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deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (November 2014)

Fri Dec 05, 2014 3:57 pm

Those aren't low profile, though. :(
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morphine
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (November 2014)

Fri Dec 05, 2014 4:06 pm

Doh. I read "low profile" and understood "short".
There is a fixed amount of intelligence on the planet, and the population keeps growing :(
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (December 2014)

Thu Dec 18, 2014 11:49 am

A few days ago I nearly purchased a GT 730, working on the assumption that one with GDDR5 would be faster than the HD 4600, and would still be cheap ($60). spoiler: after reading I've discovered that it is, but not by much, and so I did not buy one.

Anyways, that, and the conversation in the "which GPUs are now obsolete" thread got me to wondering about the relative performance gains over Intel HD graphics. So I did a quick check comparing Ivy Bridge (HD4000) and Haswell (HD4600) IGPs to some of the cards mentioned here, using 3dmark's "cloud gate" results database. They were updated into the front post.

The db actually includes Sandy Bridge numbers as well, and I may include those too if I get some time to search their DB again, however the takeaway is: HD 4600 makes the GT 730 with GDDR5 not worth the price and the R7 250 GDDR5 questionable. HD 4000 (and HD 4400 in some of the i3 processors, since they've got the same number of EUs) could benefit from an upgrade to a GT 730 with GDDR5, but an R7 250 with GDDR5 would be a much better choice. Sandy's HD2000/3000 will see a big performance increase from the 730 and a HUGE increase from the R7.

I'm hoping that the low end of the R7 300 series will be fast enough to at least double HD 4600's performance and fall into a lower price bracket than the R7 250; NVIDIA could take what they did to Maxwell for the Quadro K620 and tack on some GDDR5 and we'd probably get a nice boost from them as well.

[edit] went and updated the main post to include number for Sandy Bridge.
Last edited by deruberhanyok on Thu Dec 18, 2014 12:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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kuririkura
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (December 2014)

Mon Dec 22, 2014 11:15 pm

Hi All,

if you already have intel Core i5 and above, i don't think any of the graphic card below GTX 750 is worth,

below is the result of passmark on my intel HD 4600 (onboard) (i5-4570) score is 752, GTX 740 score is around 1.600 (which i think will not improve much), GTX 750 is 3.200 and above

Image

I'm thinking of the GTX 750-ti, but do anyone can advice how the warranty from newegg is work? (in singapore i can't find this 750 ti model, only GTX 750 zotac is available)
 
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (December 2014)

Wed Dec 31, 2014 10:55 am

Does anyone know (or think) if the GTX 960 will be released with a low profile bracket/small form factor? I just bought the gigabyte 750TI but wondering if i should hold off for the GTX960
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (December 2014)

Wed Dec 31, 2014 4:44 pm

I feel pretty good in saying that isn't going to happen - all of the current rumors indicate that the 960 will be priced between $200 and $250. It will need to have performance to match that price range. Given what we've seen of Maxwell so far, my guess is that would put its power use around 110W or so.

Figure that the 750ti is already based on Maxwell, and we probably can't expect the kind of efficiency increase going from first gen Maxwell to second gen that there was going from Kepler to Maxwell. So the 960's power use and performance will be somewhere between the 750ti and 970, but closer to the 970 than the 750ti.

If they cut it down so much that it could fit into a low profile card, there would be a massive performance gap in their lineup (one that would happily be filled by AMD, I expect). Otherwise, assuming anyone would even make a low profile card that required an external power connector, the heatsink would have to be so large that it would eliminate the point of low profile. And it would probably sound like a turbine the entire time.
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kuririkura
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (December 2014)

Sun Jan 04, 2015 8:56 pm

I think also it will not possible, the TDP for 960 is 100 watt which will require 6pin PSU
www * techpowerup * com/gpudb/2637/geforce-gtx-960.html

PS: just bought gigabyte 750ti.. this card is awesome overclokable.. up to 1.3Ghz on CPU an 6GHz on memory without overvoltage :)
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (February 2014)

Tue Feb 17, 2015 7:30 pm

Just did a big infodump update to this, including an i3 vs i5 comparison I ran myself.

