Zalman VF700 Review

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mdahc

Senior member
Oct 9, 2004
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OK. I flashed my BIOS using the nVIDIA/MVKTech forum instructions. Is 51 deg. C. (idle) a little hot for a 6600 GT? Should I run the VF700-AlCu at normal mode?
 

imported_humey

Senior member
Nov 9, 2004
863
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Yes, low is for silent use so not to o/c ideally, you need make your own decision and see what noise is like, i read its less than a 6800U stocks cooling at normal speed.
 

mdahc

Senior member
Oct 9, 2004
571
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I'm not OC'ing. I put the VF700-AlCu on my GPU b/c the stock shrouded eVGA/nVIDIA heatsink is too loud. I'm asking b/c this AT article shows idle temps for various 6600 GT's in the low to mid 40's (idle). Thus, if not OC'ing, is 51 deg. a little too hot?
 

mdahc

Senior member
Oct 9, 2004
571
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Nope, just the thermal paste that came with the heatsink. I haven't used Arctic Silver in a while b/c it's slightly conductive, I'm not OC'ing, and I didn't see much of an improvement when I did use it (of course, I haven't used AS since ver. 3 and that was back when I was running an AthlonXP 1800+). So are you guys saying that 51 deg. idle is a little too hot?
 

imported_humey

Senior member
Nov 9, 2004
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There is nothing to conduct on the core and ram chips on these cards, only the voltage mosfets are a bit to close to live circuits so use ceramic, but again thats to help o/c, not really needed if your running default, but again, if you got card stripped down that far it cant harm to cool mosfets more.
 

mdahc

Senior member
Oct 9, 2004
571
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Thanks to all for the input, but I'm still looking for an answer as to whether or not 51 deg. idle on an AGP 6600 GT is too hot. I guess after reading the aforementioned AT article, it would appear that is a little hot, but I've read of others (esp. w/XFX AGP 6600 GT's) who've had the same idle temps w/ stock cooling. Any experiences?
 

biostud

Lifer
Feb 27, 2003
18,193
4,674
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you don't really need to care about temperatures until it reaches about 80C
 

imported_humey

Senior member
Nov 9, 2004
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uor driver tells you the cores slowdown threshold, on my Ultra it was 115C, now seems to be 120C with the modded GT bios i got here, lol, thats before i edited to 1.6v
 

rise

Diamond Member
Dec 13, 2004
9,116
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well, after about 5 days of curing (figured i'd give it a week) i'll probably take the ceramique off next week and try the as5.

not that the temps are awful. my 6800gt running rthdribl full screen for 30+ minutes gives me 67c, not bad. idle is around 48c.

this is a little worse than the silencer but the temps here in ma are higher. imo, the silencer does have a better ram cooling solution but i like that the af700 seems to circulate the ambient air better than the silencer. it really blows across the entire pcb.

i'll be interested to see if the as5 is the difference tho. also, has anyone taken off the ceramique before? is it the same as the as5 meaning i need to heat it to hell and pull it?

 

vext

Junior Member
Feb 17, 2005
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I recently bought a VF700cu for my evga 6800 ultra (agp). I have an Epox 9nda3+ (fantastic agp mobo) and wanted to access the sata ports which get covered by the fan/heatsink on a large video card. I also wanted to reduce the noise level and improve the cooling. After installation, the max temps dropped from 73c to around 70c when running rthdribl at 640x480, and idle dropped to 50c. The sound level, using the 12v lead, is quite low, although audible.

The VF700 can mount on a 6800 ultra card two ways, 90 degrees apart. Using the factory recommended location will obscure the 9nda3 sata ports. Rotating 90 degrees out gives me plenty of room to run the sata cables to the board. Both positions seem to provide plenty of cooling air for the other chips on the video card.

Unfortunately, after a successful installation, I broke one of the fan blades! What to do? I had read that it's possible to replace Zalman flower fans with modified case fans. Sure enough, the VF700 is very easy (and safe) to disassemble, work on and modify. The fan motor is mounted with two little screws onto a steel backing plate, which mounts to the copper heatsink assembly. I selected an old no-name 80mm case fan I've had for years. I removed the fan and motor by clipping the four plastic sprues which suspend the motor in the center of the fan housing. I hand pre-drilled the two little holes in the base of the plastic motor using a dremel tool and 1/32" drill. Locating the holes was easy, I just put the steel backing plate on the motor and used the holes as guides to drill the motor. The original Zalman motor had two little plastic tabs on the base of the motor for the mounting screws. The replacement motor didn't have tabs, so I had to drill the holes into the bases of two of the plastic sprues where they mount to the motor. Re-assembly took about ten minutes. The original screws were able to cut their own threads in the new holes.

