hello, i was playing a game for about 45 minutes and after i shut the game down i touched the heatsink of my graphics card and i burned myself. i have a 9800 pro 128mb and even now an hour after i stopped the game its still almost too hot to touch and all fans are operational. i dont know if theres a solution to this problem other than just upgrading to a new heatsink/fan. please help if anyone has any suggestions
thanks
Not sure what you mean by 'all fans', as you ghaven't indicated. But if you haven't got adequate case ventilation and airflow you need to improve it when you're using a 'chunky' video card. An intake fan at front/bottom and an exhaust fan at rear/adjacent to processor ar the bare minimum, and if the vid card still runs hot another intake fan mounted in the side panel above the video card is a good idea.
by all fans i mean the fan on the gpu the can drawing air out of the case. as of now i have the side of the case off (dont know if this would help out some). thanks for the article i was thinking something more along the lines of this http://www.arctic-cooling.com/en/products/vga_silencer/
The VGA silencer is a nice unit. (I just gave one away, 'cause I've got an FX5900XT, not a Radeon)
But nice or not, it doesn't alter the fact that the basics need to be attended to first. Tidy up cabling, ensure adequate and correct airflow inside the case. If you don't attend to those, you might as well be pissin' into the wind!
i actually am working on tidying things up now =) although i REALLY need a heatsink with a fan on it for my cpu(i have a 2.8 ghz cpu so it gets hot). right now my dell has a green hood that draws warm air over the heatsink out of the computer and thats the only way for air to escape the case which in my mind is very inefficient. i am ordering a NEW mounting bracket for a pentium 4 heatsink since dell has a rectangle heatsink mounting bracket -.- so im getting this >>> http://www.buyextras.com/thsp7forpe4u.html that should clear up the cpu problem and leave the fan in the back of the computer to draw air out of the case directly instead of pulling it over the heatsink first which should improve airflow. and if i get that heatsink for my graphics card it will exhaust the hot air from the card out of the open pci slot so that will make a huge difference in the case tempurature.
and 1 question. i installed a heatsink and fan on my north bridge and it works good but im not sure what it actually does =\ like if im playing a game will that improve fps? im not sure about that one. isnt it the main link between cpu and memory or something? =(
thanks for the help
You got one thing wrong in your approach. You need to ensure that air IS drawn over your heatsink! That's how it works!
It's what I meant by adequate airflow - the air currents need to be drawn ACROSS the hot running components, and you need to ensure that there is adequate air intake and air exhaust to ensure that a continual flow of air from outside the case is used to do so. Bring in cooler air from outside, draw it across the heatsinks to carry away the heat, and exhaust it from the case!
That northbridge certainly does contain the memory controller, but I wouldn't worry too much about it. You shouldn't get excessive heat in your Northbridge unless you're overclocking the processor and/or RAM, and I'd highly doubt you're doing that on a Dell!
And one further thing. Don't get too freaked out because that video card is supposed to run rather hot. All high performance video cards do. If you aren't getting lock-ups, graphical 'tearing' or snowy 'artifacts' onscreen, then you don't really have a problem.
i know i need to draw air over the heatsink but i just thought that the way dell used this hood to use the exhaust fan to draw air over the heatsink was way more inefficient than just putting a heatsink with a fan on it. i want to have a heatsink with a fan rather than the stock dell method =\ also how much does that gpu fan cost? usd
heres a picture of the hood concept: the open hole that you see there is where the exhaust fan is and the other end covers the top of the heatsink drawing air over it. im just not a big fan of it
[IMG]http://sparrowloop.bizland.com/PowerEdge/PE2400_CPU_Cover.gif[/IMG]
its the green thing
[IMG]http://home.comcast.net/~newpcdeals/4600/open.jpg[/IMG]
Sorry, I'm not aware of the internal configuration of your Dell. I personally wouldn't touch a 'Name brand' PC with a 10 foot pole, and haven't seen the insides of one for ages! If it has a passive heatsink on the processor, then yes, a decent heatsink with fan would be better.
You could use Froogle to check pricing in your location. I'm in Australia, mate, not the US.
aye mate ill check it out thanks. one last question is would that arctic shiver fan be the best option or are there better fans?
It's the cooler of choice for Radeon 9x00 card owners in most enthusiast forums I've had involvement with ;)
That's a terrible internal setup for a system with a high-powered video card, by the way. I'm sure you'll find some further helpful ideas in the article I linked earlier.
yeah i agree with the card i love the idea of the exhaust thats genius and yeah its a bad setup thats why im getting the cpu fan and taking off the green thing and thanks for the article i mostly need to get some of the wires under control
In the case of a Dell system with that type of configuration: Don't screw with it. Those systems have been engineered so that they won't burn up or anything.
Did you upgrade the video card in that system? As it stands right now, there's not going to be much you'll be able to do in terms of upgrading the cooling on that system. About the best thing you can do to it is install one of those PCI exhaust fans that they have out now, and honestly, I'm not sure how well those things do.
If that is the video card that came in the box, I wouldn't worry too much about the temperature of it. The only thing I'd say is, don't touch it if you don't want to get burned! If that is an upgraded video card, I'd personally rethink having upgraded the graphics on that box. OEM/Brand name boxes really are meant to be used as appliances, and not really have something like the video card upgraded...
What type of Dell system is it, anyways?
Alex, that's got me a bit bewildered. how the hell could you do anything but improve the cooling of a system by replacing a passive heatsink with a heatsink/fan combination?
That shroud is only on there to assist drawing air away from the processor heatsink because a passive heatsink is such a shitty solution. Quiet it might be, but efficient? Not in my view!
In the case of a Dell system with that type of configuration: Don't screw with it. Those systems have been engineered so that they won't burn up or anything.
Did you upgrade the video card in that system? As it stands right now, there's not going to be much you'll be able to do in terms of upgrading the cooling on that system. About the best thing you can do to it is install one of those PCI exhaust fans that they have out now, and honestly, I'm not sure how well those things do.
If that is the video card that came in the box, I wouldn't worry too much about the temperature of it. The only thing I'd say is, don't touch it if you don't want to get burned! If that is an upgraded video card, I'd personally rethink having upgraded the graphics on that box. OEM/Brand name boxes really are meant to be used as appliances, and not really have something like the video card upgraded...
What type of Dell system is it, anyways?
sorry for not replying i was on vacation. its a Dell Dimension 4600 , and the graphics card isn't overclocked(not yet). I was looking into the pci exhaust fans and i have heard good reviews for them. that might be a solution too.
G'day again, heiroglyphics fella :D
Yes, a PCI exhaust fan would be an option, but not as good a one as the Arctic VGA Silencer, in my opinion, which adds both an exhaust ducted fan and a vastly improved graphics processor heatsink to your Radeon card.
Next best option, in the view of overclockers everywhere it seems, is the inclusion of an intake fan mounted in the case side panel, and blowing external air down onto your display card. For a high-end and overclocked video card, a combination of both methods could even be used.
A cheap PCI exhaust fan, such as a JustCooler for example, is nowhere near as good a choice.
i agree i have heard excellent reviews for the vga cooler. maybe use both the pci fan and cooler? =\
Good news:
i overclocked the 9800 pro with stock hsf to:
core=400.24 Mhz
memory=371.65Mhz
it works great with no artifacts. I just need the vga silencer and some ramsinks and ive seen people get there core to 500 mhz!!! (i dont think i can do that) ;)
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