, my wife's 4 month old Zotac 550ti's in SLI were redesigned properly to incorporate the center fan. Zotac placed the fan inside and not just on top of the heat sink, but left the casing open ended with bigger heat pipes. Her only heat issue was the fact that the top card's fan was being blocked about 60% by her wifi card, which is the major downside to this design vs. the very loud turbine design. Easily remedied by a 80mm fan. (card's are on sale you know, hint hint...)
That photo was taken during wire tuck, i have no clue why I took a photo before it, but i did. I need to take a new photo, my gawd that mobo is old. She now runs a new asus board and an 8-core cpu like me.
like so...
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11-09-2012, 03:42 PM
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I have a 120mm fan in a hole on the side of the case blowing at the video cards similar to your design. With that fan on it was down to 80c, before i cut the hole and added the fan it was staying at about 85c. Not much difference.
The original design is good however the fan is not sufficient. The video card is not enclosed. It has a good path for air, just not enough of air goes through it. It simply takes air in through the center and blows it out through the fins. I'd imagine if you can find a fan the original size that blows enough air, it would work. You can see though on your own pic, the left side is open and blows out of the case, the right side is also open.
The original design is good however the fan is not sufficient. The video card is not enclosed. It has a good path for air, just not enough of air goes through it. It simply takes air in through the center and blows it out through the fins. I'd imagine if you can find a fan the original size that blows enough air, it would work. You can see though on your own pic, the left side is open and blows out of the case, the right side is also open.
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11-09-2012, 03:42 PM
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If I'm feeling ambitious, I'll try this next time I pull my computer apart to blow out all the cat hair. I've got a myriad of fans floating around, and I'm only running the one video card anyway.
It's been a while, but I thought SLI only worked with things that were specifically written for it? I didn't think there was any benefit to running non-SLI games on a system with 2 cards? I'm probably wrong on this, its been A LONG time since I even thought about SLI
It's been a while, but I thought SLI only worked with things that were specifically written for it? I didn't think there was any benefit to running non-SLI games on a system with 2 cards? I'm probably wrong on this, its been A LONG time since I even thought about SLI
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11-09-2012, 03:57 PM
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I do not use SLI, i use 2 video cards to 3 monitors. The entire mod took me 15 minutes to do and that was including figuring out how to mount the stuff and cleaning the fans and the video card guts before i put them together. There are 4 bolts that get removed from the one end of the video card, the heat sink will come off however if you dont wipe out the grease it should be good enough. The plastic cover with the original fan gets removed from there. The bolts are underneath and are inaccessible unless you separate the heat sink from the video card.
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11-09-2012, 04:14 PM
#12
If I'm feeling ambitious, I'll try this next time I pull my computer apart to blow out all the cat hair. I've got a myriad of fans floating around, and I'm only running the one video card anyway.
It's been a while, but I thought SLI only worked with things that were specifically written for it? I didn't think there was any benefit to running non-SLI games on a system with 2 cards? I'm probably wrong on this, its been A LONG time since I even thought about SLI
It's been a while, but I thought SLI only worked with things that were specifically written for it? I didn't think there was any benefit to running non-SLI games on a system with 2 cards? I'm probably wrong on this, its been A LONG time since I even thought about SLI
Her benchmarks with a single was over double in SLI, and it helps tremendously with "non-SLI" games like her EQ2 and APB:R, which she mainly plays. I don't understand how it works, since I had the same understanding as you; but ive seen a massive increase in frames and quality. My guess is if the game doesnt "support" SLI, it automatically splits the effort and gives some processing to one card and the other the rest. However, SLI doesnt like running anything graphics stressful in windowed mode because SLI does work by splitting the screen processing evenly between the cards in SLI.
Her Heaven Benchmark for one card was an average of 40fps with a max of 80fps; in SLI it was an average of 85fps and a max of 120fps.
Her new single 570 gets just shy 10fps on top of those numbers, since SLI is PSU stressful and very, very very loud, she wanted the 570 that was given to me since I RMAed my 560 AMP! because I destroyed it with too much voltage.
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11-09-2012, 04:28 PM
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Christ, that's insane.
I remember SLI was a BITCH when it first came out. The only way you could get it was an NVidia branded motherboard chipset, and the drivers packages didn't work for dick with XP. I upgraded all my crap, got a new board, bought 2 matching video cards PLUS bought a legit copy of Vista, and it NEVER worked right. Dudes kept posting these amazing 3dMark scores on the various forums with their SLI rigs but it never translated into a functional increase in FPS for anything I was playing. I still remember that as the WORST computer upgrade cycle I ever went though.
I remember SLI was a BITCH when it first came out. The only way you could get it was an NVidia branded motherboard chipset, and the drivers packages didn't work for dick with XP. I upgraded all my crap, got a new board, bought 2 matching video cards PLUS bought a legit copy of Vista, and it NEVER worked right. Dudes kept posting these amazing 3dMark scores on the various forums with their SLI rigs but it never translated into a functional increase in FPS for anything I was playing. I still remember that as the WORST computer upgrade cycle I ever went though.
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11-09-2012, 04:32 PM
#16
Christ, that's insane.
I remember SLI was a BITCH when it first came out. The only way you could get it was an NVidia branded motherboard chipset, and the drivers packages didn't work for dick with XP. I upgraded all my crap, got a new board, bought 2 matching video cards PLUS bought a legit copy of Vista, and it NEVER worked right. Dudes kept posting these amazing 3dMark scores on the various forums with their SLI rigs but it never translated into a functional increase in FPS for anything I was playing. I still remember that as the WORST computer upgrade cycle I ever went though.
I remember SLI was a BITCH when it first came out. The only way you could get it was an NVidia branded motherboard chipset, and the drivers packages didn't work for dick with XP. I upgraded all my crap, got a new board, bought 2 matching video cards PLUS bought a legit copy of Vista, and it NEVER worked right. Dudes kept posting these amazing 3dMark scores on the various forums with their SLI rigs but it never translated into a functional increase in FPS for anything I was playing. I still remember that as the WORST computer upgrade cycle I ever went though.
Those jumpers in between the PCIe slots.
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11-09-2012, 04:46 PM
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Nvidia definitely has gotten that sli thing down. The only thing that pisses me off at the moment is you need the same video cards to run surround gaming. You cannot run surround gaming with mismatched video cards using the nvidia software. In other words unless i purchase another 460 i cannot use 3 monitors for surround gaming with the nvidia software. From memory you cannot run sli with mismatched video cards either.
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11-09-2012, 04:56 PM
#18
That is the stock heatsink, i just removed the plastic cover+fan.
Nvidia definitely has gotten that sli thing down. The only thing that pisses me off at the moment is you need the same video cards to run surround gaming. You cannot run surround gaming with mismatched video cards using the nvidia software. In other words unless i purchase another 460 i cannot use 3 monitors for surround gaming with the nvidia software. From memory you cannot run sli with mismatched video cards either.
Nvidia definitely has gotten that sli thing down. The only thing that pisses me off at the moment is you need the same video cards to run surround gaming. You cannot run surround gaming with mismatched video cards using the nvidia software. In other words unless i purchase another 460 i cannot use 3 monitors for surround gaming with the nvidia software. From memory you cannot run sli with mismatched video cards either.
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