XFX 390's go back to blowers?

[Elixer]

http://www.eteknix.com/xfx-brings-back-blower-style-r9-390x/

You ask me, this is nuts.

Their DD cooler is one of the better coolers out there, and now, they want to go back to the same crappy blower that was on the 290 cards?

 

[Zodiark1593]

Are blowers not effective, or simply just noisy as hell?

 

[Elixer]

Well, they can get very noisy, and are not optimal for temp control either, especially this design.

 

[Mondozei]

One of the reasons why these types of coolers are popular is because they are better for Crossfire. The same applies to NV's reference coolers. Many custom/aftermarket coolers do a much better job on a single GPU but stack them together and the 2nd card usually gets a lot of heat dumped right into it.

It would be interesting to see if XFX have done any modifications on their own(my guess is yes), so as to ameliorate the issue you referred to. Because if they got to decent noise levels, it would be an attractive option for buyers who are contemplating to go Crossfire down the path.

 

[3DVagabond]

They must have some old stock laying around. If they are offered at enough of a deal to make custom cooling worthwhile, then fine. If not then why on earth would anyone (besides a handful) buy it?

 

[Silverforce11]

Some things should be left to die, forever..

 

[Techhog]

If only it at least had the classy shroud shown in renders. :/

 

[railven]

Wasn't there an XFX rep in one of the other threads? Good time for him/her to chime in.

This is absolutely stupid. I wish there was a better picture of the box. It better clearly say something along the lines of Reference blower or POS Blower.

 

[james1701]

What is the ghost 3.0+ open thermal design on the box?

 

[Techhog]

What is the ghost 3.0+ open thermal design on the box?

Proof of a hoax?

 

[fleshconsumed]

http://www.xfxforce.com/en-us/produ...radeon-r9-390-double-dissipation-r9-390p-8256

From what I gather the Thermal Ghost is XFX marketing speak for a dual fan open heatsink design. This has to be a hoax.

 

[LTC8K6]

Double Dissipation refers to the dual fan design.

http://wccftech.com/xfx-reintroduce...es-cards-handle-grenada-based-r9-390x-r9-390/

 

[MrTeal]

It also says it's a blower on the box.
http://www.xfxforce.com/en-us/produ.../radeon-r9-390x-1050mhz-4gb-ddr5-r9-390x-8bd6

With how much restriction there is on the exit, that thing is going to be LOUD.

 

[KingFatty]

Blowers? So crass, and all this time I thought the accepted industry term was "fluffers"...

But maybe this will drive down the price on this model, if nobody wants to buy it except crossfire people, the market will be tiny so price should drop [looking for silver lining here]

 

[LTC8K6]

Is it that this blower is new?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814105049

 

[XFXSupport]

Chiming in...

There was a demand for blower style in the new mini and micro case designs that wanted direct rear ventilation. Ultimately, proper case flow would resolve the DD radiant cooling design, but system integrators insisted on the blower style... The run of them isn't going to be too large and wont likely be available at the major retailers. I personally tested one, reminded me very much of the 290 reference. Once the reference 290's ran out, we had no single rear-exhaust fans left to sell for over a year, so this was made to bridge the gap.

Mark at XFX

 

[Elixer]

Chiming in...

There was a demand for blower style in the new mini and micro case designs that wanted direct rear ventilation. Ultimately, proper case flow would resolve the DD radiant cooling design, but system integrators insisted on the blower style... The run of them isn't going to be too large and wont likely be available at the major retailers. I personally tested one, reminded me very much of the 290 reference. Once the reference 290's ran out, we had no single rear-exhaust fans left to sell for over a year, so this was made to bridge the gap.

Mark at XFX

Huh, so system integrators insisted on the blower style? Yikes.
I don't see how that makes any sense to them though, they just get too loud!
No wonder they are selling less and less PCs, if they sound like a lawn mower in your living room.

Thanks for the info Mark!

 

[richaron]

It also says it's a blower on the box.
http://www.xfxforce.com/en-us/produ.../radeon-r9-390x-1050mhz-4gb-ddr5-r9-390x-8bd6

With how much restriction there is on the exit, that thing is going to be LOUD.

