[PhotonFanatic]

My HTPC is so loud that its unbearable. It sounds like I'm at the airport. Funny thing is, its not even anything to do with the rest of the computer, its the graphics card. IIRC its an Asus brand GT-220. I got it and plugged it into an old office computer of my wife's, that she no longer needed. It serves its purpose perfectly, all except for that blasted noise. The last thing you want to hear when you're trying to watch a good movie or something is that awful high pitched, loud, small fan noise.

So I'm thinking of doing 2 things. 1, I want to buy a new case. A case that is centered around being quiet. Does such a case even exist? You'd think that someone would have built a computer case by now, that is designed to be quiet. The old case looks like its been run over by a truck anyway. 2. I'm going to get a new PCIe video card capable of playing 1080p. And I want one that is quiet! Can someone recommend an good inexpensive HTPC card that is dead quiet? I really need some help with this one.

 

[chip94]

Have you tried lowering the fan speed with MSI afterburner?

 

[EPiiKK]

You should check out gtx 650 or amd 7750

i can't really recommend any cases, i dont have experience with HTPCs, Maybe fractal design node 304?

 

[BorisTheSpider]

I just put an Asus Radeon 6670 (1GB GDDR5 version) in a built and it was very quiet when under low load (ie. practically silent), I was able to use afterburner to set up a fan curve that made it just barely audible over the two (quiet) case fans at full load, so unless you need truly silent I'd say it's a pretty good card.

Asus also do a GT640 that's passive, and I've seen some Sapphire passive cards as well. Not sure how well a GT640 will handle CUVID/MadVR if that's what you want, but it probably would with the less intensive upscaling/downscaling algorithms.

 

[Indiegreg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BorisTheSpider

I just put an Asus Radeon 6670 (1GB GDDR5 version) in a built and it was very quiet when under low load (ie. practically silent), I was able to use afterburner to set up a fan curve that made it just barely audible over the two (quiet) case fans at full load, so unless you need truly silent I'd say it's a pretty good card.

Asus also do a GT640 that's passive, and I've seen some Sapphire passive cards as well. Not sure how well a GT640 will handle CUVID/MadVR if that's what you want, but it probably would with the less intensive upscaling/downscaling algorithms.

holy crap! Boris!? i didnt know you were on overclock.net. hello mr.spider!

 

[Badwrench]

Here you go: ASUS GT620-DCSL-2GD3.

As far as cases go, we need to know what kind of hardware you are using: atx, mirco atx, etc. Also, do you want an htpc style case, or a mini tower?

 

[PhotonFanatic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Badwrench

Here you go: ASUS GT620-DCSL-2GD3.

As far as cases go, we need to know what kind of hardware you are using: atx, mirco atx, etc. Also, do you want an htpc style case, or a mini tower?

Thanks! I bought that card as per your recommendation. I completely forgot about fanless cards for some reason. I think that I was thinking that only the lowest cards were fanless. Like ones that couldn't even do HDMI. Don't know why I was thinking that.

As for the case, I'm going to be running a standard sized motherboard. Its a standard sized ATX board. So that will need to fit. I think just a standard case will be fine. I need everything to fit easily into the new case. Its all coming out of an off the shelf gateway PC and going into the new case. Then again, if all that will somehow fit in one of the smaller form factor cases, I would be cool with that. Long as its a case made to be quiet of course. That noise is driving me crazy lol

 

[2002dunx]

http://www.quietpc.com/asus-hd7750-directcu

Highest spec passively cooled card I could find.

dunx

 

[PhotonFanatic]

Think you posted right as I posted that I bought a card lol. Thanks anyway for the recommendation.

 

[DaveLT]

HD7750 Ultimate, you won't go wrong with the HD7750 as it's just so much faster than a GT640 that you're most likely going to find passively cooled that is the most powerful on the green team

And the GT620 is actually a fermi card not a kepler card (It's a GT530 which means it's actually a GT430)

 

[PhotonFanatic]

Don't need fast just quiet and capable. Its just an HTPC card all I need it to do is be able to play 1080p.

As for the case, I'm going to be running a standard sized motherboard. Its a standard sized ATX board. So that will need to fit. I think just a standard case will be fine. I need everything to fit easily into the new case. Its all coming out of an off the shelf gateway PC and going into the new case. Then again, if all that will somehow fit in one of the smaller form factor cases, I would be cool with that. Long as its a case made to be quiet of course. That noise is driving me crazy lol

 

[DaveLT]

Then the HD6450 would have been cheaper.

And less power hungry

 

[Pawelr98]

Hd5450 is even cheaper. I bought while I was in thailand for 990baths wchich is about 30$. It can even play Left4Dead at 1080p with all on low with nice framerate (35-50).It can play 1080p movies fine.

 

[PhotonFanatic]

Not an ATi fan. I don't like the way they market their "specs". Never can tell what the REAL story is on their capabilities. Same reason I don't much care for AMD.

 

[DaveLT]

Benchmarks prove it. And since when did they market their "specs" Wasn't the one who did it = Nvidia?

 

[Mopar63]

Specs are not that meaningful for the use you are putting out their. 1080 playback can be done by Intel's onboard just fan as well as AMD with the APU. A discrete cared gives a little extra horsepower but not much in play back. Video is just a playback, not a rendering, so video performance is minor at best. The fact your card was loud at all means you might have had a bad card. Should not have pushed it hard enough to make the fan kick in.

 

[PhotonFanatic]

That's what I'm trying to tell these fanboys. And no, its ATi that says they have more shaders than they do, (but its just how they rate them! lolz) and they also "rate" their clock speeds higher. Why do you think that Nvidia appears to have lower clock speeds and less stream processors, yet still matches performance in the same classes? You'd think you'd have noticed this by now, its been that way for quite a few years. As such, I'm just not an ATi fan. Sorry if it hurts your feelings but I just don't care.

So please stop clogging up my thread with that immaturity. I didn't come here to start some kind of green vs red pis$ing match.

 

[DaveLT]

Say that to someone with 5 DEAD nvidia cards in his closet in 3 years. Yep, that's me. I've had enough of Nvidia
Fanboy, really? I should have been labelled "Nvidia Fanboy" instead because i had been one in 2009 and i realized how stupid it is to buy Nvidia up till last year and believing their nonsensical hype and marketing which never comes to fruition

Who says i've never been on fudzilla? (i.e Fanboy land) I was active in 2009.

 

[EPiiKK]

When we are talking about cards only for 1080p playback why are we arguing which performs the best? Both can play 1080p videos flawless... Go for which ever brand you want and what worked out the best for you...

 

[Mopar63]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhotonFanatic

And no, its ATi that says they have more shaders than they do, (but its just how they rate them! lolz) and they also "rate" their clock speeds higher. Why do you think that Nvidia appears to have lower clock speeds and less stream processors, yet still matches performance in the same classes? .

Just to clear this up, this is not correct. AMD does have more "shaders" however they use a different architecture and that is the reason for the speed and performance we see. Here is a twist for you, when you get outside of Cuda and use the open standard for GPU Computing the AMD cards start to really show those extra shaders, they are actually more powerful in full blown parallel processing.

AMD's biggest issue is not their hardware but the fact they need to work harder at optimizing their drivers to take advantage of the great hardware they have.