Specifically, what are your subjective opinions on the Sapphire 5770 with Vapor-X and the GTX 460 offerings? Hagedoorn suggests that the 460 from eVGA is actually quieter than an unspecified 5770 part: http://www.guru3d.com/article/geforce-gtx-460-sli-review/16 and I want to know firstly what the difference in noise level is between the Vapor-X cooler and other 5770s, and whether a 460 would be quieter still. I know, a simple question phrased in a complicated way. . . . but if you have experience of these cards please help
Your looking at 2 very diffrent cards The 5770 vapor x will be quieter but the 460 at stock blows it away performance wise and if you overclock it or get a pre overclock it's nearly 470'level of performance 5770 is not comparable to any nvidia 400 product The 250 or 260 are the closest both are louder 460 is the gpu to buy at the min and if you get a palit version it's pretty quiet to boot
Thanks rollo, I know the performance is not comparable, I just wanted to know that if I go for the higher performing card the noise wouldn't make my machine unusable as an audio workstation during "work hours". You mention the Palit as being particularly quiet. Does it use a non-reference cooler?
Well you wont be playing games while using it as a audio workstation so both cards would be near dead silent.
Idle noise of most cards is good these days, Sapphire Vapor-X cards being the exception, due to having a very high idle fan speed. The reference HD5770s are exceptionally quiet at idle due to their low idle power draw, and you can force the speed down a bit further in catalyst without any issues. I would rate the noise level at that speed to be around 13dB or so, which is no noisier than the quietest non-fanless PSUs you can buy.
That seems rather harsh and I certainly don't agree with that view - my Vapor-X 5770 certainly isn't loud, even under load. And it's definitely quieter than my old 8800GT - admittedly I'm not comparing current gen GPUs, but there's no doubt in my mind that the 5770 Vapor-X is a massive improvement acoustically. I'd go so far as to say than it's quieter than the stock case fans in my Antec P182 at low speed - and those are rated around the 13db mark if my memory is right. Having said that, with the GTX 460 now on the market it's the only sensible option in the £120-£200 price bracket for price/perfoemance. Even if it's louder, the reviews I've read and the general consensus on these forums all agree that it's by far a better card. Whether it's louder or not is something I can't comment on, but my subjective opinion of the HD 5770 Vapor-X is that it's definitely quiet and certainly powerful enough.
The Vapor-X is an expensive card for the chipset, which is what had me considering the 460 in the first place. Urgh. There's no way of knowing without trying the 460 and potentially sending it back. . .
I have a 768mb evga 460 SC and the only time I hear it over the din of my exisiting fans is when it is set to the maximum fan speed (oddly thats 60%).
