Are fanless graphics card of the same model as good as the original?

[flowerzebra]

My current graphics card (Nvidia GeForce GT 620) is not working properly and need to be replaced. The cause is probably overheating due to too much dust in the fan/sink, and perhaps old age.

I'm thinking of buying an MSI GeForce GT 710 card but I noticed this one does not have a fan. This makes me a little bit suspicious. If it can handle the heat without a fan why isn't all cards of this model fanless? Is it because technology has advanced enough to make the old cards less power hungry without sacrificing performance?

 

[zoltan.boese]

No, the same chipset will produce the same amount of heat, in case of the gt 710 it is 19W TDP. That is equivalent to a laptop processor, that also can be cooled passively. Newer generations are more power efficient, but thanks to the better performance the gt 1030 has a TDP of 30W.
If you choose a passively cooled gpu, be sure you have good airflow in your pc case, otherwise the heat has no way to exit.
As you noticed it, there are variants with cooler fans, if you can, rather choose such one, like the EVGA GeForce GT 710 (01G-P3-2711-KR) or a MSI GeForce GT 1030 Aero (V809-2492R)

 

[DRagor]

Fanless cards are made for usage that will not heat the card all the time. That is not for gaming, mining etc. If you need GPU for desktop work, fanless one will do without problem (especially if your case has good airflow), and it has one advantage of being absolutely silent. But if you try gaming with such card, you will notice that such card will eventually hit it's thermal limit and then it will throttle (reduce clocks), so it's performance will be on average lower than same model with fan. Not that gtx 710 was made for gaming anyway.

 

[flowerzebra]

It's not used for games but we sometimes connect it to the TV and watch videos (Netflix, YouTube, etc.). I don't know how demanding that is, but that's when the problems of the old card first started to show up.

The case is quite roomy and has many small holes on the sides, but the only other fans are the CPU fan and PSU fan. To me this sounds like it should be good enough compared to a laptop. I guess I could install an extra case fan if necessary but I don't think it will be easy to fasten it down where the graphics card is located (the intended place is further up).

 

[DRagor]

Watching videos should not be a big problem for fanless card. It is not demanding as games so you should be fine. Although having no case fans does not help, but it should be ok anyway.

 

[flowerzebra]

I've got the card now and everything seems to be working fine. Thank you for being so helpful.