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dealmaster
Limp Gawd
- Joined
- Jul 12, 2007
- Messages
- 467
I'm running an EVGA 7900GS and I just recently bought a Zalman VF900 cooler for it, since I plan to overclock. The stock clock on the card is 500/690, and I was hoping to push the core to 600ish and the memory up to 825 or so.
I installed the HSF without issue, I used some AS5 that I had instead of the stuff they provided. I screwed it down as tight as it would go without breaking my card. I plugged the fan's 3-pin connector into the fanmate adapter, plugged that into the fanmate, then plugged the fanmate into a 3-pin fan slot on the motherboard.
I booted up and opened ATITool and saw my temps were 49-51 idle. First of all that's a ridiculous temperature for this cooler. Secondly, when I adjust the fan speed with the fanmate, the temperature stays the same. It doesn't seem to matter if it's on max or min, which is very very strange, especially considering I have a 120mm fan blowing across it length-wise that is mounted about 3 inches away.
I took the HSF off, cleaned the GPU and the HSF surface again and remounted it, making sure to spread a thin, even layer of AS5 on the chip's surface. Got the HSF mounted down nice and tight and fired it back up.
Same temperatures. For what it's worth, the NVidia control panel is also reporting the same temperature. From reviews I've read about this card/cooler combination, I should be idling in the high 20s, low 30s, and loading in the mid-high 40s.
I can't plug the HSF into the video card itself because the video card only has a 2-pin plug and the HSF has a 3-pin. Does anyone have any ideas or did I just happen to get a crappy one?
EDIT: My ambient temps in the room are around 65-72F and I have 1x 120x38mm (thick) intake fan in the bottom of my case, 2x 120mm intake fans in the middle of my case (blowing directly across the gfx card), and 2x 120mm exhaust fans at the top and rear of my case. Would it be worthwhile to mount a 92mm fan I have laying around right under the gfx card to exhaust the hot air out of the open PCI/PCI-E slots?
I installed the HSF without issue, I used some AS5 that I had instead of the stuff they provided. I screwed it down as tight as it would go without breaking my card. I plugged the fan's 3-pin connector into the fanmate adapter, plugged that into the fanmate, then plugged the fanmate into a 3-pin fan slot on the motherboard.
I booted up and opened ATITool and saw my temps were 49-51 idle. First of all that's a ridiculous temperature for this cooler. Secondly, when I adjust the fan speed with the fanmate, the temperature stays the same. It doesn't seem to matter if it's on max or min, which is very very strange, especially considering I have a 120mm fan blowing across it length-wise that is mounted about 3 inches away.
I took the HSF off, cleaned the GPU and the HSF surface again and remounted it, making sure to spread a thin, even layer of AS5 on the chip's surface. Got the HSF mounted down nice and tight and fired it back up.
Same temperatures. For what it's worth, the NVidia control panel is also reporting the same temperature. From reviews I've read about this card/cooler combination, I should be idling in the high 20s, low 30s, and loading in the mid-high 40s.
I can't plug the HSF into the video card itself because the video card only has a 2-pin plug and the HSF has a 3-pin. Does anyone have any ideas or did I just happen to get a crappy one?
EDIT: My ambient temps in the room are around 65-72F and I have 1x 120x38mm (thick) intake fan in the bottom of my case, 2x 120mm intake fans in the middle of my case (blowing directly across the gfx card), and 2x 120mm exhaust fans at the top and rear of my case. Would it be worthwhile to mount a 92mm fan I have laying around right under the gfx card to exhaust the hot air out of the open PCI/PCI-E slots?