Gah!

In theory I like impeller based designs, but this restricted exhaust and the associated back pressure will cause headaches; especially with 290(x) based motors/heatsinks/shrouds. Surely someone at XFX can find an industrial spec hole punch and go to town on that rear bracket? I don't think this is a case where you can re-use materials to save a few pennies...

 

[Techhog]

It also says it's a blower on the box.
http://www.xfxforce.com/en-us/produ.../radeon-r9-390x-1050mhz-4gb-ddr5-r9-390x-8bd6

With how much restriction there is on the exit, that thing is going to be LOUD.

And it'll probably throttle down to 900MHz. The only reason to buy this is to watercool it.

 

[.vodka]

It'll throttle with, or without that restriction on the back.


The 390 is clocked higher than the 290 (plus some more voltage), and that card already struggled with the blower of hell under a more forgiving load... unless there's a different heatsink under that shroud, something I doubt.

 

[MrTeal]

It'll throttle with, or without that restriction on the back.


The 390 is clocked higher than the 290 (plus some more voltage), and that card already struggled with the blower of hell under a more forgiving load... unless there's a different heatsink under that shroud, something I doubt.

Well, set the fan to 100 and it won't throttle. I got my XFX 290 up to 1050MHz on the stock cooler in Furmark (and Litecoin mining 24/7), though the 290 backplate has a lot less restiction.

Removing the back bracket entirely makes a noticeable difference in temperatures at a fixed fan speed though. Not particularly useful for anyone using a standard tower case unless you're willing to butcher the bracket, but prior to putting mine under water it helped a little to keep noise down with auto fan.

 

[maddie]

Did any of you guys read this post?

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=37806195&postcount=16

Quote:
Chiming in...

There was a demand for blower style in the new mini and micro case designs that wanted direct rear ventilation. Ultimately, proper case flow would resolve the DD radiant cooling design, but system integrators insisted on the blower style... The run of them isn't going to be too large and wont likely be available at the major retailers. I personally tested one, reminded me very much of the 290 reference. Once the reference 290's ran out, we had no single rear-exhaust fans left to sell for over a year, so this was made to bridge the gap.

Mark at XFX

 

[12andy]

Has anyone ever thought of/ attempted rigging up a shroud - attached externally - to PULL the hot air away from the bracket vents via 120mm+ fans?

Not much surface area to work with on the fan input side, but I might try this myself to help tame my reference card, whilst retaining its heat-exhausting capabilities and possibly 'assist' the blower with its workload.

 

[.vodka]

Well, set the fan to 100 and it won't throttle. I got my XFX 290 up to 1050MHz on the stock cooler in Furmark (and Litecoin mining 24/7), though the 290 backplate has a lot less restiction.

Removing the back bracket entirely makes a noticeable difference in temperatures at a fixed fan speed though. Not particularly useful for anyone using a standard tower case unless you're willing to butcher the bracket, but prior to putting mine under water it helped a little to keep noise down with auto fan.

Although I see your point, 100% fan speed will probably make you deaf D:

http://semiaccurate.com/2013/11/11/diy-amd-radeon-r9-290x-heatsink-mod/

Well, that was a boring show of basically nothing that took two hours of benchmarking to put together. The take away here is that our mod had little to no effect on the performance of the R9 290X in the benchmarks we looked at.


All is not lost though, as our little mod did conclusively reduce the noise profile of the R9 290X even if it didn’t boost performance. The drawback to our mod is that in PCs where the motherboard is positioned vertically users may see a modded R9 290 wiggle around in their case a bit more because there’s no longer a back-panel bracket to hold the card in place. A longer term fix for this issue would be to remove the sections of the panel constraining air flow while retaining the case mount on the bracket. But if you ever had to RMA your 290X it might be difficult to explain why your modded back-panel doesn’t void your warranty.

An interesting read for taming the noise.

 

[Azix]

it should be possible to make a better reference cooler. Even one with two fans even if one of the fans only serves to accelerate the air pushed by the first fan. couple heat pipes tucked in there and bam!