Quote:
Originally Posted by
cre3d 
It's not complicated at all, took me 30 minutes to do two cards. Check out the temperatures and resulting noise levels. I went from idling 40-50C (these are MSI Twin Frozr III coolers, highly efficient) to 30C and loads went from 80C+ to 55C max. Not to mention the fan noise under load was unbearably loud before. It's 10 zip ties and done
The DCU II is better than the Twin Frozr III in terms of cooling, and quieter too.
I've had a GTX 580 DCII, 6950 DCII, and a GTX 570 TF III. Both of the DCII cards idled in the low 30C range and loaded in the 50-60C range in 3DMark11. My TFIII 570 idled in the mid 30s and loaded at slightly higher temps than the DCUII. Yours probably had bad contact if you were getting 40-50C idle temps.
Here is the idle temp (32C) and max load temp (62C) for my old DCII GTX 580. The 62C temp was recorded during a 3DMark11 run at 930 MHz core.
So there is absolutely no need for OP to void his warranty and go with a water cooling system that can leak (yes, the sealed loop systems can leak, just do a quick google search). Best thing for him to do would be to either lubricate the fans or RMA the heatsink.
Edited by 996gt2 - 3/3/12 at 7:58am
. Perhaps you have a SB and you can use the iGPU while waiting on the RMA return.