Nothing "interesting" to add, though - people aren't exactly clamoring for rumors about the next generation cheap video cards.

I'm tempted to just make something up.
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Melvar
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (February 2014)

Tue Feb 17, 2015 7:39 pm

deruberhanyok wrote:
I'm tempted to just make something up.

If you come up with something good enough maybe some company will steal the idea and make it, and you can get the card you've always wanted!
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (February 2015)

Tue Feb 17, 2015 10:33 pm

Ha! I'd settle for more effort being made to introduce newer technologies on the low end first - new manufacturing processes, new GPU architectures... sort of like NVIDIA did with Maxwell being introduced in the 750 instead of waiting until the 980 rolled around.

I mean, the GeForce 750 launch was an interesting surprise, right? Here's a new architecture, on the same 28nm manufacturing process, that's tons more efficient than Kepler (which was already way more efficient than Fermi), and it's selling for $120. Whereas the 980 launch, that was another "big video card launches with new technology, is very fast and costs $500" kind of dealie.

I mean, they don't have to just give up on this market because of half-decent integrated GPUs coming out of Intel now.
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deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Fri Mar 20, 2015 8:29 am

Bumping this up - still no new low-end cards released, but I did a little extra poking around and found at least two HD 7750 / R7 250E cards being sold as regular R7 250s. One the same model that arunphilip purchased (I actually got my hands on one of those to verify) and another available for less than most of the other R7 250 cards with a pretty flexible output configuration. So the recommended single-slot low profile card was actually changed to that Sapphire model from the Visiontek one which had been there for a while.

I'm really hoping the whole lower-end of the next generation of cards won't be rebrands, but some info on AMD's 300 series mobile GPUs seems to indicate that the low-end parts might still be Oland based - hoping that doesn't carry over to the desktop. NVIDIA's new mobile parts at least seem to be almost all Maxwell (exception to the 920M, Kepler based), so that's a good sign for their lower end.
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Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Tue Mar 24, 2015 10:23 am

I am in an unusual situation that maybe you guys can sympathize with, and maybe even offer advice on: I'm trying to build a low profile living room gaming PC that wouldn't look out of place (nor audibly intrusive) in the entertainment center.

For some reason or another, this project has been ongoing for over 6 months now. (I've treated it as a hobbyist project) For those interested I've already got a mini-itx motherboard and settled on a core i3 4130 with 8GB of ram and a 240GB SSD. I've got a Radeon HD7750 and a GTX 750ti half height from Galaxy and a Realan E-K5 for the case.

Considering the length of this project, I've decided to take this project a bit more seriously and just get it done. The primary difficulty I'm having is getting the 750ti to fit or the PSU not strong enough. I've gone through about 4 or 5 cases so far (Antec ISK300-150, Inwin BM639, Dell Inspiron SFF case, etc..) and have either had serious issues with the PSU (not powerful enough or of a weird proprietary format) I can get the 7750 into any of them, but it's a bit underpowered and can get a bit noisy when pressed.

I've settled on the Realan E-K5 case as it allows me to use a mini-itx PSU of my choice and the Galaxy 750ti. Clearance-wise, a double-slot, half-height video card will fit, (assuming you are not using the fan slots on that side of the case.) With 2 80mm x 10mm fans, the amount of space available is roughly 29mm-30mm (esitmated) from the center of the PCIe slot to the outer edge of the fan blade radius. The stock cooling solution is about 2-3mm deeper than what the fans allow.

My plan is to replace the stock cooling solution with something custom. Finding an aftermarket heatsink using the 40mm x 22mm mounting holes on these half height cards have been particularly vexing. However, I may have found some previous generation video cards that use the same mounting hole pattern. The PNY Quadro 600 and the MSI N630-1GD3/LP according to google images looks like they may fit the bill. Time to hit up ebay.
 
Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Thu Mar 26, 2015 6:42 am

So, I got the PNY Quadro 600 today (it was still in the mailbox from yesterday) and realized the heatsink was just WAY too small. It was about the size of an oreo cookie (once removed from the shroud), and weighed about as much...sure It would fit the mounting holes, but...

On a lark, I repasted the heatsink and tossed the Quadro into the system. According to HW Monitor, the thing idles at 54C! After a round of passmark, I saw temps of 90C.
For even the 40W GPU in the Quadro, this heatsink was not adequate, I don't even want to try this on the 750 ti.

Image

Still some hope with the MSI low profile GT 630. Hopefully the seller ships soon...

I plan to mod the heatsink by removing the existing shroud/fan and modding a blower style fan at the end of the heatsink like on the Quadro. I've ordered both 50mm x 15mm and 50mm x 20mm blower fans.

Image Image

Sizes not to scale of course. :)
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Thu Mar 26, 2015 8:07 am

Hi Mr Bigglesworth! Welcome to TR!

It seems you've stumbled upon the same problem many of us have seen with these cards: the only reliable way to find potential replacement heatsinks is by using ones pulled off of other cards. It's the perfect kind of project for someone who knows more about CAD, and would want to kickstart a custom fabbed solution. But that person is not me. :(

Although at least you have a little more headroom in your case than a regular single-slot width would allow. Do you have a link for the case you're using? I've googled for it and found a number of sellers, but can't seem to find detailed specs and pictures. From the way you're describing it, I'm wondering if you might be able to get away with only one 80x10mm fan.

How's the ventilation in the case? Is it possible to simply use the stock heatsink config on the Galaxy card without having both 80mm fans in place?

I didn't think to check temps when I was testing the 7570 or 250E. The fans on both of those are similar to the one on the Quadro, and they get kind of noisy at load, but I honestly didn't think to check. I'll have to run a Unigine test on them next time I get a chance to see how hot they get.
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Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Mar 28, 2015 6:03 am

Hi Deruberhanyok!

I actually considered custom ordering a heatsink, but got scared off by the cost and the expected quantities. I didn't consider kickstarter though. I may actually give this a bit more thought if I can bring the solution down to a proper single card height.

The case I'm using is here:
minicase.net/product_E-K5.htm (I'd post the full URL, but the forum won't let me...)

The ventilation in the case is good if a little weird. The case is essentially a sieve, so attempts at directional cooling may be difficult. I've coonsidered going with a single 80x10mm fan, but that won't affect the clearances for the stock heatsink on the Galaxy 750ti. Everything is just 3mm too deep... : /

Something I've noticed about the heatsink on the 7750. The construction is a fairly thick alloy plated/washed copper base with soldered on thin-fin aluminum fins and a blower fan. It's not an extruded alum design like on the Quadro though it shares fan designs. In the E-K5 the temps on the 7750 is 37C idle and can get up to 75C at load which is very reasonable. Considering the 7750 is a 75W GPU (more like 55W in games according to Tom's) The feasibility of a half-height single slot color is definitely there. Maybe I just need to source that exact design heatsink just with different mounting hole pattern?

Update: The MSI N630GT-MD1GD3/LP is finally on it's way. I'll have pics of it when i get it, before and after mods.

Update 2: Alienware beat me to the punch with their "Alpha". Win 8, Core i3, 4GB ram, nvidia GM107 based GPU starting as low as $449 at Walmart. I never thought I'd see the day when Alienware comes up with something more cost-effective, smaller, quieter and more visually appealing than something I can put together. I'll continue on with my project, but I don't think I'll do more than post my heatsink design and results after it is done.
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Mar 28, 2015 5:43 pm

Aha, I misunderstood - when you said that it was too short with the fans, I was thinking it might be able to fit if you didn't use the fans. You said the amount of space available with the fans is about 30mm, but that the stock solution was 2-3mm than what the fans allow? So I figured the stock solution was something like 33mm deep. But it looks like it's actually taller than that, maybe closer to 40mm?

