Look ma' I bent my HR-03GT cooler!! (W/ PICS!)

[Jsunn]

Hello All,

My problem was that I just got a new GTX285 SSC and I wanted to use my older GTS8800 512 as a PhysX card. The issue was that I had put the HR-03GT cooler along with the HR-11.

In my MM-UFO case and my new Gigabyte mother board, the card would not fit in the bottom PCIe slot, so my options were to put the old stock cooler back on or try and make room by bending the HR-03GT heat pipes.

Well here are the results. I just bent them slowly and checked the condition of the pipes every couple of centimeters. I will not be held responsible if you screw up your cooler!

Here are the pics.

I did mount an air block to divert the hot air from blowing on my GTX285.

Let me know what you think.

[STEvil]

Works awesome, doesnt it?

[itslogz]

Nice.. Did you just bend it with your hands slowly or something? Im not familiar with how strong the heatpipes are on them

[tool_462]

Nice! Any effect on temps going from standard to bent? I wouldn't think so unless the fan cooled the back side of the card enough to drop core temp.

[fatguy1992]

Nice work

[Craftyman.]

Nice! Any effect on temps going from standard to bent? I wouldn't think so unless the fan cooled the back side of the card enough to drop core temp.

hey you used to post on tom's hardware didn't you

[LuckyNV]

looks great, how are you cooling the card VRM though?

[biohead]

wuss

[tiro_uspsss]

I remember Andre doing this I think, back when the HR03 first came out.. think he did it with 2 of 'em & mounted it to 2 88GTXs to bench

nicely done

[Jsunn]

Nice.. Did you just bend it with your hands slowly or something? Im not familiar with how strong the heatpipes are on them

Yeah, I just used my hands and bent slowly. The heatpipes are just copper tubes so they are realativly easy to bend. Just take your time.

-Jason

[Jsunn]

Nice! Any effect on temps going from standard to bent? I wouldn't think so unless the fan cooled the back side of the card enough to drop core temp.

None that I have noticed.

[tiro_uspsss]

just out of curiousity - why not a 120mm fan?

[Jsunn]

I didn't have a 120 PWM handy. I am still figuring out how to O/C my physx card so right now it is at stock settings and it doesn't get too hot. also, I didn't want a lot of "warm" air blowing on my GTX285.

-Jason

[tiro_uspsss]

I didn't have a 120 PWM handy. I am still figuring out how to O/C my physx card so right now it is at stock settings and it doesn't get too hot. also, I didn't want a lot of "warm" air blowing on my GTX285.

-Jason

ahh, ok cool

[Retro]

Very skillful bending of those pipes, it looks good alongside the 285
I did want to ask about using your 8800 for a PhysX card though. Does this provide an advantage over just enabling PhysX with the 285 only? I just enable it on my 280 when I want to play with Nvidia's demos and such, but not for any major gaming use. Is the additional card a major boost for PhysX?

[Jsunn]

Very skillful bending of those pipes, it looks good alongside the 285
I did want to ask about using your 8800 for a PhysX card though. Does this provide an advantage over just enabling PhysX with the 285 only? I just enable it on my 280 when I want to play with Nvidia's demos and such, but not for any major gaming use. Is the additional card a major boost for PhysX?

The way that it works, anyone please correct me if I am wrong, but the second card will do the calculating of the physics processes while the main card does the rendering.

In 3dMark Vantage you will get better scores withe Physx enabled on the main card, because it is often the faster card and during the test there isn't much graphically going on. In an actual physics coded game, you will see the improvement.

-Jason

[Retro]

The way that it works, anyone please correct me if I am wrong, but the second card will do the calculating of the physics processes while the main card does the rendering.

In 3dMark Vantage you will get better scores withe Physx enabled on the main card, because it is often the faster card and during the test there isn't much graphically going on. In an actual physics coded game, you will see the improvement.

-Jason

Thanks for the explanation. This could be quite a benefit when we see some of the new PhysX titles that are coming out.
Speaking of benefits, how is the new 285? I saw your temp. and fan speed reports in your other thread, and the performance must be a big jump from the 8800. I think that having 1024mb of ram also makes a big difference over the 512mb in the 8800.

[Jsunn]

Thanks for the explanation. This could be quite a benefit when we see some of the new PhysX titles that are coming out.
Speaking of benefits, how is the new 285? I saw your temp. and fan speed reports in your other thread, and the performance must be a big jump from the 8800. I think that having 1024mb of ram also makes a big difference over the 512mb in the 8800.

The performance jump is HUGE!! Far Cry is awesome with the settings at high and 4X AA. I am going to go to very high and see how it looks. I was sitting at ~60FPS!

Also, back to the Physx question, the game has to be "coded" to use the second card as Physx or nVidia's CUDA.

If its not the PhysX card will just sit there, no loss, it is really a win win.

[Retro]

The performance jump is HUGE!! Far Cry is awesome with the settings at high and 4X AA. I am going to go to very high and see how it looks. I was sitting at ~60FPS!

Also, back to the Physx question, the game has to be "coded" to use the second card as Physx or nVidia's CUDA.

If its not the PhysX card will just sit there, no loss, it is really a win win.

That 285 was a good investment, I figured there would be a big jump in performance from an 8800

I sure noticed the improvement going to a 280. And that was from a 9800GX2. I hope Nvidia gets it right this time with the 295, but I am going to stick with single-gpu cards regardless. I will enjoy it even more once I finally get that HR-03GTX project finished

It will be interesting to see what the game developers come out with for PhysX then.
I don't know if this list has any of the specially coded upcoming games on it yet, but there are a lot of titles, both past and present.
http://www.nzone.com/object/nzone_physxgames_home.html