ZERO Noise, But How’s the Heat?
I’ve never really thought that a decent performance gaming card like the HD 4850 could ever be passively cooled. Even actively cooled, it was still super hot. Not only has GIGABYTE claimed that they can make it happen, but they also claim that they’ve bettered the results from the reference active cooling system and they’ve done it with a completely silent design. Rubbish? Actually…
GIGABYTE claims that the card’s cooling solution drops the temperature of the core by 18% over the reference cooling solution. It’s a pretty lofty goal considering that it can barely stay cool with a fan. Well my friends, based on the 75C idle temperature in a 26C room, produced by the reference cooling solution on a completely reference 625MHz core/960MHz memory speed HD 4850, the Silent Cell on a slightly overclocked 640MHz Core/960MHz memory card gave us an idle temperature of 54C in our 26C room. A quick maths gives us a total decrease in temperature of 28%. The question is, would the same story be told when we put the GPU under load?
We put the GPU under continuous torture using a running loop of 3DMark06 Demo. After about an hour, we found that the high temperature reached 95C. The reference cooler on a reference clocked GPU gave us 98C. The silent cell equipped HD 4850 is still better. We also took readings with the core overclocked to 705MHz and found that the idle temperature only increased by 1C to 55C and that torturing it only made it get up to 98C. Silent Cell really does work on the HD 4850 and all without the fan noise associated with the reference cooling solution.
I even went ahead and dumped it into the Cooler Master Cosmos 1000; a case I adore, but not when that stupid VGA tunnel thingy is inserted. I inserted the stupid tunnel thingy which used to raise the temperature of my old 8800 Ultras a whopping 10C and tossed the Silent Cell HD 4850 inside. I left the thing overclocked and I tortured it continuously running a looping demo of 3DMark 06. It was OK after an hour, so I let it loop for another 12 hrs or so… or was it 24? Anyway, the point is that the demo was still running strong when I came back. Brilliant.
Final Thoughts and Conclusion
So it’s pretty clear that despite the rather reference like appearance of this particular variant of the HD 4850, it is anything but ordinary. GIGABYTE put some serious work into creating a video card based on a GPU that I never thought could be passively cooled. Even the reference design struggles to cool it at times. With an idle temp of 75C+ degrees with a fan blowing over it, you’d have to be absolutely mad to try to make this card silent in a modern computer system. Well, GIGABYTE is mad. Mad enough to actually pull it off!
As we mentioned, there were a lot of factors that stacked this task in the favor of GIGABYTE being able to pull this feat off. For starters, they started with a very solid platform derived from their Ultra Durable technology used in their motherboards. This saw the inclusion of better power components and most importantly, the 2oz copper PCB. Both of which work to create a motherboard that runs much cooler than normal. This technology is passed on to this card in the form of something called “Ultra Durable VGA” or “UDV” for short. Clearly, it works because we’re able to prove the claims that GIGABYTE has made on the box.
The end product of all this engineering and tinkering isn’t the most overclockable card. Well, it overclocks a little, but you can forget about bumping the memory. However, what we do have is all the benefits of the already proven HD 4850, made completely silent, yet still manages to be far cooler when it is doing basically 2D stuff inside your system. Who does 2D stuff you ask? Well, how about audio recording engineers, silent computing enthusiasts, maybe even students in tiny dorm rooms that want some real peace and quiet. Have I mentioned that this card also has some of the best 2D picture quality that I’ve seen as of late? When it’s time to game, or watch a movie not only is the card still completely silent, most importantly, it is still completely stable.
GIGABYTE has taken the already great HD 4850 and made it silent and stable. It’s still one of my favorite GPUs and without the noise it’s even better than before. You will pay a little more for this silence, but based on everything that makes this card possible, it’s actually completely worth the extra few dollars. Go ahead and get one for your audio editing rig, your HTPC or your quiet work/gaming machine. It’s totally worth it!
Pros
- Completely silent!
- Lots of connectivity options from HDMI to VGA to DVI
- Overclocking and cooling claims check out – It’s better than the reference cooler by at least those amounts
- Actually quite a bargain for an HD 4850 given all the extra tweaks that went into this card
- Stable even under some hot as hell conditions
- Did I mention it was completely silent?
Cons
- May be difficult to find due to it being a somewhat niche product
Overall Rating: 9.0 / 10.0
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