Cool, quiet, fast cards at any point soon?

[mikeymike]

Are graphics cards just going to get bigger, noisier, heavier and hotter for the forseeable future, or do people think we'll see Nvidia/ATI go through the same phase as AMD have already and Intel are just thinking of doing?

I'm a bit miffed after building a PC for a customer which is a damn sight quieter than mine (www.mikeymike.org.uk/mikes/mypc.txt), and is a cooler/quieter/faster system, and I think the reason is the graphics card - his being a Quadro 4 380XGL that doesn't have a fan and doesn't spew out heat, and mine being a GeForce 4 Ti4200 (otherwise the specs and hardware in use is extremely similar).

 

[coolsquirtle]

don't worry, eventually water cooling will take over

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[entium]

unless we see a revolution in the silcon industry. Yes they will. Low K is good with lower temps and less power, there are a few other processes which are better but not economical for use yet.

The problem with dropping micron sizes in gpu's and cpu's well in any silcon waffer for that matter is resistance increases thus more heat.

IBM is working on somethin called Strained Silicon, this process is very expensive (because its not widely used yet) but intial tests have shown an increase of 30% in performance while dropping power using 70%

Now Low K is the type of waffer used, and Strained Silcon is a fabrication method add them together and yeah it will drop power consumption and heat by quiet a bit. Cost will be astronomical lol.

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

You could always go the Heatpipe method.

Relatively easy to do, relatively little hassle or risk, and somewhat cheap.

0.11 or 0.9 may offer some more elegant options, but really both companies are going to get every last bit they can out of their chips, and thus have them become space heaters. CPU's are bad too, the difference is they have better assemblies, and are better anchored onto the MOBO and have larger assemblies (usually with larger fans) and thus aren't as whiney because they can achieve alot more without the same rpm. Also the CPUs have even less transistors, especially compared to the latest graphics chips.

Really if you want passive cooling you lose performance. The R9600Pro has active cooling, and the R9600 has passive cooling, but there is a performance hit to running the chip colder and slower. At least a heatpipe will let you run an R9800XT with relatively quiet operation. I don't expect even Zalman to have a heatpipe solution for either the X800pro/xt or GF6800/GT/Ultra, but maybe for the X800SE/GF6800XT, but who knows.

Gainward has a great water solution for the GF6800 series, but it's not cheap, and it's definitely not small or hassle free.


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[Zeekfu]

Wrong section but related to the cpu heat.
Why is the athlon 64 desktop rated to take less heat than the mobile? Does that mean the mobile version has a better silicon in it or something or just picked out of the optimal part of the wafer or what? I know it is volted lower (1.4 vs 1.5) but it also has a higher case temperature rating (95 degrees instead of 70 degrees) What the heck is the difference? Anyone got any ideas on this?

 

[Crashman]

My 9600 Pro outputs about as much heat as a GeForce2 MX. So it's really a matter of which card you buy.

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[entium]

Athlon 64's use SOI (silicon on insulator) fabrication process made by IBM with .13 microns. There could be something with the isolulation layer that makes it not able to take as much heat?

I think the mobiles use a smaller micron size right, .09. If so I'm thinking SOI might be very difficult to do with .09

I was wrong they both use the same processes

Interesting question Zeekfu

There must be something like an extra silver plate in the wafer that helps the mobiles cope with heat better.

 

[ChipDeath]

The <i>only</i> reason the mobile chips run cooler is that they're running on a lower voltage. Less Volts=Less heat - Vcore has a greater effect on heat than the clockspeed does.

The Mobiles are just hand-picked cores which happen to be happy at the lower voltage. Same with mobile Athlon XP chips. some batches (and even individual CPUs) are simply happy with lower voltages than others. presumably they're just slightly more 'perfect' than others.

This is definitely true of the Athlon XP mobiles, and AFAIK AMD doesn't have the manufacturing capacity to have another modified process for mobile A64 chips, so I would imagine it's the same with them.


---
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[Guest]

Maybe the two chips can take the same amount of heat but AMD "Garantees" your mobile will still do fine at these temps. Since the Mobile are installed in a much more cramped area with typically much worst airflow, I think they have more chance to run hot.

Thats just a tought maybe the mobile can actually take more heat dunno.

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[DonnieDarko]

People have pushed the vcore down on desktop a64 chips to 1.25-1.3 and running them stable. So I think your right about just certain cores being able to run on lower core voltage.

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[Zeekfu]

The explaination labby gives seems to make sense.

From what scott tells me it overclocks to about the same high end as desktop but runs a bit cooler in getting the same oc. So I guess the basic difference may be it is hand picked and given a better guarentee? Seems like 15 degrees is a lot of difference though. That is why I was wondering if there was a difference in the manufacturing process.

All in all it doesn't seem worth the effort as the desktop is a few dollars more and doesn't come with heatsink/fan which would be another $30--$50+. I hear stockcooling with the boxed desktop chip is good out of the box too. Still I am curious exactly what the difference is. Here is a helpful chart someone linked a couple of days ago:
<A HREF="http://www.amdboard.com/amd64_opn.html" target="_new">http://www.amdboard.com/amd64_opn.html</A>
see where it says case temp down the page a bit?

*Anyone have a link to a step by step of the chip manufacturing process? I think that would be cool. I saw some stuff on intel website a while back, perhaps I'll go back and look over it again.
*I actually thought the prescotts were using the strained silicon technology already, I guess I need to go back and reread that again. From what I hear they sure aren't running cooler so I must have misread.<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Zeekfu on 06/25/04 09:04 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Zeekfu]

hey, I moved to "addict" ok I need to quit posting now----shakes....scratches......

 

[entium]

congradulations

For the step by step unless AMD releases it don't think anyone else would have it :/

Prescotts are strained silcon, the next coming chips for AMD will be too. I think PowerPc chips are already too.

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

AMD does have the specs/layout on their site, but there are minor differences, other than voltage.

<A HREF="http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/ProductInformation/0,,30_118_9485_9487^9493,00.html" target="_new">AMD64 Desktop</A>
<A HREF="http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/ProductInformation/0,,30_118_10220_10221^10234,00.html" target="_new">AMD64 Mobile</A>

They also have one for the AMD64Mobile for DTR (DeskTopReplacement) but they have similar architectures. Mobile for the Notebook, seems a little redundant.

Anywhoo, the system bus seems slower and the memory controller is limited to 64bit width which I doubt would make much difference, but since the memory controller is integrated on die who knows. Anywhoo, just two links to a little more info, even if it isn't graphics related.


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