How Noisey Is it?

[khenderson]

Looking to upgrade my graphics card and I'm not interested in SLI/Crossfire. I've had my eye on something like a x1900xt 256 or the 512 version. However, people seem to complain a lot about how loud this card is and I'm hoping to keep noise under control. I've looked at the Geforce line, but for the price there's just nothing comparable in performance. The closest things seems to be a 7900 GTX or an overclocked 7900 GT. I hope someone can tell me I'm wrong and show me something close to a x1900xt 256/512.

Anyone have any recent guides showing a comparrison including the 1900xts and the 7900 Gtx and GTO, etc?

Can the fan/heatsink be changed on the 1900x to bring the noise down? If so, can I expect the same protection from heat and what can I expect for cost?

For those with 1900xt how bad is the noise really?

Thanks

 

[SynthDude2001]

Personally the fan noise even at 100% doesn't really bother me. It's certainly not quiet, but it's never once been an issue for me in games; the sound (whether using speakers or headphones) will easily drown it out. YMMV of course, but this has been my experience.

(I have an X1900XT 512MB in case you were too lazy to click my rig link in my sig )

 

[Atheus]

It seems to stay cool enough at about 30-40% fan power, and it's not too loud at that level, but still the loudest thing in my machine. I have turned it up 100% once to try and stop a game crashing. Heat didn't turn out to be the problem, but I did find out that at 100% it's way too loud, you have to turn the sound up or wear 'can' style headphones. You should never really need it at 100% though.

 

[SparkyJJO]

Simple solution to the noise - buy a HIS IceQ 3 X1900XT. That cooler is amazing, performs well and is very quiet. My friend has one (darn it I wish HIS had those out when I bought my X1900XT *mutter grumble grumble*).

This is what I'm talking about

 

[Ayah]

Buy an ATI silencer, accelero or a vf-900

 

[SparkyJJO]

Originally posted by: Ayah
Buy an ATI silencer, accelero or a vf-900

There is no silencer series for the X1900 which sucks, it is what it really needs. The accelero and vf900 are air recyclers and in some cases make stuff run hotter because all that hot air goes nowhere. The accelero or vf900 would probably work fine though if he had a side panel fan over the PCI slots to provide fresh air there.

 

[khenderson]

Originally posted by: SparkyJJO
Simple solution to the noise - buy a HIS IceQ 3 X1900XT. That cooler is amazing, performs well and is very quiet. My friend has one (darn it I wish HIS had those out when I bought my X1900XT *mutter grumble grumble*).

This is what I'm talking about

Thanks for that tip Sparky JJO. I'm seriously considering it. The 1900XT 256mb seems very comparable to the 7900 GTO with the edge maybe going to the 1900xt. I'm sure the 1900xt 256 mb is louder and hotter than the 7900gto, but I wonder how the 7900gto compares to the HIS 1900xt for sound and heat. Doubt there's any review out there to tell me.

Anyway, good option. Thanks!