Zalman Fanless VGA Cooler? Heat Pipe?

[skligmund]

I was at the evil red empire (CompUSA) today, and saw on the shelf, one of these: http://www.zalman.co.kr/usa/product/zm80-hp.htm

Anybody here of any experiences from this? Is it more effective than the stock coolers on a Ti4400 (PNY)? Considering it used no fan, I am skeptical, but it does seem large and perhaps a sound idea.

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[NurseMSIC]

Yep i use mine on my GeForce4 Ti 4200 that i can still overclock as well as before. My previous heatsink and fan (it's a Leadtek card) were easy enough to remove (took about 10 minutes), and i am a happy customer.

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[Turk]

Hi! The Zalman works just fine BUT be shure that it is compatible both with your GFXcard and your MOBO! At the Zalman site they have some pictures of which mobos that will work with that cooler. Some mobos have their DIMMS sockets to close to the AGP slot, or the AGP slot to close to the CPU socket etc etc.

GL

Turk

 

[NurseMSIC]

Whilst i would always agree with Turk's sentiments, i have to say that Zalman seem to have covered 99% of their bases by giving you two heatsinks in the package, each one having a sliding-type mechanism to allow for individual graphics cards differences to be met. I think it's only Matrox cards and REALLY bizarre makes of cards from Lithuania or some such (sorry all you from Lithuania - love your graphics cards) that will be a problem attaching the heatsink to the card. You need about an extra half inch out from your graphics card for where the <A HREF="http://www.zalman.co.kr/english/product/zm80a-hp.htm" target="_new">pipe</A> goes around, but even that is about an inch or more off the ground. It certainly wasn't a problem on <A HREF="http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=433&MODEL=MS-6728" target="_new">my motherboard</A>.

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[Guest]

When I was looking into this thing I realized that there would be very little space between the heatsink and the graphics RAM. This means that I would have to remove my RAM chip heat sinks, oooo yuck. An email to the Zalman tech support, verified this for me, I think he said 4mm clearance if memory serves me...

 

[skligmund]

Hey guys, thanks for the quick reply!

I might have to go get one of those things, as I have done the measurments and it will fit in my current system.

Anybody know of any good passive heatsinks for my stock voltage T-Bred 'A'?

What are we going to do tonight Brain?
The same thing we do every night Pinky; <b>Try to take over the world!</b>
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[Quetzacoatl]

Naaah, you can't really passively cool Athlons/pentium4s/celerons. They just put out too much heat under load, even at stock they are likely doing some 20-40 watts of heat. You're best off just getting a large heatsink thats efficient and using a low cfm, low noise fan

Instead of Rdram, why not just merge 4 Sdram channels...

 

[error_911]

with regards to the Zalman, i personally wouldn't put that on my vid card unless i had a side-panel mounted fan blowing right on it, or at least some GOOD airflow. As for passively cooling your t-bred, ahahahahahahahahaha (sorry i had to). unless you feel like takin a few hundred copper pins, a nice fat copper plate and do a hell of a lot of soldering I don't think you'll get anywhere near a fanless solution, sorry

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[NurseMSIC]

That is a good point. I have a Chieftec case, and i now realise how well designed it is - the case fan in the side is DIRECTLY over the Graphics card sucking air out. It must help.

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[skligmund]

Well, I did run my T-Bred 'B' overclocked at stock voltage with a passive heatsink for a while, just to see if I could. Pretty much all I did was take of the fan. It ran 100-105F idle, and went up to 135-140 under load. So I put my fan back on so I could overclock it again. Now that wont happen with my faster T-Bred 'A', but it was worth a shot asking.

As for having good case flow and a fan blowing on the VGA card, I have that. So I might look into it more, but this thread has cured the cat, because I am no longer curious.

What are we going to do tonight Brain?
The same thing we do every night Pinky; <b>Try to take over the world!</b>
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