Better GTX480 Cooling

[snipermouse]

Hi all, just found one possible sollution to the extra heat produced by an SLI set up. Was looking at the nvidia forums when I noticed a post from "Raptor" (so all credit to him) saying that he noticed small screw holes at 80mm apart on the back of his GTX580 and whether you could attach a 80mm fan to the back of them. So I went exploring, my GTX480's have the same screw holes. Concerned about the amount of extra heat my new first SLI bulid was producing I purchased an ANTEC TRI COOL 80mm fan and attached it. I dont bench at all but during gaming (BFBC2, max settings) I now get a nice and cool 60-75degC on the 2 cards as apposed to 80-90degC, a nice 15-20 drop.

Thought it might be a good option for those who don't have space or mounting holes near the drive bays for extra cooling of an SLI setup.

I've attached a pic of my setup.

Once again credit must go to "Raptor" over at Nvidia Forums for bringing this to my attention.

Cheers

 

[smarteyeball]

Nice find.

I did something similar when I shoe horned a 120mm in behind my cards when I had a 4890 crossfire setup.

 

[Lordbob75]

Great idea! Looks awesome too.

~Lordbob

 

[Everlong]

That's probably what I'd do. I'm getting tempted to buy a second GTX470 (only downside being I'd need a new PSU as mine only has 2 PCI-E connectors).

 

[smarteyeball]

Undesirable, but what about using the molex>PCI-e converters?

 

[Everlong]

Never really trusted using them. Are they a viable option to running the card stably?