G80 too hot for ya?

**Stormcrow** · August 4th, 2007

Jeez, my 8800 was idling at 55° and loading out at around 70° when I first popped her in; so when I unscrewed the heatsink..imagine, about two thimble-fuls of that industrial gray paste just slathered on the core. I knew when it took almost a minute and a half of wiggling the heatsink to get it to unstick there was the problem. It was late at night and I didn't think to take a pic of all that paste smeared everywhere, but I'll tell you, I had to scrape it off with a razor then apply three coats of Arctic Cleaner just to get it to look presentable. More wiping later, and I could finally see the Nvidia logo clearly. Add some Ceramique, replace the heatsink, up the fan from 60% to 100% in Rivatuner and now it sits idle at around 45° with a load between high 50's to mid 60's. Note this was an Evga card, but the other brands probably have the same problem with all that thermal compound acting like an insulator.

And if you're wondering, the card is still whisper quiet even at 100% fan. I can't hear the thing over my 120mm fan on low and my PSU.

Lead Head · August 4th, 2007

I wish my card ran that low, I top out at about 70-73*C loaded, and idle around 65*C, and its the loudest thing in my case, I can hear it over the P180s side panels, even with every other fan on max.

**Stormcrow** · August 4th, 2007

If you've got the stock single slot heatsink on that X1800, I feel for you. That thing is known for being almost as loud as a 5900 and pretty worthless for what it's supposed to do. The stock double slot is a little better, but not by much. If you haven't already, I'd drop about 40 bucks on a VF900 or something to cool that monster down.

**RAID** · August 5th, 2007

my card idle's around 60 and hits 85 under load. i need to try this out. is there a step by step on this anywhere?

**Stormcrow** · August 6th, 2007

Google didn't turn up any illustrated guides, but I can explain it. You'll probably need a size 0 Philips, as Evga uses large screws with tiny slots, but I managed with a size 1 and a little patience. Just unscrew the screws holding the heatsink to the PCB, but go slowly; they have springs attached for added tension and will bounce away if your not careful. Don't touch the 4 in the center. Those hold the bracket onto the GPU which you'll see when you take the heatsink off. Then you want to take off the two black screws on the front bracket, and the heatsink will be sitting free.
Next, just grab the heatsink and gently wiggle it left and right to loosen the thermal goop, starting with slight force and then add more as you feel it give way. It can take upwards of a minute and a half for the sink to finally break free, as Evga slops this stuff on. Then you can leave the fan plugged in and just set it aside, and marvel at the sheer volume of gray crap you have.
I used a razor to scrap it off, but something like a plastic spoon or a toothpick would work fine. Make sure you have a napkin, cause theres going to be a ton that rolls off the core and heatsink. When you've got the majority off, just clean up the core and copper contact plate with alcohol or Arctic Cleaner if you have it. Unless you have some good high performance thermal tape, leave the white tape on the heatsink and RAM alone. Taking it off will leave a gap about 1/8 of an inch wide and it won't contact the sink anymore.
After that, apply Arctic Silver 5/Ceramique as it needs to be, and set the heatsink back on top of the PCB. Its a pain to get it to line up; I found it easier to set the sink on top, then flip it over and set it on the top of the table and just adjust the PCB until the holes line up. Screw it all back together and you're done.
Stick it back in, and use RivaTuner/AtiTool, whichever to adjust the fan speed from 60% to 100%.

Oh, RAID, if you do this could you snap some pics along the way at each step? I didn't think to do that, and we could make this into a guide

Yellowhello · August 6th, 2007

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

If you've got the stock single slot heatsink on that X1800, I feel for you. That thing is known for being almost as loud as a 5900 and pretty worthless for what it's supposed to do. The stock double slot is a little better, but not by much. If you haven't already, I'd drop about 40 bucks on a VF900 or something to cool that monster down.

Yep, I got a VF900 for my 8600GT, and it's idling at 33C - 35C!!