What VGA cooling is better? AC, or passive?

[CMH]

Lemme just spell it out:

I am torn between Arctic Cooling NV4 Rev2 and some passive cooling solution with fans (Tt Giant III or Zalman ZM80D-HP) for my VGA. Which I plan to OC of course. The AC is alot cheaper I must say, but I was thinking that the passive cooling ones might perform better with... say a 120mm fan blowing into it.

It takes more work and all that, but the main thing I want is performance.

Airflow in my comp is top notch I think at the moment, so I might not even need another fan blowing:
1. 80mm on top.
2. 80mm on side panel.
3. 120mm (about 36CFM) front.
4. 120mm (67CFM, rocket sounding thing) back.
5. modified my PSU to take in a higher CFM 80mm. can't remember spec on that now.

I might just get anohter 120mm to blow directly on top of my VGA, if I get the passive cooling one (stuff the 80mm optional fan or 3 CFM 9kRPM crap).


I can't get any decent reviews which will tell me which one's better. The AC is winning though, since its got really good reviews, but I think its just because of the brand.

Any thoughts appreciated.

 

[DragonMaster]

Yes, you can't get reviews ; no one's trying passives with fan in front of them...

If you don't like to do everything like everyone else, you could try the passive + fan.

 

[CMH]

Which was the whole idea, I was trying to see if passive + fan would be better than those Arctic Cooling things. Especially since I've already got good airflow in my case.

 

[DragonMaster]

Best thing is to find someone that already tried, but I think that the passive would be better.

 

[CMH]

According to reviews, the passive cooling with a fan (those that are designed for them) don't really work as well as the Arctic Silencer by itself.

Anyone with any experience with Arctic Silencer or passive cooling (or better yet, both?) on X800s?