Quick report on the BBA X800XL

[RacerX]

Well I had a quick trigger finger and saw the $272 price on Hot Deals and got one.
2days later had it arrived retail packed

At first I was a little disappointed because although the cooler looked really nice, this appeared to be the same one that FS said was really loud on the PowerColor X800 XL. Turns out this one is a little different.

Anyways, I installed it in my SFF (see specs below) and fired things up. On bootup the fan was quite loud (like much louder than any other fan in the system) but it spun down once Windows kicked in.
Actually it dropped to a level below that of my CPU fan (which isn't all that loud ..maybe 30db max).

Happy so far ... looks good sitting in there and ran a few 3dmarks (at 425/550)
3dmark05 = 5005
3dmark03 = 10700
3dmark03 1280x1024 4x/4x = 6300
GLExcess = 18,200

Pretty happy w/ the result considering it's a P4 setup. Definitely alot faster than the 6600gt it replaced.

I guess my whole point in posting is to let you guys who are fanatic about fan noise that this one isn't a wailer like the Sapphire or PowerColor.

 

[arswihart]

i thought the sapphire and powercolor fans were supposed to be pretty quiet as they are

 

[ronnn]

I wasn't aware that there were noise issues with some x800xl varients. Thanks for the heads up.

 

[amol]

It doesn't have a PCIE molex power connector??

I think POWERCOLOR'S does

 

[RacerX]

the PowerColor has the power connector b/c it's a VIVO card as well

as far as noise, every review I have seen so far on the X800XL's have been heavily critical of fan noise ... here are just two examples --> #1 & #2

 

[arswihart]

i just saw a firingsquad review of the powercolor, they it does have a loud fan. But the card they test has a totally different cooler than the one in the picture at powercolor's website or at mwave.com, so I'm thinking they just tested a pre-production version of the card.

anyone find a review of the x800xl featured on powercolor's website with comments on loudness of the fan?

 

[amol]

Originally posted by: RacerX
the PowerColor has the power connector b/c it's a VIVO card as well

as far as noise, every review I have seen so far on the X800XL's have been heavily critical of fan noise ... here are just two examples --> #1 & #2

oh okay

looking at the 3DMark05 scores you got, I'm debating on whether i should sell my X800XT PCIE and get the BBA X800XL from the CompUSA about 10 miles from me . . .

I'd save about $150 =/ but I dunno if the performance gain with the XT is REALLY WORTH IT

 

[arswihart]

that bjorn3d review says the fan is pretty noisy, but At Hothardware, they say this:

"Sapphire's cooler is much smaller than ATI's, but it is built entirely of copper and is equipped with a high-speed 13-blade fan. We found this cooler to be very quiet during testing, and it seemed to do its job very well considering we were able to successfully overclock this card well above its stock speeds."

guess we need some more opinions, anyone have this card?

 

[imported_BadKarma]

Originally posted by: Amol

Originally posted by: RacerX
the PowerColor has the power connector b/c it's a VIVO card as well

as far as noise, every review I have seen so far on the X800XL's have been heavily critical of fan noise ... here are just two examples --> #1 & #2

oh okay

looking at the 3DMark05 scores you got, I'm debating on whether i should sell my X800XT PCIE and get the BBA X800XL from the CompUSA about 10 miles from me . . .

I'd save about $150 =/ but I dunno if the performance gain with the XT is REALLY WORTH IT

$150 is a lot of money.
I would sell it and get the X800XL instead.
And I would do it quickly too, because the longer you wait the less you're get for your X800XT.

 

[Xed]

Pretty sure I read the first sapphire x800xl's (red pcb) used the ati refrence design and were kind of loud but the green pcb ones have the new fan and are pretty quiet