PowerColor Teases Its Passively Cooled Radeon HD 7850

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PowerColor has teased the Radeon HD 7850 SCS3, the first passively cooled HD 7850 that has come to market.

On its Facebook page, PowerColor has teased its passively-cooled Radeon HD 7850 SCS3 graphics card with the slogan that "silence is golden" and "no fan means no noise." Though the company has yet to provide any specific information, it appears to use a reference PCB and will presumably have the reference clock speeds of 860 MHz for the GPU and 4.6 GHz for the 1 / 2 GB of memory.

Though we don't doubt that the efficient HD 7850 could function in this form, it is imperative that if there is any attempt to passively cool a graphics card, use a case with excellent airflow to prevent overheating.

The PowerColor HD 7850 SCS3 will be "released soon on the market" with a still undetermined price. It is the only retail, passively cooled version of the Radeon HD 7850 of which we are aware.

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Tarun Iyer
13 Comments Comment from the forums
  • slomo4sho
    A 2GB version of this card would be great for a silent HTPC :)
    Reply
  • realibrad
    why would an HTPC want to use a card that powerful and that uses that much power?
    Reply
  • slomo4sho
    HTPCs make for great Steam boxes. My current set uses a HD 7850 and works great with a wireless xbox remote for gaming.

    Also, the idle power on the 7850 is not that high.
    Reply
  • dalethepcman
    HTPC's are often used as gaming rigs, because gaming on the big screen is better for some games than on a small screen.

    Having said that, HTPC cases would probably not have sufficient ventilation for one of these to function properly.
    Reply
  • HD 7850 uses little power even for HTCP standards, ~100W under full load.
    Reply
  • loops
    Looks like you could grate cheese with it too. After that, put a lil bit of foil on there and make a grilled cheese sandwich.
    Reply
  • Cons29
    the cheese would probably melt. but seriously, i've only touched (literally) a few passively cooled gpu's and they are hot. so i cannot imagine having a mid range card passively cooled. the one i touched was even a low end one with big heatsink
    Reply
  • eklipz330
    i'd rather use that mini gtx 670 for an htpc. but for a silent computer? this one for sure
    Reply
  • glitch20
    this will work no doubt i have the oc edition ver & i have a max oc of 1050mhz not exceeding 78 degrees even though its summer here .
    Reply
  • salgado18
    Hey Tom's! If this card has a passive cooler, it means it's very efficient at dissipating heat. Which means that, if we install some fans on it, or blowing directly over it, overclocking could be very good.

    Could you test that? ;)
    Reply