In order to get more horse power from my aging 9700 Pro, I have resorted to overclocking it with the aid of an after market VGA cooler to replace the stock HSF in addition to a home made fanwich to cool the back of the GPU and RAM sinks. Some have asked for pics of this fanwich in action so I post here for all to comment or replicate.
The case is a Thermaltake XaserIII and the motherbord is an ASUS A8V Deluxe. Since this is about the video card, I will suffice it to list the Sapphire Atlantis 9700 Pro stock core and memory speeds, as it arrived out of the box, at a meer 300/290. The video card now clocks stably at 411/333.
In my system, I have an open back plate above the AGP card where I can mount the fanwich. It blows air down onto the back of the GPU further dissipating heat.
Here is a pic of the PC without the fanwich:
Here is a pic of the PC with the fanwich installed. The top card is the fanwich and the lower card is my video card:
The parts I used were all things I had lying around the house (except for the Zalmal VF700-Cu VGA cooler and Heatsinks attached to the 9700 Pro). I used a galvanized alloy steel "wood-framing brace" also called a "hurricane clip" for the body of the fanwich card so it would be stiff.
I drilled the preexisting holes larger to allow for better air flow and then cut a circle to match the inner diameter of the fan. Next, I drilled the mounting holes for the fan and smoothed out all the sharp edges with my dremel tool.
The fan is from an AMD stock HSF I received in a boxed AMD 64 bit CPU and measures 60 or 70mm, I can't remember now. Because the fan uses a motherboard connector, I attach the fan to the motherboards extra fan header, like the chassis fan, for power. I also can attach this fan to my baybus controller to adjust its fan speed and noise level by using a 3 pin to molex adaptor I made.
Notice I used a piece of cardboard for a gasket to lessen vibration and to make a good seal. I also applied some aluminum tape to the top surface to hide my tool marks and reflect my black lights.
For a mounting brace, I took an old PCI 56k modem apart and used the back mounting bracket. It has two little arms with threaded ends, including screws, to mount to the body of the metal board. After drilling the metal body plate, I again used gaskets, motherboard retention screw washers in fact, to reduce vibration.
Finally, you may notice the black tape at the very end of the retaining brace; I placed electrical tape there so I would have a nice tight fit to the case. There is no vibration or noise and the cooler temps allow for some overclocking or improved stability if your video card tends to run hot.
The case is a Thermaltake XaserIII and the motherbord is an ASUS A8V Deluxe. Since this is about the video card, I will suffice it to list the Sapphire Atlantis 9700 Pro stock core and memory speeds, as it arrived out of the box, at a meer 300/290. The video card now clocks stably at 411/333.
In my system, I have an open back plate above the AGP card where I can mount the fanwich. It blows air down onto the back of the GPU further dissipating heat.
Here is a pic of the PC without the fanwich:
Here is a pic of the PC with the fanwich installed. The top card is the fanwich and the lower card is my video card:
The parts I used were all things I had lying around the house (except for the Zalmal VF700-Cu VGA cooler and Heatsinks attached to the 9700 Pro). I used a galvanized alloy steel "wood-framing brace" also called a "hurricane clip" for the body of the fanwich card so it would be stiff.
I drilled the preexisting holes larger to allow for better air flow and then cut a circle to match the inner diameter of the fan. Next, I drilled the mounting holes for the fan and smoothed out all the sharp edges with my dremel tool.
The fan is from an AMD stock HSF I received in a boxed AMD 64 bit CPU and measures 60 or 70mm, I can't remember now. Because the fan uses a motherboard connector, I attach the fan to the motherboards extra fan header, like the chassis fan, for power. I also can attach this fan to my baybus controller to adjust its fan speed and noise level by using a 3 pin to molex adaptor I made.
Notice I used a piece of cardboard for a gasket to lessen vibration and to make a good seal. I also applied some aluminum tape to the top surface to hide my tool marks and reflect my black lights.
For a mounting brace, I took an old PCI 56k modem apart and used the back mounting bracket. It has two little arms with threaded ends, including screws, to mount to the body of the metal board. After drilling the metal body plate, I again used gaskets, motherboard retention screw washers in fact, to reduce vibration.
Finally, you may notice the black tape at the very end of the retaining brace; I placed electrical tape there so I would have a nice tight fit to the case. There is no vibration or noise and the cooler temps allow for some overclocking or improved stability if your video card tends to run hot.
What settings do you have when you play BF2?
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