The Official Graphics Card and PC gaming Thread

BTW, you're missing US behind the newegg links in your sig...

 

Oops - I meant to remove UK and US so it made more sense to place them on one line - I need 3 lines of sig not 5 to have a picture, and it has to be that tiny to be within the rules - almost pointless having it really, but there we go.

 

Why don't you get a pic of the entire card? You can have a width of up to 500px.

 

Can't find one at a suitable angle. Pictures of the proper 4870X2 rather than the first engineering sample are rare.

 

w/c will be for me, when nehalem comes around, maybe before, if i get a much better rig.

for me, it'll keep temps down, is quiet, (ok not sam quiet, but normal human ears quiet ) AND looks very nice if done with thought, unlike the one in the cm-690

 

bit off topic but I'm sure we can relate it to GFX cards. lol.

Don't have the Zalman but it looks like a good psu. I do have the CM 850 and it's a good psu, NO doubt about it. Of course it's the "newer" model that has the "80 plus" sticker on it. lol. A quick little search indicates the "better" CM-850 has that little sticker. lol.

The RC-690 and RC-590 cases are nice. I like the "available" cable management and of course the air flow is very good to say the least. Of course Sammy would change out the fans but if they're not running "full tilt" they are pretty good.

NOW (the relating part) either psu will run a couple of GFX cards w/o any issues.

....gm

 

Sam has a new sig - I think he likes his x2!!

Spamual, Shaff's cousin, likes water-cooling. Not Sam cool but cool enough for normal human ears. What's your take on water-cooling greensman?

Ok, well if the difference is the rumble of the pump, what is the decible rating of a little pump - does anybody know? It can't make THAT much of a little rumble! And there should be some way to sound-deaden the pump - wrap cotton around it etc. I can't believe you can't get a pump down to nearly inaudible, which would be, what, 5-10 db?

Sam, you said 32-33 degrees with water, 45 degrees with air. You said that's close enough. But is it really if you want to drastically overclock the cpu?? I'm thinking of everybody still struggling with crysis, and I imagine they'll still be struggling with crysis by the time nehalem kicks in, and the 5000 series ATI cards arrive. I read a review recently of the GTX280 SLI, and for the fun of it (maybe it was 3dguru) the reviewer got a cpu from intel that was majorly overclockable, and pushed it all he could go - it might have been air cooling however. Using the 3dmark vantage, he found that the much faster cpu speed also increased the graphics scores although they are supposed to be independent.

So my point is that the temperature difference seems huge to me, 30% warmer with air versus water. That HAS to make a major difference on overclocking, No??

 

I like what "water cooling" offers but I have this aversion to mixing water and electricity. lol. Well the potential mix that is....

As for the noise that water cooling adds it would be the "cooling fans" with the radiator that might be an issue. Well at least some them I've seen. Never used one so don't ask. lol.

...gm

 

It's not actually water in there lol. The coolant is not electrically conductive. My main reason for not water cooling is the cost involved.

 

you know me.. i don't normally say this but "you're wrong". lol. It is water and you add some stuff to it that makes it cool better and also gives it some color if you so choose.

crazypc.com link for "green" color additive and coolant L@@K at what you add the "green stuff" too... distilled WATER.

....gm

 

If it's got stuff in it then it's not water anymore At leasts thats how I think. Otherwise Pepsi, Coke, Milk, would all be considered water, right?

Anyway, it's distilled water so you're safe either way. But it really is expensive isn't it? I can't justify the cost.

 

Boozer, let me clue you in. Pepsi, Coke, Milk, ARE considered water. I'm speaking from a chemical standpoint. They are, after all, more than 90% water, right?

Greensman, you have a good point about mixing water and electricity, but distilled water, pure water, is quite different in its conductive powers from everyday tap water.

Boozer, I know you're going to say that distilled water doesn't conduct electricity - and you're right to a point. It will conduct a tiny amount of electricity as it ionizes water to H+ and OH- but it HARDLY conducts at all - and the type of shorting out that you are thinking of, Greensman, isn't going to occur.

