Thermalright's Shaman VGA Cooler: The Quiet Giant?

[killerclick]

[citation][nom]redgarl[/nom]Who need silence in gaming mode?[/citation]

Depends on what kind of games you play, not every game involves shooting and explosions every two seconds. Besides GPUs are also used for other things nowadays.

 

[akula2]

@the cm 212+ is a cpu cooler, this article is about a vga cooler, there is no way both of those can be compared...

True but I was mentioning about CPU coolers only

 

[freggo]

Interesting how the Temperature bar graph starts a "0"; and still shows impressive improvements while you had to 'cheat' on the noice bar graph starting at "47" to make the improvement show up as a significant step when in reality it is relatively modest.
Do we really need little presentation 'tricks' like this or is it just me?

 

[bildo123]

[citation][nom]killerclick[/nom]Depends on what kind of games you play, not every game involves shooting and explosions every two seconds. Besides GPUs are also used for other things nowadays.[/citation]

Exactly. Also, "silence" is quite loosely used here. I mean my 4870 sounded like an off brand hair dryer on low (IMO). Also I play games like L4D and Killing Floor where a faint noise here and there can make a difference. Also, I don't want to just turn up the volume to compensate because everything else becomes too loud.

 

[DT12]

I have a Gigabyte 5830 that has two nice big fans and cools the card to these levels and beyond....
And I almost cannot hear it even with an open case....

Just saying....

 

[lradunovic77]

This is piece of crap which let's you to run only one video card.

Those guys from Thermalright must be morons. Do they even know that people run SLI, TriSLI or Crossfire setup

 

[cjmcgee]

[citation][nom]freggo[/nom]you had to 'cheat' on the noise bar graph starting at "47" to make the improvement show up as a significant step[/citation]

I hate it whenever they use a non-zero origin for their graphs; it's confusing and always feels kind of dishonest to me.

 

[killerclick]

[citation][nom]freggo[/nom]Interesting how the Temperature bar graph starts a "0"; and still shows impressive improvements while you had to 'cheat' on the noice bar graph starting at "47" to make the improvement show up as a significant step when in reality it is relatively modest.Do we really need little presentation 'tricks' like this or is it just me?[/citation]

Actually it makes sense when sound is concerned. A normal conversation is 60 dB while a gunshot at close range is 140 dB. Would you say a gunshot is only 2.5 times louder than a normal conversation? See, even a few decibels difference is very noticable especially when relatively quiet sounds are measured.

 

[cjmcgee]

[citation][nom]killerclick[/nom]Actually it makes sense when sound is concerned. A normal conversation is 60 dB while a gunshot at close range is 140 dB. Would you say a gunshot is only 2.5 times louder than a normal conversation? See, even a few decibels difference is very noticable especially when relatively quiet sounds are measured.[/citation]

I seems like that is an argument for a logarithmic graph; a linear graph with a non-zero origin does not really do a good approximation of that.

 

[Kileak]

[citation][nom]veah[/nom]Disappointed that TH did this review with an additional component rather than the out-of-box cooler only. It is completely misleading no matter how much it is disclosed, that the added vrm cooler is not part of the product being reviewed. If the card were to fail due to the vrm chips cooking, that needs to be part of the review. Instead you are effectively covering a manufacturer deficiency by adding another product.[/citation]

What he said.

 

[Guest]

Would have liked to see them try and put this thing in various cases.

It does not look like it would fit too well in my Antec 300, and a lot of other cases with the amount of extra width it adds.

 

[rubix_1011]

Real cooling -> Koolance!

Koolance is the bottom of the barrel in most watercooling circles...not sure which one you are in. They make decent waterblocks, but the rest of their kits are trash.

How can Tom's take this product to review and do an actual 'review' when you had to piece it together with another cooling solution? In my mind, this is a failure...not being able to fully utilize the cooler you paid money for, but giving it 'good reviews' in conjunction with a separate cooler installed.

A very poor review...very unscientific and unrealistic. The fact that you needed to use a 2nd cooler alone is enough to recommend this product not to get installed. You are propping this card up even though it suffers a broken leg due to poor VRM cooling/failed install of cooler.

Test the soltuion as-is...even if there are failed components. Don't advertise the review for the single cooler when it was obvious that TWO were used and needed. FAIL.

 

[apache_lives]

nearly 1kg aint good for a card...

 

[BulkZerker]

Its funny how many of you are bashing the review when toms says outright what the main shortcoming of this cooling solution is, the sub par thermal tape.

 

[youssef 2010]

Good article

I any body else other than me worried that this cooler might break or warp your vga card?

 

[insightdriver]

[citation][nom]redgarl[/nom]Two of those in crossfire... or SLI... right... see my concern here...[/citation]

Exactly. And just about every video card will throttle and shut down when GPU temps get too high.

 

[cleeve]

[citation][nom]cjmcgee[/nom]I hate it whenever they use a non-zero origin for their graphs; it's confusing and always feels kind of dishonest to me.[/citation]

I agree in almost all cases *EXCEPT* when it comes to deciibels. The ambient noise from the system we used with NO graphics cooler is the starting point, I probably should have stressed that in the article but I hope it makes more sense to you now.

 

[Darkerson]

What a beast! Even if it is a little impractical to use, it definitely does what its supposed to do, other then the VRM part not sticking very well. And they seemed to have addressed that issue as well.

 

[bumrush]

Just picked this up a few weeks ago. For those who still don't see the point, please consider the following: using MSI Afterburner I OCed my Asus EAH5850, with 1.3v, to 1010MHz core clock, 1245MHz memory clock, and I now run at 60 degrees Celsius at 100% load for 1 hour with MSI Kombustor. Obviously, not every card can OC like this, but if you do your homework and get lucky with your silicon, the investment can be pretty exciting as long as you are content to never run SLI/CrossFireX (unless you have one of the very few motherboards that could conceivably support it with this cooler in place).

 

[dertechie]

It seems that at $85 (and especially $115 with the second VRM sink) that you're reaching the price of adding a GPU block to an already-established watercooling loop. How's this monster compare with that? Seems to me that the kind of people that buy $85 VGA coolers are the same kind of people who might just already have a water loop.

 

[liveonc]

You'll have to be a person who can't stand noise, need ONE GTX580 or GTX480, & have enough room in his case to fit this thing. To actually want OR need this Thermalright dynamic duo, Badman & Birdman... ;-)

 

[cobra5000]

What the? A full page ad pops up EVERY time you turn a page, even for members!? This had better not be the way Tom's is heading..

 

[el_bastardo74]

[citation][nom]cobra5000[/nom]What the? A full page ad pops up EVERY time you turn a page, even for members!? This had better not be the way Tom's is heading..[/citation]

+1...i find it very aggravating as well. like every page being full of ads wasn't enough. this is the reason i don't come here every weekday to see news updates.

 

[latbonchimsi]

Why no GELID icy vision? would have liked to have seen the performance comparison.

 

[pinkfloydminnesota]

How many of these do they expect to sell?