GTX 680, which one?

sesselpupser

sesselpupser

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neema_t
Hi guys,

If any of you are regulars at the Sim Racing Hardware forum, you might've seen that I'm itching to get a 680 ASAP. Problem is, I'd quite like an MSI Twin Frozr III, but they don't exist here (the UK) yet, scan.co.uk just says they're waiting for an ETA. So, as that could be a while, I'd like to buy something else so I can have it now rather than wait for an indeterminate period of time. The question is, what?

I've had a look at the EVGA superclocked 680 here. I don't want to spend more than £470, you see. The thing is, at the moment I have an MSI GTX 580 Twin Frozr II/OC and it runs up to 70 degrees while playing BF3, so I'm concerned that the cooler on this particular 680 won't cool it enough to run at a nice temperature in my case. Would it be advisable to wait for the Twin Frozr III after all, or am I being overly cautious?

My case is a Fractal Design Define R3 with one 140mm Yate Loon fan (on the side with a dust filter), two Scythe 120mm Gentle Typhoons (one in the front, one in the back) and two of Fractal's own 120mm fans (front and rear top) with space for one more fan on top which is currently occupied by a dust filter and another fan on the bottom, in front of the PSU, but I don't think I could put a fan there without all the PSU cables getting stuck in it... Are there any fans I could buy that would noticeably drop the temperature inside the case, or maybe the dust filter on the side panel is a waste of time? I had heard the Define R3 was alright for cooling but 70 degrees (and CPU temps of around 44) seem a bit high to me.

What do you guys think?
 
Well, I have the EVGA superclocked 680 and it works brilliantly. I have no heat issues too. Like you said it is £470, but I would say it's worth it. It does run hot but with a well vented case (like yours) it'll be just fine. If price weren't a problem I'd tell you to get the 690. ;)
 
How do you find the Define R3 case? I really want one when I go to build my gaming desktop.
 
I would wait on one with more Vram. I'm wanting to go triple screen though, and figure more VRam will be needed in the near future to run some games maxed with triple screens.
 
korza493
How do you find the Define R3 case? I really want one when I go to build my gaming desktop.
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Click here, Select Oceania, and then select your particular landmass. That will tell you who sells their cases in your country.

Now onto the main topic. I'd try to remove the side filter on the case. Though those gentle typhoons seem like the type that are best used with a water cooling rad or exhaust outside the case. I think the problem is just the fan configuration. What do you use for the CPU cooler?
 
^ I didn't mean it like that. I meant to ask what the OP thought of the case.. :lol:
 
Getting anything in the 680 range with the stock cooler is going to be risky, especially in the R3. Open Bench results show the stock 680 with stock cooling reaching temperatures up to 80C. Combine that with your not as well ventilated case (even though it does have good cooling, the sound dampening characteristics make it a bit more of an oven), and the overclock, and you're bound to have issues.

I'd highly recommend holding out until you can get the MSI TwinFrozor version, or perhaps an ASUS DirectCU2 (if they're released yet). 👍

EDIT: Although you may have issues, they can be resolved by the card ramping up the fan speed. This in turn causes noise, and defeats the purpose of you having an R3 (it being a 'silence' oriented case). Another reason to hold out for an aftermarket card.
 
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See, that's what I'm thinking. I too want to run triple monitors but the 680 is only just in stock here in the UK as it is, and the stock clocked 4GB card is only just better than an OC 2GB, and they're nowhere to be found here at all ever, so I'd be waiting for an OC 4GB for quite some time and who knows how much they'll cost. I'd rather get the 2GB now and upgrade when I find a game I can't play at a reasonable frame rate.

The R3 is fine, really, it's got plenty of room and the most difficult part of my build was getting the cables through the holes in the case without pulling the rubber grommets off while doing so. I had a bit of trouble with the SATA cables too but they were solved by using the right angled end on the motherboard side and the flat end on the disc drive. It's my first ever PC so I can't tell you how loud or quiet it is in comparison but the only time I notice the sound is when the fans speed up on my 580, and overall it's nowhere near as quiet as my Mac Pro, but that's got something like five relatively small fans compared to my PC's eight (including two on the 580 and one in the PSU), but I do have one of the soundproofing fan slot panels removed with a dust filter in its place to provide a little extra breathing.

