GECUBE X800 XL 512MB SilenCool

http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2005/07/22/gecube_x800xl_silent/1.html

 

WOW a passive cooled 512mb High end card!!!
But I still won't buy Ati cards unless they got shader model 3.0 !!!!

 

Yeah, it's a shame this isn't a SM3 card. But I guess the selling point is that it not only runs things just as well as (if not a little better than) the 256mb x800, but it's also passive.

This would make a *great* addition to a home theatre PC that you would want to output HD quality from. A little pricey, but it plays battlefield 2 slightly better than one of the top cards on the market, and it does it silently. Did I mention silently? Because, seriously...I wish my 6600gt were silent...

I'll look forward to the 512mb version of the 6800gt, but that silent part...that's a great thing...

Oh, and bigz, great article. I'm really liking your new review synopses and charts...makes it so much nicer than having to click on the picture of the settings and play "spot the difference." What size tfts did you order?

 

I'm actually quite impressed with this card, the results in games and what not are pretty good considering it's absolutely silent, which was the highest spec ATI card before this that had a silent solution? 9600/9800?

should sell pretty well to people like myself who value their hearing

 

I'm willing to listen to the readers to make sure that we get the right information over to you. I still think there's great value in actually reporting how well each card 'played' games, as well as the apples to apples comparison. I'm glad that it is easier reading - I've wanted to make apples to oranges as easy to read as possible. I might be there now, just about.

Pair of Dell 1704FPT's - 17". I'm looking to add a 20" widescreen in the middle of the pair at some point in the future.

http://accessories.euro.dell.com/sn...ry_id=210&first=true&page=productlisting.aspx

 

Quick question guy, if you wouldn't mind.

I'm in the process of building as quiet a PC as possible and I've been shopping around for silent/fanless components. Anyway, when it comes to graphics cards a lot of the sites and reviews I've read recommend not using a fanless GFX card if your case doesn't have good airflow.

So here's where I'm stumped, the PC I'm building will minimise on fans to attempt near silent operation. This will obviously mean the airflow in the case is not great, so do you think the X800 is a good idea? Could I end up having stability issues?

Anyway, cheers guys and thanks for the great review Bigz.

 

I would like to help you NuTech but I am stuck in a.... ahhh..... I'm disturbed to say it..

[gathers his strengh (up, up, a, a, down and x)] ok guys I will say it...
...stuck in a world of air cooling my PC is as loud as my AC set on a lowest fan speed... I mean it's not that I just hear the power of my PC... I can feeeeeel it - little rumbling of the floor.

I respect my PC to the level where I want to listen to it..erghh her. So I don't know why these silent watercooled, passive devices are ment for... maybe next thing you'll want to have is a passive display huh?
I mean no refresh rate problems, no annoying brightness..... *dozes off into passive world through the powers of beer and a couch*

Dreams about passive displays:



Don't you guy's miss the days when you'd put 4 extra 80mm fans... and then youd be like hey tom I have 11 fans in my case that's 2 more than yours... (BTW I do actually have 11 fans in my case... I wonder if I make them all blow down, would the case hover...?)





Okay enaugh of that *points above* crap.
What I'm thinking is that we either should have cheaper more mass produced liquidcooling solutions, or use something like a car sound dumpening (how is it spelled?) system. You would have highly insulated case with one fan that would blow out the hot air into the sound dumpening unit and then release a nice humming sound to the environment... Although passive cooling is quite awesome now, I think we still need a lot more succifient cooling solution since technology is quite held back due to heat problems (my opinion). Hardware developers are doing so much, look at the technology vs cooling advancement. Ok an example, my 4 year old duron 850MHz very similar (non stock) heatsink/fan as my athlon 2800+. One is almost 3 times more powerful however only 10 degrees (Celsius) hotter. If we'd compare much older vs amd x64 cpu's then the difference would be much bigger. Imagine if there were no heat problems.... we'd be at at least 10Ghz (maybe due to power limitations..?)

 

How about making the text that's different between the different rows a brighter colour? I.e. instead of (or as well as) different colours for the different cards (rows), you make the settings that differ highlighted?

[edit] ^^^ realises that was a crap explanation. Example: if two cards say "High" detail and one says "Ultra", make the "Ultra" one an Ultra colour like Ultramarine, er, or something bright anyway. Do the same with the res etc., if you have 3 all different make them increasing grades of brightness as they get better.

 

That's quite impressive tbh.

 

I must admit I wasn't 100% happy with these tables - I am going to be discussing things with the art guys to make things more appealing and easy on the eye. The method that we used in the past two reviews was great, but it took rather too long to create each table - a few hours for all 6 rather than half an hour to an hour for the lot.

I'm looking for something simple but effective and I'll take your feedback on board and see what we come up with after some discussion.

 

I want a passive display

 

go find few sharpies and make yourself one.... Best thing ever is that you can create your own games, programs, OS's, everything. It's awesome.