7600 gt - Zalman or Arctic Cooling?

[sjps220]

I have a 7600gt and I'm looking to ditch the stock fan as it is quite loud. I have been told that the zalman vf-700 cu will fit this card, as will the arctic cooling silencer 5 rev 3. First of all, is this correct? Will the accelero fit?

So if my options are the vf-700 or the silencer 5 rev 3, which would people recommend and why?

Also, I know the 7600gt is already clocked pretty high so there's not a lot of overclocking room, but if I get one of these coolers will it help me OC? My temperatures are fine right now, but when I try to OC using coolbits, it fails testing once I get up to over 605 core and around 770 memory (from 580/750). Will a new cooler help it to pass the coolbits tests, or am I at a physical limitation?

Thanks for your help.

 

[sjps220]

my local computer shop has the vf-700 alcu in for $29.99 (canadian). They list the price for the vf-700 cu as $34.99 but they dont have any and they're not sure when they'll be in. The silencer 5 rev 3 is $39.99.

If I decide to go Zalman, which one would you suggest? Is there a huge difference between cu and alcu?

 

[sjps220]

Come on, somebody help me!

Someone must have some previous experiance with either zalman or arctic cooling and surely someone can answer my overclocking question.

 

[paranoid guy]

Have you your heart set on fan cooling because water cooling is a lot better.
It's also...you guessed it, more expensive but if you're an overclocking maniac it's probably worth it...I hope.

 

[sjps220]

Thanks for your reply!

I am not really an overclocking maniac, since this is my first try. I just wanted to overclock the card to the level of the factory overclocked cards that would have ended up costing me about $80-$100 more, but I was having a hard time passing the coolbits test. I think watercooling is a bit much for my needs. I'm considering this upgrade mostly because of the noise of the stock cooler, but I will probably try overclocking again if I get it.

So if I get good cooling, whether it be from water or air, will it help me pass those tests in coolbits?

 

[paranoid guy]

Just wiped my whole bloody post... oh well, here we go again. Basically the gist of it was (damn it was almost finished and all ) yes better cooling=better coolbits test results and stock cooling is too loud=get water cooling, it's noiseless. Bloody return button...

 

[CMH]

I currently have an X800XT fitted with a Zalman VF700CU, and I must say its pretty impressive, dropped my temps from almost 80C to just a tad below 60C.

Pretty quiet too.

And I managed to OC from 500/500 (GPU/GRAM) to 579/579 on that, without going too much higher than 60C.

The only problem with the Zalman I must say is that hot air circulates back into the case, whereas the arctic cooling expels it. If you can manage the hot air in the casing, apparently the Zalman cools better.

I had to move my soundcard down a slot to provide another PCI slot space to handle the hot air. Now there's 2 empty PCI slots below my GC. If I didn't do that, I won't see any difference in temperatures.