Demented

Well, it turns out that another member here verified that it WILL work. However, when I tried to put it in there last night, my motherboard has a capacitor in the way, so even though it does fit, I can't do it there.

If the GTX 280 cooler does indeed only take up three slots, then I should still have an available PCIe x16 slot at the bottom. From what I have read, a PCIe x1 card will work in that slot, but I'm wondering if there is anything I'll have to do in my BIOS to make it work properly. I guess I should have tried it last night, so maybe I'll do it tonight.

I really hope there are no issues, because I really want that cooler. I found it on a site for only $49.99 too, so I don't want to miss out on that deal.

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Chris Ihao

Ok. Thanks man. I didnt know that part about the PCIe x16 slots working for x1 cards either. Could be useful.

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Demented

Well, my TV tuner is working fine in the bottom PCIe x16 slot. I had set up my guide for DirecTV again, but that was no biggie.

Also as far as that ^ goes, a guy did an EXCELLENT review and mod to solve that issue INCREDIBLY! Check that out here.

Now I'm really ready to buy it, but though I've done aftermarket coolers on CPU's before, I've never done it on a GPU. With that review and Greg's awesome guide on installing it, I'm not really worried about messing it up, just want to make sure it's worth it.

I've got some nice clocks already with not much heat with the stock on high, but from what I've seen, this cooler can reduce temps even further, and I assume I'd be able to overclock even higher. Also, I want to solve the VRM issue, cuz I didn't like the temps that guy got in his review, and it did dramatically lower them, but I'm wary of having to hack off a part of my stock heatsink.

Anyone got a stock heatsink from a GTX 280 they wanna sell me cheap?

Anyways, sorry to threadjack somewhat, but thought the review and my info would be helpful in some way, so.

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Greg121986

Just going to bump this just in case someone else wants some info about these coolers.

For those of you with the VRM cooling problems, have you checked to make sure the VRM cooler is actually connected to the VRMs? The sticky pads are absolute trash for keeping the aluminum piece attached to the VRMs. I found that both of mine had come loose after a short period of time. I used a couple zip ties to hold the cooler firmly in place and I saw a sizable drop in temps. The VRM under normal gaming load is not too bad.

Also, adding an exhaust fan to the side panel has not had any significant effect on temperatures. I have not tried it as intake, but I assume it would not help either.

Greg121986

I just bought two packages of Swiftech MC14 Ramsinks to hopefully put on my memory chips, and some Thermltake Copper heat sinks which I am hoping to put on the VRMs. We will see how that goes. Has anyone tried the Thermaltake sinks on the VRMs? I'm not even sure if they will fit.

Greg121986

Sorry for the pic quality, I had to use my cell phone. I recorded a ton of data for temps. I'm going to have to check it out and find the best way to put it together.

I finally got around to installing the copper heat sinks that I bought. I was able to barely fit the Thermaltake heat sinks onto the VRMs. The two VRMs closest to the power plugs required me to grab some of the thermal pads that came with the Arctic Cooling Xtreme GTX 280 cooler. Luckily it had some extras and I was smart enough to keep them. The other three that I installed seemed to fit directly on the VRMs. So far there does not appear to be any shorting out because the card is working just fine. The copper heat sinks are very close to a few contact points on that part of the card.


After testing to make sure my VRM heat sink application had not killed my card, I put the Swiftech copper heat sinks onto the memory chips on the back of my card. I had previously been running these chips bare because I accidentally used the thermal pads on the GPU side of the PCB, instead of the back side. If it doesn't help very much, I think it at least looks pretty cool!


Before heat sinks applied. There was NO heat sink attached to GPU 0 Voltage Regulators! The crappy AC thermal pads had lost their grip awhile ago and I was running with bare VRMs. I had known this for quite awhile. For GPU1 in all of these tests it is using the VRM cooler supplied by AC but it is zip tied in place as well as using the thermal pads provided by AC. This has so far proven to be reliable for me

40% Fan Speed IDLE
GPU0 - 47
Mem - 39
Amb - 42
VRM - 42

GPU1 - 43
Mem - 35
Amb - 37
VRM - 43

ATI Tool Artifact Scan - 3 minutes

GPU0 - 60
Mem - 51
Amb - 49
VRM - 84

SLI 3 minutes

GPU0 - 53
Mem - 45
Amb - 46
VRM - 59

GPU1 - 50
Mem - 42
Amb - 42
VRM - 65

SLI 10 minutes

GPU0 - 55
Mem - 46
Amb - 48
VRM - 62

GPU1 - 50
Mem - 42
Amb - 44
VRM - 69

Furmark SLI 2 minutes
1280x1024 4xMSAA

GPU0 - 67
Mem - 59
Amb - 52
VRM - 118

GPU1 - 53
Mem - 45
Amb - 44
VRM - 87


After VRM sinks on GPU 0

IDLE - 3 minutes
GPU - 41
Mem - 33
Amb - 36
VRM - 43

ATI Tool Artifcat Scan - 3 minutes

GPU0 - 54
Mem - 45
Amb - 45
VRM - 75


SLI 10 minutes

GPU0 - 52
Mem - 44
Amb - 47
VRM - 59

GPU - 50
Mem - 42
Amb - 43
VRM - 69

Furmark SLI 2 minutes 40% Fan
1280x1024 4xMSAA

GPU0 - 63
Mem - 55
Amb - 52
VRM - 103

GPU1 - 53
Mem - 46
Amb - 45
VRM - 89

Fans 100% Idle
GPU0 - 43
Mem - 35
Amb - 39
VRM - 45

GPU1 - 42
Mem - 34
Amb - 36
VRM - 41

ATI Tool Artifact Scan Fan 100% - 10 minutes

GPU0 - 48
Mem - 40
Amb - 43
VRM - 52

GPU1 - 48
Mem - 40
Amb - 42
VRM - 65

Furmark 100% Fan 2 minutes
1280x1024 4xMSAA

GPU0 - 58
Mem - 50
Amb - 48
VRM - 94

GPU1 - 52
Mem - 44
Amb - 44
VRM - 87

Memory heat sinks 40% Fan GPU 0 SLI Enabled
Idle - 35

ATI Tool Artifact Scan 3 minutes
Mem - 40

Furmark 1280x1024 4xMSAA SLI 2 minutes
Mem - 52

SLI Team Fortress 2
GPU 0 - 51
Mem - 43
Amb - 46
VRM - 63

GPU1 - 43
Mem - 35
Amb - 38
VRM - 45

Greg121986

Well it seems like GPU 0 is dying. I played TF2 and was fine, but now after playing COD4 I got nothing but artifacting, and now even in Vista desktop I get lots of artifacts. I figured this GPU would go bad.