Quiet Mid-High End GPU for HTPC Gaming Rig

[ecosse_011172]

Hi,

I'm looking to put together a small, quiet gaming rig for use with a 50" 1080p Plasma and I'm looking at the following:

• Silverstone GD06 case
• Silverstone ST40NF PSU
• MSI H67MA-E45 Micro ATX Motherboard
• INTEL Core i3-2120 "Sandy-Bridge D2", 2x 3.2GHz
• Corsair H60 Liquid CPU Cooler
• Samsung 1Tb Spinpoint F3

The GPU is the tricky part, I want it to fit in the case (10.5" max), run current games as well as possible at 1080P and to be very quiet. I'd like the rig to be no louder than the current gaming consoles.

I've been looking at the following :

• MSI HD 6950 Twin Frozr III Power Edition/OC AMD Radeon Graphics Card - 2GB
• GAINWARD GeForce GTX 560 Ti Phantom

Can anyone help?
What would be the best option?
What else should I consider?


Thanks

 

[Madcatatlas]

the Phantom card has 2 gb or 3gb ram?

the 6950 should be the fastest of the two for gaming purposes. And probably has more going with htpc in mind.

 

[Ancalagon44]

I hear the HIS 6950 IceQ X Turbo is pretty quiet. Well I read that in a review.

EDIT: Also a 6950 is likely to be quieter because it uses less power at full load. Less power = less heat produced = less need for a noisy fan.

 

[peonyu]

Twin frozr cards are very quiet and cool well. If you want to, im sure you could manually set the twin frozr fan speeds to ~30% [nearly inaudable] and it would still not pass 85c under load [with no overclocking]. Thats been my experience with Twin Frozr II's atleast...A Twin Frozr III is going to be even better.

 

[jacktesterson]

Palit makes a Sonic Platinum GTX 560 Ti that is only 7.4 inches long and has a hefty factory overclock

 

[tviceman]

Twin frozr cards are very quiet and cool well. If you want to, im sure you could manually set the twin frozr fan speeds to ~30% [nearly inaudable] and it would still not pass 85c under load [with no overclocking]. Thats been my experience with Twin Frozr II's atleast...A Twin Frozr III is going to be even better.

I own a twin frozr III and unfortuntaley, as great as the card is, it's fans do not cool as quietly as the twin frozr II does. It probably is the best vendor-made cooling solution for keeping temps down, but it's not the quietest.

OP: I also own a galaxy gtx560ti, the one with removable dual fans. It was EXTREMELY quiet even up to 60% fan speed and was able to get a nice overclock at the same time. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811163171 The power supply that comes with that case worked perfectly fine with an i5 2500 cpu, overclocked gtx560ti, and 2 hard drives.

 

[ecosse_011172]

Thanks a lot guys.
I'm not really concerned about over clocking, I'm more interested in good stock performance that has as quiet cooling as possible that I can have the fans running as low as possible under load.

It's interesting to read about the Frozr II/III experiences, 560Ti should provide pretty solid performance at 1080p, shouldn't it?

 

[mosox]

This one should fit, according to Silverstone - up to 11" cards

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131394

Looks like it's quiet

http://www.kitguru.net/components/g...color-hd6970-pcs-review-silent-and-deadly/26/

 

[birthdaymonkey]

OP: I also own a galaxy gtx560ti, the one with removable dual fans. It was EXTREMELY quiet even up to 60% fan speed and was able to get a nice overclock at the same time. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811163171 The power supply that comes with that case worked perfectly fine with an i5 2500 cpu, overclocked gtx560ti, and 2 hard drives.

I have that Galaxy dual-fan card as well. I'm unhappy with the noise it makes. It was nice and quiet at first, but over a period of a few months, the fans started to make a variable pitch noise and the bearings developed a chatter (sounds kinda like a faint hard drive seek) that comes and goes.

Sure it idles at 30*C, but I want my PC to be silent when I'm not playing a game. I really wish I could turn the fan speed lower than 30% but that seems to be the minimum.

Maybe my card is just a freak defect... but if I RMA it I'll have to pay shipping to the US (never cheap), and I'll be without a computer for weeks.

Anyway, based on my experience, OP, I wouldn't get the Galaxy.

 

[ecosse_011172]

This one should fit, according to Silverstone - up to 11" cards

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814131394

Looks like it's quiet

http://www.kitguru.net/components/g...color-hd6970-pcs-review-silent-and-deadly/26/

That looks very interesting indeed, thanks a lot.