No one can seem to answer what video card(s) will work in my computer.

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zephyr89

zephyr89

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I have been asking around people at my IT job, people on here, people on other forums, I can not seem to get a straight answer. All I want to know, and I can't beleive there aren't many others who have this same problem, is this.

Every single decent GPU that is produced these days is a full two lanes wide. I have a 6 in long full height creative x-fi sound card in a PCI slot two slots down from my GPU slot. I had already tried getting a full shrouded GTX 460, with a centered fan and the card, like all cards today, is so wide there is not enough room between the fan and the sound card for airflow. It's like 1mm. When I turned the computer on, it sounded like someone was holding their hand over the hose of a shopvac.

The question is this. Is there any single GPU that you know of under 10 inches long that is designed to have airflow with a card that is directly in the third lane? Please guys, it has been months and nobody knows for sure and I can't be throwing 200+ dollars around like nothing. Any of these?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125390

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814261108

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127566

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127565
 
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B

beenthere

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You are not going to get any high end Vid card that isn't a double wide. So the only option is to use a lower power Vid card that doesn't have a fan mounted on it or thick heatsink. Your options are going to be very limited IME.
 
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zephyr89

zephyr89

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Wow, this is exactly what I mean. I am posting this because there is no option with my current setup other than to completely upgrade my mobo cpu ram and video card, a new computer, and I do not have the money for a new computer.

I know I'm not going to get one that's not a double wide, I am asking if there are any double wides which will work.

Creative Drivers are crap but their hardware was still good when I bought it. With the daniel k drivers It sounds as good as a 600-700 dollar home theater receiver.

And just totally beside the point, even if I had your favorite brand and your favorite model of sound card I would still be in the same situation. My onboard sound does not cut it.
 
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nordlead

nordlead

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You are asking the wrong people then. You could probably get a definitive answer fairly quickly by e-mailing every hardware card manufacturer and asking them if they have any cards that are less than X mm thick and are the equivalent or better than whatever card you want.

I'm going to bet that there really aren't any double slot cards that will work since the reason to use a double slot card is to cool the card. Manufacturers will use as much space as possible so they can get the biggest heat-sink and fan combo as possible in part because they need to or their hardware will overheat.
 
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nordlead

nordlead

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I forgot about the water cooled solutions. pretty expensive though...
 
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jonnyrb

jonnyrb

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You already know the solution... Your only other option would be water cooling your card and getting something like a 65** series with passive cooling

Edit: It's relative to asking "I want a super powerful car, but I don't want it to be expensive or take gasoline" Weak card -- Water cool - New mobo
 
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zephyr89

zephyr89

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and yet I've seen a dodge neon beat a porsche 911 GT2 in a drag.
 
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hang-the-9

hang-the-9

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I'm guessing it was not stock, not even a neon turbo can do that, which kills the cheapness. I've beaten fast cars in my Toyota Matrix also, till the other car used more than 10% throttle :)

I'd take the advice about getting a single slot card rather than ignore the advice everyone is giving you. There are plenty of pretty fast cards out there that are single slot. You can't move the sound card over to the far PCI slot?

There is a saying I like "If one person tells me I'm a monkey, I'll ignore them. If 2, I may look in the mirror. If 3, I'm buying bannans". You have several people here, and in other places tell you something, instead of saying OK that must be the case, you are flailing around saying you can't get good advice. You already did, now if you don't chose to take it, up to you. Water cooling would be nice though, a thin block and it traps heat better than a large fan would.
 
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jaguarskx

jaguarskx

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The answer is pretty simple. All video card that are designed to use two slots will all have basically the same dimensions in terms of how wide the video card is.

Since you do not want to upgrade anything else in your computer, there is no other PCI slot to move the sound card to, and you do not want to remove the sound card, there is no other solution other than to buy a video card that only uses one slot (lane).


