Silencing a GPU

Supine

Supine

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One of the reasons I am hesitant to put two GPU's in a single machine is that graphics cards have always been a frustrating source of fan noise for me.

What do you guys use to shut these things up? Or do you just put up with the noise as a compromise to having an awesome gaming experience? :)
 
the noise from a single fan is annoying, let alone 2. i'll be watching this thread for advice.
 
Setup custom fan profiles such that the fans are quiet when the graphics cards aren't under load.
When you're gaming, you're pretty much always playing with sound, and then having a noisy PC doesn't bother you at all.

Like I have an i7 940 @ 3.8GHz + 2x MSI GTX460 1GB OC @ 850MHz in an Coolermaster 690 II Advanced case, and the graphics cards makes quite a lot of noise, but nowhere near as noisy as a single Asus HD6970 DirectCU II on a default fan profile.

Installing enough silent case fans to boost the airflow through your case is probably the best & cheapest way of getting the noise generated by your graphics cards down, because they won't have to work that hard.
A bigger case could also help.

Lastly, if you have lots of money to spend, go for a water cooling solution where you replace the heatsink + fan's with waterblocks.
 
a shotgun works to silence just about anything. That said, water cooling isn't as expensive as it used to be. So check into that
 
I can get up to 950mhz with my MSI GTX 460 SLI set up, but I do have watercooling on them.

a 240Rad will be enough for a GTX 590/6990. Pretty much a 120mm will to for any single GPU and 240 for an SLI set up, just cause you do not recycle Hot air inside your case.

Reference GTX 570 went from 85Deg C to 45 DegC(Furmark, full load) just on a 240 Rad and a XSPC Rasa GPU Block, That means that you can run 1000rpm-1200rpm Fans and your GPU will not even exceed 45Deg C in Games, that will make for a quiet set up.
 
@P924:
Thanks for that cool Antec GPU mod link!
That guy had a very stupid cable-tie thing going, since it didn't provide sufficient pressure between the heatsink and the GPU.

I'd rather get a proper watercooling kit with the right mounting brackets, so that you know there's going to be good enough contact pressure.

@Geogre:
Nice!
Do you have 2x GTX460 Hawk's or the standard OC models?
 
WC is pretty much the only option for dual cards.

For a single card, an aftermarket air cooler is also good. Far superior to any non-reference OEM cooler ito cooling and esp noise, but relatively expensive, large, and heavy.
 
Pada said:
@P924:
Thanks for that cool Antec GPU mod link!
That guy had a very stupid cable-tie thing going, since it didn't provide sufficient pressure between the heatsink and the GPU.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I just used the first link that popped up on Google. I got a lot of better options the other night with regards to mounting, just do some Googling. I'm probably going to go that route in the near future (with proper mounting, obviously; possibly a copper full cover plate as well)
 
Pada said:
@P924:
Thanks for that cool Antec GPU mod link!
That guy had a very stupid cable-tie thing going, since it didn't provide sufficient pressure between the heatsink and the GPU.

I'd rather get a proper watercooling kit with the right mounting brackets, so that you know there's going to be good enough contact pressure.

@Geogre:
Nice!
Do you have 2x GTX460 Hawk's or the standard OC models?
Click to expand...

2x MSI HAWK's, the 780 ones...
http://www.msi.com/product/vga/N460GTX-Hawk.html
 
The Artic Accelero's are very good , and probably your cheapest option . I have one on my 5970 and its hardly noticeable when maxed out .
 
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