How about the EVGA Signature card? It's about £20 more but it looks like the plastic cover is perforated, that might just be for show, though. Can you get aftermarket GPU air coolers? I'm sure I saw a Twin Frozr II cooler for the 580 somewhere, maybe I could look into that.
 
^^ Hmm. Well like I said, personally I'd hold off till the Twin Frozor version is available. Really, stock cooling is hot, and loud...

One thing though: Is this more a point of you wanna be one of the first people to own one? It's fine if it is, just pondering. :lol:
 
Oh no no, it's nothing like that. My main reasons are that I've got three monitors lying around with nothing to do until I've got them installed on my sim rig and I'm getting quite restless about getting them all connected up, but I've also got someone interested in buying my 580, but I can't sell it until I've got a 680 (of course). Also I bought a new monitor for my desk and the 580 can't quite run things as well as it used to at the increased resolution (which is stating the very bloody obvious to say the least), it's 1920x1200 whereas my old one was 1680x1050 and I've seen a significant drop in frame rates in basically everything. For the most part that's not really a problem, but a few games were only just running at over 60fps and now they drop as low as 40.

I'm not planning on having my desk monitor and the three on my rig all connected at the same time, it'll depend on what I'm playing. My rig doesn't have proper provisions for a keyboard nor mouse so I can't play anything except racing sims with the wheel or games that are better with a 360 pad that would benefit from three monitors (like Just Cause 2... I'm struggling to think of others), and for everything else I'll have my PC at my desk running just one monitor.

But thanks, you're certainly reinforcing my initial doubts about the stock cooler, I just can't find out when the Twin Frozr will be available here... Oh hang on a minute, scan.co.uk have updated their product page, it's the 11th of this month. What a waste of time, sorry guys!

Edit: I hate Scan sometimes, though, their prices just go up and up so quickly... It's now £480 rather than the £470 it was last week.
 
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Well if you already have someone to buy the 580 to offset the costs then I don't see how to disagree.
 
There are other alternatives. Although I'm a fan of the MSI cards, Gigabyte with the Windforce 3 cooler, and ASUS with the DirectCUII cards are around a similar par as cooling goes. Perhaps one of those cards pops up in the next few days?

EDIT: There is another way. Possibly purchasing off Newegg and having it shipped to Europe through a friend/UPS or such. I know there are curior services from US to Australia, don't see why there wouldn't be for the US to England.

And besides, it couldn't cost more than 30 quid to get the card shipped, if you get some kind of deal with Newegg on the card, you may even get it cheaper than buying within the country... However this is probably a stupid idea and I'll be yelled at soon :P
 
Only up to 80 degrees? That's 20 degrees cooler than my card.
 
I'm very skeptical about buying stuff from the States (or anywhere) because of customs charges, shipping time, warranties, retailer guarantees and all that. I'd prefer just paying extra to be honest, I just hope they don't sell out before I can order one...
 
Was gonna say, 80C is the norm nowadays, even higher with the highest top-end cards. My 6950 still reaches around 75-80C with a superior non-reference cooler on it...
 
^^ Even so, it's not good for the chips... correct me if I'm wrong, but it's the end of winter where you are? So, theoretically, it would reach higher temperatures during summer. Not good...
 
tlowr4
^^ Even so, it's not good for the chips... correct me if I'm wrong, but it's the end of winter where you are? So, theoretically, it would reach higher temperatures during summer. Not good...
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Yep, that's true! That's OC temps though - at stock its barely above 70, so I will probably run it like that during the summer. Not as bad as the stock 6970s with reference coolers tho - they're known to run at around 90C...
 
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tlowr4
Ah. A 100ºC club member! We welcome you. 👍
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VGA: Video Griddle Adapter.
 

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