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VGA Cooler Roundup on ATI X1900 Series

Cooling/VGA & Other Cooling by piotke @ 2006-11-13

We test 4 after market VGA coolers from Thermalright, Zalman, Sytrin and Arctic Cooling on a hot running Powercolor ATI X1900 GT. Which one keeps the card the coolest and how quiet can it be done? Find out in this group test.

Thermalright V1 Ultra package & installation

Thermalright V1 Ultra

In the V1 Ultra’s box you’ll find a detailed installation guide, thermal paste, mounting gear and a collection of memory heatsinks and thermal pads.

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The heatsink dissipates the heat at both sides of your VGA card, as the unit “sandwiches” your card between it:

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The included 80mm fan is low profile (15mm) and spins at 2500rpm@12v.

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The fan is actually mounted at the rear of the VGA card (bottom) and not on the front side where the GPU is (top). An additional 80mm can be installed at this Top side by use of zip-ties.

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Installation

The V1 Ultra can be installed on a wide range of VGA cards thanks to its flexible mounting system, the downside is a rather cumbersome installation process; you first place a custom bracket around the GPU core, and then screw the heatsink in place, much like some CPU cooler install methods.

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With the heatsink in place it looks like this:

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It’s still quite low profile, although the fan at back is sticking out a bit:

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SLI on motherboards where the PCIe slots are a bit further apart should be possible if you arrange the fan’s mounting;

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As mentioned before, with zip-ties we were able to mount a normal size 80x80x25mm fan to the top of the heatsink (gpu side):

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Let’s find out how they performed ->

Comment from h1gh @ 2007/05/12

Due to space constraints (no free PCI slots in my system), I was interested if you could re-test the VF1 WITHOUT the included fan with a 120mm fan mounted on the rear of the case (i have a Arctic-Cooling ACF12).

My system setup is similar to the Piotke's Test Setup picture on Page 1 of your review except my Zalman blow air directly to the back of the case.

TIA

Comment from jmke @ 2007/05/13

these products and test card are no longer available as we have to make room for new product reviews & gear; sorry :/

Comment from Rutar @ 2007/05/13

I still think TR cripples their cooler by supplying a crappy fan. It is just asking to ghetto mount a 1000 RPM 120mm Silent Eagle.

Comment from jmke @ 2007/05/13

TR doesn't supply fans with their HSF

Comment from Rutar @ 2007/05/13

"The included 80mm fan is low profile (15mm) and spins at 2500rpm@12v."

?

Comment from jmke @ 2007/05/13

for retail channel they sometimes do, but if you check their product line-up you'll see that practically none come with fan. I think the low profile is not a bad choice as it limits the risk of it not fitting inside your case.

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