What's the full clearance without any fans on the side? The ventilation on that case looks pretty good, actually, so I think you'd be able to get away without the case fans and still keep the system running quietly, and still keep cool. What are you using for the CPU heatsink? I've got a Xigmatek Praeton in mine and it's practically inaudible.

You could also look into sanding down or cutting a few mm off of the heatsink, similar to what this guy did, just not as extreme.

I've been impressed by the heatsink on the 250E/7750 I've got here. I wonder why more OEMs aren't just using the same design for a GeForce 750 card? Power draw has got to be close to the same between the 750 and a 250E.

Curious to see if it works out with the heatsink from that 630 card - let us know how it goes!
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vargis14
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Mar 28, 2015 6:50 pm

I am copying and pasting some of this from one of my previous posts where I went on ranting about how there is no standard MXM board design yet after so many years and also how they can fit a CPU like a i7-4720HQ 2.6-3.6ghz 4c/8t badazz CPU along with it's its power circuits/VRM's along with the GPU like a GTX 750ti/860m GPU with 4gb of vram sometimes more along with all its VRM's. Ohh do not forget M2 sata slots, Mini PCIE slots, DP,HDMI and Sata ports USB 3.0. All on a circuit board the size of a mid to high end DESKTOP graphics card! Not only that it performs just as well as a huge desktop and only uses maybe 150watts of power! A truly amazing feat of engineering.

Why can we not have a mITX motherboard with a BGA CPU " Edit: LGA would be better"with single or dual MXM slots, or even a single 860m, 970m or 980m built into the mITX board itself ? Giving you the option of picking the case you want, Memory, your cooling solutions with possible heat pipe designs running to the top of a finned aluminum case case to keep either the CPU or GPU cool slightly extra cooling then needed for your GPU. All powered by a 200-300 watt power brick you can tuck away. It is crazy since they can fit everything I said above onto a small circuit board no bigger than a mITX board with ease. I would much rather have a interchangeable MXM GPU or GPU's but I would take a integrated AIO mITX motherboard with a built in mobile 970m or 980m since their performance is pretty darn close to the desktop counterparts. If such a product did exist I am sure a few case manufacturers would jump on designing cases right away giving us many choices to choose from and on top of that they would make for perfect steam boxes so I cannot understand why they are not on board with such a easy idea that just has to be executed and has already been executed many many times in laptops. So there is plenty of tech already in place to give some of us what we want at a slight premium, but with a bit of customizability.

But here is the killer. !!! What urks me out the most is why oh why is there is no MXM standard yet after all these years ? "kicks dirt hill" :cry:
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Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Mar 28, 2015 9:07 pm

The clearance without any fans is a little more than 2 full slots. Without any fans, the stock heatsink/fan fits nicely. However, without the fans, the whole thing gets uncomfortably warm after about half an hour of benchmarking/gaming. I saw CPU temps of over 72C.
For the CPU heatsink I'm using the stock Intel cooler with the copper core (the one that comes with the pentium 3258?)

I considered cutting down the fins, but I was without power tools this week and didn't want to risk wrecking it. Also didn't like the stock GPU heatsink. Too much metal where there should have been fins...there could have been something like 12-20 more square cm of surface area, but they chose not to machine it.

I'd assume the soldered thin-fin, copper-base heatsink design costs more than the extruded fin aluminum type. I'll post pics of the 630 heatsink when I get it. I got the fans in today. May have to design a housing with some light grade polyethelene sheets.
 
Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Mar 28, 2015 9:17 pm

vargis14 wrote:
I am copying and pasting some of this from one of my previous posts where I went on ranting about how there is no standard MXM board design yet after so many years and also how they can fit a CPU like a i7-4720HQ 2.6-3.6ghz 4c/8t badazz CPU along with it's its power circuits/VRM's along with the GPU like a GTX 750ti/860m GPU with 4gb of vram sometimes more along with all its VRM's. Ohh do not forget M2 sata slots, Mini PCIE slots, DP,HDMI and Sata ports USB 3.0. All on a circuit board the size of a mid to high end DESKTOP graphics card! Not only that it performs just as well as a huge desktop and only uses maybe 150watts of power! A truly amazing feat of engineering.