The substitute 80mm fan turned out to be quite superior to the original Zalman. The Zalman is a low profile 15mm thick fan, with rounded ends on the blade (I assume to prevent finger snag because there is no grille). The 80 mm fan I used is 25mm thick, with very sharp leading edges (like a Panaflo) and moves more air, quietly. The only problem is it projects past the Zalman flower. It definitely uses up the adjacent slot space. It's easy to snag a finger on the tall fan: no grille.

Temperatures dropped another 2~3 c. Idle is 49c and rthdribl drives it to about 68c. It runs Doom 3 at high settings in the mid 50's. I'm real happy. I was considering buying a new Panaflow high speed 80mm and butchering it, but it doesn't seem worthwhile at this point. I wouldn't put a heavy or high output fan on the Zalman because the two screws are quite small and only mounted in plastic. I guess you could fit a Vantec Tornado and try to beat watercooling... Wow, 120cfm for a video card!

I had previously used trimmed sata cables to solve the problem of sata port access. That worked fine, but this is a cleaner and more functional solution. For anyone with an Epox 9nda3+ and a 6800 ultra, this is the best way to go.

I would recommend the Cu version for 6800 cards and the Al version for 6600 cards. The 6800 cards run hotter and can use the ~2c lower temps. They're also larger and can support a little more weight. The Al version is much lighter and may reduce the possibility of warping the video card.

My wife's A64 3000+ Shuttle runs a Leadtek 6600GT with stock cooling and it gets up to 80c in the blink of an eye when running rthdribl (Doom 3 is much kinder). I haven't dared to see how high it actually goes. That's because the Shuttles have very poor airflow for radial-flow video card coolers like the VF700. The stock fan is smack-dab against the inside of the case. The VF700 would be worse (I haven't checked to see if it fits, but I doubt it). Cross-flow cooling like the Arctic Cooling NV series would be better. Too bad they don't make one for the Shuttle. Are you listening Thermalright?
 

rise

Diamond Member
Dec 13, 2004
9,116
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that is great to hear. i've wondered how the fan replacement will go when that time arrives. its also nice to hear the improvement with a different fan, i hadn't considered that the supplied fan is only 15mm. thanks for the info.

i opted for the al/cu for my 6800gt because the al/cu 7000 does such a good job on my cpu.
 

vorlon33

Junior Member
May 13, 2005
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:) Quite happy with it so I just want to share the info. My bfg 6600gt oc stock fan gives me 63 F at normal use. Worse still, after a while some kind of rattling noise happened. Replaced with VF700 Cu and the temperature at similar usage level is about 54 F. I am just using the 5V connector. Total silence from the video card.
 

Munky

Diamond Member
Feb 5, 2005
9,372
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You know, I also broke a fanblade on my vf700, being stupid and putting fingers in my case while the computer was on :eek:. Anyway, nothing happened to my finger, but I emailed the zalman service department, and explained that I accidentally broke a fan blade on a cooler I bought just a week earlier, and they sent me a new fan for free, it arrived in a few days. That is definitely some high quality customer service, and it makes me more likely to buy their products in the future.
 

uOpt

Golden Member
Oct 19, 2004
1,628
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Having this cooler and loving it.

The only thing that bothers me is that it leaves all cooling to the south side of the card (the side facing the PCI slots). My passive VGA heatsinks place most or parts of themself towards the CPU. Which is good because my panaflos are working there.

Although, the Aerocool VM-101 probably prevents me from mounting a 7700CU on my CPU :( Not tried yet.
 

BillyBobJoel71

Platinum Member
Mar 24, 2005
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i ahve an upside down mobo case and the vf700 points driectly past the hd to the psu, and the cpu is not hit with all the vga heat since its at the bottom.
 

TheGoat Eater

Golden Member
Mar 20, 2005
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thegoateater.com
hey- should the heatsink be lapped -has anyone done this for this card and does the shape of the heatsink make it hard? I lapped my Gigabyte 3d Rocket Cooler Pro to a near mirror finish
 

fatcat1785

Member
Nov 27, 2004
101
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I love my VF700 ALCU, the installation was easy because they site shows step-by-step instruction. I reason behind buying the VF700 is that my video card orignal fan was loudest thing inside my computer and the VF700 fix that right up and the temperture droppage was satisfactory.
 

rise

Diamond Member
Dec 13, 2004
9,116
46
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Originally posted by: TheGoat Eater
hey- should the heatsink be lapped -has anyone done this for this card and does the shape of the heatsink make it hard? I lapped my Gigabyte 3d Rocket Cooler Pro to a near mirror finish

i've never needed to lap any of my zalman hsf, cpu or vga. the quality and finish are excellent. put some as5 on and you're good to go.
 

ddogg

Golden Member
May 4, 2005
1,864
361
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probably the best fan out there....my 6800U idles at 45C and is about 65-70C under load