Boozer, I must have missed something when you mentioned the cost of distilled water. A gallon for ironing clothes runs about $2 at the supermarket, or am I missing something. Maybe SUPER distilled is $5 a gallon, but how much water could you possibly need in a PC, a couple of quarts? Edit: Ohhh, Duhhh, you're talking about the whole cost of the water cooling system. I can be really dense sometimes. I'll let greensman answer that below.

 

The initial cost is a little much, yes.

NOW go ahead and pour Pepsi, Coke, Milk, or the "coolant" on the electrical parts and see what happens. I'M NOT APPROVING THIS ACTION THOUGH!!! rofl...

It still has the ability to "conduct" electrical current so it has the same properties that water does.

....gm

Is this the GFX thread or the "cooling" thread??? hehehe. Well at least we know that creaky will steer clear.... ROFL...

add: crimsonboy you're right about the "conductivity" of distilled water but it will still have some negative affects if "something" bad happens. Sorry it still just scares the crap out of me to get something like "water" near my babies... lol. ;P

 

lol

I guess we are all happy with our Tower heatsinks then?

 

I'm NOT complaining... lol. ;P

So for those of you that have owned a HD4850.... how is it for NORMAL performance or would that be overkill if you really don't plan on serious gaming?

...gm

 

REALLY overkill if you're not gaming.

 

well next year, i shall tell everyone how it is

 

lol

You do that. But wont there be something better out by then?

 

I hear you Greensman, but estuansis talks a pretty picture when he describes the advanced graphics capabilities of crysis, which defeats every known combination of cpu and gfx card - triple SLI GTX280 or 4870x2 times 2 = 4. The dude, estuansis, talks about motion blur, particulates floating by as you pass through the terrain - he talks about stuff that defies imagination - eye candy of a super WOW level of distraction. Effects that screenshots don't do justice to. Sam is beginning to get the buzz.

. .

But nobody can run the game on super high at 2560x1600 and get consistent 30 fps - NOBODY!

So if the game really is as good, graphics-wise, as estuansis describes it, and he has got me really intrigued, then I see one goal of the new build as being able to run the damn game at Sam's resolutions, 4 million pixels per frame, and have it be playable, DX10, super high settings, 30-35 fps.

By my way of thinking, that means next generation gfx cards, and next generation CPUs massively overclocked - and I think that means water-cooled.

Sam said air cooling gets the cpu to 45 degrees, cool enough. He also said water cooling gets it down to 32-33 degrees. How can 45 be cool enough when that is 30% warmer than water cooling?




Here's a pelt based refrigeration system running water to the cpu, which will get it down considerably further, at a not-prohibitive cost of around $230 - but perhaps with a noise penalty in terms of air-flow required to cool the radiator - which I think you mentioned. We all love tec based coolers - since our fav gfx board of all time was the gecube 1950xt - HORRIBLE monster!!

This Freezone is supposed to be a better 6-pelt design that runs the multiple small 12 volt pelts at only 4 volts, thereby making them more efficient, producing less wasted heat. This system is supposed to be able to chill the cpu to ambient air temp - meaning I guess the temp inside the case. Colder than that and you would get condensation, which is water on the electric components which YOU do not like. So I guess you don't want cpu temps colder than ambient air temp. They include a controller to keep everything working properly, and to keep the cpu from getting TOO cold. That tells me that you need a well-ventilated case, and you need to get the gfx heat out of the case. The cooler the ambient air inside the case, the cooler you can drop the cpu temp, with more headroom for overclocking.

Then there are phase change based coolers around the $800 mark,

. . .
that will get the cpu even colder. I don't understand that exactly, if the pelt cooler already gets it down to the coldest level you want before dangerous condensation occurs - then why would you want colder than that? How do they overcome the condensation problem? I hear some of them can get the cpu to -12 degrees C, or about 20 degrees F below freezing - again, how do they overcome the condensation problem? Maybe Sam or Ray know.

I couldn't find it this time, so maybe they don't make it anymore, but I thought I read last year about the same kind of system using glycol, instead of water. Glycol might make you feel better about your babies, glycol is definitely NOT conductive.

 

2.93GHz i7 and a 5870x2 or a GTX380