One of the biggest misconceptions about MXM is that people think it's a consumer accessible standard like PCI-Express. It's not. It's more like a loose electrical guideline for the OEM/ODMs. :)

It's also REALLY hard/expensive to cram a big die GPU, memory modules and 4-phase (or more) voltage regulation circuitry on to 4-5 square inches of PCB, and at the upper end, this has to handle up to 100+ Watts of power, then there's the clearance. Nothing can be taller than 3.5mm (IIRC) off the PCB...
 
vargis14
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sun Mar 29, 2015 8:20 am

MXM cards with high end GPU's that consume 100 watts or more are already and have been out there and in most case if you can find better MXM card that is the same type as yours it can be upgraded in most cases. The problem is there is no standard, but one thing is standard the amount of pins connecting A Mobile PCI Express Module (MXM) is that they all pretty much have 230 pins with with a desktop 16x slot having only 82 pins a lot of the GPU's power components and other do dads are placed on the laptops MB. Also MXM sizing in for 100 watts is usually at 82mm x 105mm or 3.23" X 4.13". They have a improved Tonga GPU, A mobile chip made exclusively for Apple’s 5K iMac that only uses 100watts and featured 2048 stream processors 256 moire stream processors the Tongas desktop 1792 SP's alongside a 256-bit memory bus which happened to have 4 GB GDDR5 VRAM.

The best Solution since I do not think we will ever see a MXM standard or availability to the consumer would to have a mobile GPU like a 960m, 970m or 980m with 4-6GB of Vram mounted right on the mITX motherboard. Along with the CPU be it a BGA or LGA type with SO-DIMMS instead of full sized dimms to save space on the top of the board for more mini PCIE slots and M-2 slots and since the GPU is built into the board the PCIE 16x slot can be lost for a smaller 4x slot or just space for the built in GPU. Even though the 6.7" x 6.7" mITX motherboard size could accommodate SBS MXM slots since none are wider then 3.23". I would love a 7"x 7" x 4.5" killer rig availible to the public

I guess I am alone on this Idea, but I think it is a great Idea! Along with the new arrival of x99 mITX boards and mobile Quadro or Fire type cards it could fill the gaming and workstation Super small and powerful PC spec that we do not really have a practical solution for yet beside notebooks and desktop replacements that are difficult to upgrade.
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Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Fri Apr 03, 2015 7:22 am

OK, got the MSI N630-1GD3/LP (Picked it up for $34 on ebay)...the mounting holes line up, it's in between the size of the stock GTX750ti heatsink and the Quadro.

Image

Problem however. The heatsink entends a few millimeters too far (over the capacitors) to allow mounting. I'm going to have to cut off about 3-4mm off the end of the heatsink. Time to locate my dremel...

At this point, some of you are probably thinking I should have just cut down the fins on the stock heatsink and be done with this farce of a project...I'm starting to agree, but, we're already this far in, might as well finish it. If I can locate my dremel, I'll try to cut down the fins on the stock heatsink as well.

Edit: An associate pointed out the different color of the metal of the MSI heatsink and mentioned it might be a different aluminum alloy.
 
vargis14
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Fri Apr 03, 2015 12:27 pm

Mark where the capacitors are with a sharpie and only notch the block in the needed areas to save as much aluminum as possible. Every little bit of surface area will help so trying to remove as little as possible is proactive.
2600k@4848mhz @1.4v CM Nepton40XL 16gb Ram 2x EVGA GTX770 4gb Classified cards in SLI@1280mhz Stock boost on a GAP67-UD4-B3, SBlaster Z powered by TX-850 PSU pushing a 34" LG 21/9 3440-1440 IPS panel. Pieced together 2.1 sound system
 
Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Apr 04, 2015 11:26 am

vargis14 wrote:
Mark where the capacitors are with a sharpie and only notch the block in the needed areas to save as much aluminum as possible. Every little bit of surface area will help so trying to remove as little as possible is proactive.