The most power single slot graphics card is the Radeon HD 6770. Newegg has two such cards. One is from PowerColor (DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort) for $140, the other is from XFX (only 5 mini-DisplayPorts) also for $140.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814131445

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814150574

nVidia does not have a comparable video card so it is the Radeon HD 6770 or it's nothing.
 
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jonnyrb

jonnyrb

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lol crossfire ready, I would giggle at anybody that had those in crossfire
 
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Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

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IIRC there is a single slot GTX460 available.
 
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Mousemonkey

Mousemonkey

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That's the problem with only using the egg as a source of purchase, luckily I don't have that problem as I'm not in the USA. ;)
 
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jonnyrb

jonnyrb

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I like tigerdirect.com, canadacomputers.com, ncix.com etc Newegg is nice for shell shockers every now and then :p
 
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Todd1971

Todd1971

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http://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?p=PC-685D5DH&c=fr&pid=9116f50796cbc34b232dd25bd056028be63505b9c5ebe2dc00654b05654c3c2f

PowerColor ATI Radeon HD6850 1GB DDR5 DVI/HDMI/2x Mini DisplayPort PCI-Express Video Card - AX6850 1GBD5-I2DH

$233.98

Specifications
Mfr Part Number: AX6850 1GBD5-I2DH
Chipset: Radeon HD6850
Engine Clock: 775 MHz
Video Memory: 1GB DDR5
Memory Clock: 1000 MHz x 4 (4.0 Gbps)
Memory Interface: 256-bit
Bus: PCI-Express 2.1 x16
RAMDAC: 400 MHz
Stream Processors: 960
Max. Resolution: 2560 x 1600
Connectors: DVI; HDMI; 2x Mini DisplayPort
Thermal: Fansink
Support Microsoft Windows 7/ Vista/ XP
Support ATI CrossFireX Technology
Support ATI Stream Technology
Support ATI Eyefinity Technology
Support ATI PowerPlay Technology
Support AMD HD3D technology
Support HDCP - High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection
Support Microsoft DirectX 11, Shader Model 5.0 and OpenGL 4.1
500W Minimum System Power requirement w/ 1x 6-Pin PCI Express Power Connectors
Package: Retail
 
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J

jitpublisher

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Okay as I read down this, I have couple of questions, if I missed them somewhere already, sorry but this thread is going in circles with no rhyme or reason.
OP, please, what is the rest of your hardware? Would getting a new high power GPU actually help you, whether it takes 1 or 2 slots? If your onboard sound is not as good as the Creative sound card you have, it must be an older or very low end board, which results in an older or less powerful CPU, which means perhaps you don't need as much card as you might think you do to fit the rest of your system?
 
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zephyr89

zephyr89

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Yes, I probably am going to be doing a full system upgrade 6-8 months from now. I have a OC to 3.0 ghz athlon x4 and 4 gig of 1066 ram with a 20% OC 8800GT.

Its not a bad setup, and since nearly every single game in existence is now made first for consoles and secondarily for PC, so I really haven't had to upgrade, cause games don't push the limit anymore. I can still play any game out there at decent settings, and although I am a gameplay over graphics zealot, I do still enjoy the eyecandy of new games.

Anyway, I appreciate the links guys, helpful indeed, but I am still curious if you think any of the specific cards I mentioned in OP would work anyway, simply because in the designs there is so little material around the fans, I don't think you would get a vacuum effect, and there is tons of space around the fans to pull air from.

The sound card is in the very last slot on the mobo, but I'll tell you what would work, (the hardware junkies here should take this as "challenge accepted") if there were such a thing as an extension cord for a PCI slot, essentially, a little inch high PCI card that has cable(s) coming off of it, and going into the back of another full PCI slot. That way, since there is still like 3 inches of case left after the sound card ends, I could just drill a hole on the mounting rail for the cards, and secure it far away from the video card, or just let it lay there, (its a 30 pound setup, how muchzitgonna move?) and upgrade everything else when indeed it is completely my proc/ram that is the bottleneck in the equation.
 
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