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Heya,
I'm currently running a VERY noisy 8800 GT.. and it's driving me nuts. I'm considering either putting a high-quality heatsink on it.. ($70), or simply buying a new card with passive cooling ($150-$200).
I noticed that Sparkle has a 9800 GT with passive cooling. What you think about that?
Is it worth considering the ATI/AMD cards for 4-boxing on one computer?
Performance GPUs run at 70-80*C with decent case airflow and stock heatsink/fan.. I don't see how you're going to run one passively, even with an aftermarket heatsink, and not have heat issues. Honestly, the best thing you could do for noise is watercool it. Don't need anything fancy like a full-cover waterblock.. just a GPU block and downclock the video memory a little and it'll be fine. Swiftech and Danger Den both make GPU-only waterblocks.. to make it easy, just go with one of Swiftech's "budget" water kits - a single 120mm radiator, small pump, and GPU block.. no reservoir - just a fill port from a T line. A low-rpm waterpump and low-rpm 120mm fan will be nearly dead-silent in a case, and temps will likely be much lower than with the stock heatsink/fan.
I'm running the Sparkle 9800GT passively cooled card...
http://www.cclonline.com/product-inf...ategory_id=328
and it's great, runs cooler than my previous EVGA 8800GT that died.
It's sitting at 43C as I type and will rise to mid/high 60s when WoWing and my PC is nice and quiet, so no huge industrial fans in there :)
My temps are read using NVTempLogger...
http://www.guru3d.com/article/nvtemplogger/1
http://www.sapphiretech.com/us/ They have some nice cards. My two 3870's are toxic models with vapor cooling. They are really quiet.