Thank you for the advice, I would like to follow it, however, I don't feel I have the proper machining tools (nor the expertise) to make the correct notches. All I have right now is a dremel and cutoff wheels. I've measured out the cut and according to my original plan, I will have to remove about 5mm off the stock heatsink.

Here is a pic of the heatsink (in a white bowl for contrast) with a line scratched in to delineate the cut. Sorry about the gigantic pictures earlier, still learning how to use tinypic.

Image

I am about to step outside to make the cut, wish me luck.
 
Mr Bigglesworth
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Sat Apr 04, 2015 12:17 pm

Made the cut, the heatsink now just barely clears the capacitors. Half deafened by the dremel.

Whatever the material was, it was not pure aluminum, it was a lot tougher, wear resistant and a bit heavier.

Image


Edit: I am starting to think this build is cursed.

I installed the 750ti with the new heatsink and fan and managed to start my benchmarks, I got a bluescreen while installing drivers and the system locked up while I attempted to install Unigine Valley. After the reboot, the system refuses to see the SSD. (Mushkin enhanced 240GB)

Anyway, what I did manage to find out: The new heatsink and fan seems to work fairly well; it fits in the space with a few millimeters clearance. I didn't make the custom fan and shroud yet (too much going on), but I think it may not be necessary.

I've been getting idle temps of about 33C and it hit 64C in Passmark (Light GPU) In 3DMark Skydiver (Moderate-Heavy GPU) the temps got as high as 80C, which I don't consider to be too terrible, but still a little warmer than I am comfortable with. I'll try some readings from Unigine Valley once I get the rig up and going again.

Edit 2: The SSD came up after I left it unplugged for a half hour (while I was writing the last edit)

I'm going to run Unigine Valley (Heavy-sustained GPU) for about an hour or so and see what kinda temps the system gets to.

Edit 3: I think the system is right at the boundary of thermal throttling. Unigine Valley is reporting the temps pegged at 80C but is reporting both GPU and memory speeds at the max. of 1346 mhz and 1700mhz (5400mhz) I can hear the GPU and CPU fans kicking in to high gear.

Does anyone know if the clock speed readings in Valley are real time? the GPU temp meter appears to be.

Unigine Valley has been running for about half an hour now, no framerate drops yet (except for the initial burst when textures get loaded).

Let me know if any of you want any pics of the system.
 
krclvlthn
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Mon Apr 06, 2015 1:34 pm

Hello everyone,

Thank you for great topic, helped me much finding good LP video card.

But I got another problem, as I can't buy another tower/case(for now) I'm stuck with current one: HP Elite 8200 SFF
It has small but nice, 90% efficient 240W PSU. I have already tried putting external video card with great result: GT 220 LP which worked fine until BGA failed :(
It drew about 60W of power from PCIE which to my surprise surpassed 25W HP limit :) Call me crazy :)
And yes, system was stable.


I got standard i5-2400 CPU, SSD, 8GB HP RAM and low power sound card.

So my question is, how much power does really R7 250 LP and GTX 750 Ti LP draw? NOT TDP, real power consumption.
Which graphic card would perform best on my system?
Is there a option to downclock those cards in order to reduce power consumption?
If anyone got similar results(PSU, CPU), please report how does it perform?

I look to max my HTPC for 2-3 years and ditch it for major upgrade.


And thanks in advance for any help :)
 
localhostrulez
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Mon Apr 06, 2015 4:40 pm

This probably isn't what you want to hear, but...

I've dealt with 8200's (and the like) at work, and I don't recall HP shipping any of those machines with cards above ~25W. Personally, I'd try and stick to that just to be on the safe side. Although keep in mind that you probably won't be torturing everything simultaneously, so that might help you get away with a higher wattage card. I still don't like the idea though. The fact that HP maxes out at ~25W cards on that PSU tells me something about what they trust to be absolutely rock solid and problem free with whatever their users will throw at it - remember, it's an enterprise grade PC of their highest end line that's not a workstation. 8000's, not 6000's or 4000's. People who buy these don't tolerate crap. Though that number may be more of a guideline for upgrades than anything else - PCIe x16 supports 75W per the spec, and if you put a 60W card in there, it sounds like they're not actually enforcing the limit. And for what it's worth, they're happy to ship you a higher than 25W card if you have a minitower, even though I'm not sure if the motherboard is any different (the power supply IS - more like 300W). Anyway, I figured that a GT 730 (NOT the DDR3 128-bit version) should be ~23-25W, and supports 3 displays - something to consider. I was looking into one of those for a project on what might be a similar PC myself.
 
