7600GT vmod + cooler update
I've upgraded the heatsink on my 7600GT to a thermalright v1 that I found for a great deal. First of all, it didn't quite work that well on my card since it's not a supported card. But after a moment it worked out well, or so I thought... after testing the temperatures where about the same as with the original cooler. Since I've read alot of reviews I knew the cooler couldn't be that bad.
After looking at the parts that came with the card and on how I had installed the heatsink I realised it wasn't mounted properly. There was a plastic shim that I realised would help mount the cooler so it would make proper contact with core. After mouting and testing again the temps where horrible! O_O
More checking and I realised I had to cut away parts of the shim and after some more testing I saw the temps where much better :D And I ran the original fan at 5 volts and it was about 3-4 degrees c cooler the the original cooler. During load it was still about the same temp as the original cooler though. So I moved the fan to the front and put another silent fan on the back. Now it was about 10 degrees cooler than the default nvidia cooler and much more silent too.
The card didn't overclock any better though so I tried to vmod it. I did exactly like they did at www.vr-zone.com I increased vmem to 2.2 and vcore to 1.46. Using atitool I overclocked the memory and found that I couldn't overclock any more at all. I could overclock the core about 5% more, so not that much of an improvement. But then again the core temp was 59 degrees so I'm still wondering if the cooler really is properly mounted? As far as I could see it was making good contact.
One thing I've noticed with overclocking the 7600GT is that if the core is overclocked too high 3d applications start freezing and after unfreezing they usually run at a really slow speed, probably 50% slower than usual. It seems it's the same deal with the 7900 cards.
Original cooler idle:50 load:67 noise:horrible
Thermalright v1 idle:45 load:57 noise:silent
Thermalright v1 vmod idle:47 load:59 noise:silent
I've also beated the main quest in oblivion now and I'm the head of the thiefs guild, mages guild and the dark brotherhood. Took me 83 hours, but I didn't really visit any extra caves or other places unless they had something to do with a quest so I'd guess that I haven't visited 70% of the caves and ruins.
After looking at the parts that came with the card and on how I had installed the heatsink I realised it wasn't mounted properly. There was a plastic shim that I realised would help mount the cooler so it would make proper contact with core. After mouting and testing again the temps where horrible! O_O
More checking and I realised I had to cut away parts of the shim and after some more testing I saw the temps where much better :D And I ran the original fan at 5 volts and it was about 3-4 degrees c cooler the the original cooler. During load it was still about the same temp as the original cooler though. So I moved the fan to the front and put another silent fan on the back. Now it was about 10 degrees cooler than the default nvidia cooler and much more silent too.
The card didn't overclock any better though so I tried to vmod it. I did exactly like they did at www.vr-zone.com I increased vmem to 2.2 and vcore to 1.46. Using atitool I overclocked the memory and found that I couldn't overclock any more at all. I could overclock the core about 5% more, so not that much of an improvement. But then again the core temp was 59 degrees so I'm still wondering if the cooler really is properly mounted? As far as I could see it was making good contact.
One thing I've noticed with overclocking the 7600GT is that if the core is overclocked too high 3d applications start freezing and after unfreezing they usually run at a really slow speed, probably 50% slower than usual. It seems it's the same deal with the 7900 cards.
Original cooler idle:50 load:67 noise:horrible
Thermalright v1 idle:45 load:57 noise:silent
Thermalright v1 vmod idle:47 load:59 noise:silent
I've also beated the main quest in oblivion now and I'm the head of the thiefs guild, mages guild and the dark brotherhood. Took me 83 hours, but I didn't really visit any extra caves or other places unless they had something to do with a quest so I'd guess that I haven't visited 70% of the caves and ruins.
posted by JaRoD at
12:17 AM
2 Comments:
I am about to build a system based around 2 7699GT's in SLI.
Any idea if there are any decent coolers that don't need modification?
By
Mike Watts, at 12:49 PM
I feel it's alot smarter to get a 7900gt instead of going 7600gt in sli since sli only works in some games. If you oc the 7900gt it will as fast as 7600gt in sli when sli works. And alot faster when sli doesn't work properly. I only see use for sli when you have too much money to burn and 1 of the best cards available isn't fast enough for you. Or if you have a 30"+ screen that has an insanely high resolution of course.
Don't know if there are any coolers that work well with the 7600gt. From what I've seen there isn't one that works directly :( atleast not officially.
By
JaRoD, at 11:24 PM
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