localhostrulez
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Mon Apr 06, 2015 11:36 pm

Hmm, HP also uses a 240W PSU in the Z230 SFF (workstation), although the MT version has a 400W PSU (could've sworn the elite machines are more like 300W there). And they specifically advertise those machines as "Designed for heavy 24x7x365 workloads". So like I thought, they seem pretty confident with their stock configs (with 25W video card) on that little 240W thing. (Even though PSU calculators tell me that it should barely be enough.) Also note that they actually list 100% load numbers (not blowing up at 100% load is a good thing :wink:) on both the workstations and elites. So I'm not surprised that you could get away with a bit more of a video card.

Also makes me wonder why enthusiast power supplies are so commonly well above those wattages... not all of us need fancy GPUs you know. :)
 
krclvlthn
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Tue Apr 07, 2015 12:19 am

HP Elite series are known for overengineering.

The same 8200 series, MT or Tower versions allow for up to 60-75W of power draw on PCIe. And those are very similiar if not the same specs.
But I got small PSU, so it's better to be on the safe side and I need precise data on how much power does LP cards draw straight from PCIe bus.
HP PSU is extremely tolerant up to 240W, everything beyond is magic and mystery and blown caps ;)


And BTW TDP values for both AMD and NVIDIA are mostly incorrect. It seems that it is NOT unified value..
 
deruberhanyok
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Tue Apr 07, 2015 6:52 am

That's correct, both AMD and NVIDIA report TDP differently. Intel does, too.

I'm not sure how we could measure power draw directly from the PCIe bus - anyone have any ideas?

An external power meter like a kill-a-watt could estimate the additional power drawn at the wall, and once you factor in an efficiency rating, that might be fairly accurate, but it depends on what kind of comparison you're doing.

For instance, the system I have has an i3-4370 in it. If I measured power draw at load (say, running 3dmark) and then figured in the efficiency of the power brick for the PicoPSU, I might get a fairly accurate idea what the system is using. But if I then added a video card and measured it, it would be different: adding the power used by the add-in video card, but subtracting whatever the onboard GPU used. It might not be much, but I don't know how that would affect the accuracy of the reading.

Do you think that would be sufficient, or do you need something even more accurate?
<3 TR
 
krclvlthn
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Re: Best low profile video cards available (March 2015)

Tue Apr 07, 2015 8:36 am

deruberhanyok wrote:
For instance, the system I have has an i3-4370 in it. If I measured power draw at load (say, running 3dmark) and then figured in the efficiency of the power brick for the PicoPSU, I might get a fairly accurate idea what the system is using. But if I then added a video card and measured it, it would be different: adding the power used by the add-in video card, but subtracting whatever the onboard GPU used. It might not be much, but I don't know how that would affect the accuracy of the reading.

Do you think that would be sufficient, or do you need something even more accurate?

I think it would be quite precise, yet simple enough to do. My rough calculations for R7 point to 65-75W consumption at 100%.



Also, for anyone interested, be careful which R7 you will buy, there are some GPU naming misconceptions - for example XFX R7 250 is NOT an upgraded 7750.
Sapphire R7 250 is actually R7 250E in disguise. Aand R7 250E is actually 7750.
7750 does consume
Afaik streaming units do count(look for 512 SU) and look for connectors: newer R7's tends to have displayport(but not all!)


EDIT:
found this interesting review, worth reading
http://www.amazon.com/gp/review/R3TEYL9DYP9ZQE/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B0095MRLJ2#R3TEYL9DYP9ZQE
It's just 40W from my standpoint.
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