[mythtv-users] Making the ASUS EN5750 quiet

[Raphael Pooser]

Timothy Braje wrote:
> I have been running a test MythTV system on my desktop for about a month 
> now, and am ready to build a system that can actually sit in the living 
> room.  I bought the MSI Neo4 motherboard, so I needed a PCI-Express 
> graphics card.  Since everyone seems to say that the Nvidia 5000 series 
> is the way to go for XvMC, and I haven't been able to get my 6200 to 
> work with Myth and XvMC, I thought I would try the nvidia 5750 chipset. 
>   Unfortunately, the fan on this card is *loud*.  I had thought ASUS 
> made quiet products, so I took a chance.  Does anyone have any 
> experience with this card?  I have looked at the Zalman GPU coolers, and 
> don't think any of them will fit on this card....
>
> Thanks,
>
> Tim
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>   
Go for an arctic cooling NV silencer.  I have not used any NV silencers, 
but I have used the original AC VGA silencer and am currently using an 
ATI silencer 5 on my gaming machine.  I relocated the original vga 
silencer off of my 9700pro over to my girlfriend's silent computer in 
order to shut up her newly bought sapphire x800gto.  The vga silencer 
was completely inaudible.  You can get away with putting the fans on 
these things at extremely low voltages.  If your graphics card has a 
noisy (clicking sound producing) PWM fan controller onboard, AC 
recommends not even using it and instead splicing the fan on the 
silencer directly to the 5 volt line from the power supply (by hooking 
up a spare male molex you to your AC fan of course - don't ruin the 
PS).  There is also a 7-Volt mod where you can wire the positive lead of 
the fan to 12V and the ground over to the 5V power supply lead.  To do 
that you need to make sure that you get a high current draw device, like 
a hard drive, on the same line hooked up after your graphics card fan 
though (don't want current flow into the 5V lead of the PS).  A 5 volted 
AC should shut up any graphics card you have, and honestly a 5750 should 
be cake to cool with this so no worries of overheating.
Best solution, build your own thermally regulated PWM controller and 
hook that up to your AC silencer fan, put the thermistor right next to 
your GPY core, or at least on the top side of the heat sink as close as 
possible to the die.  Set your voltage divider so that the fan turns off 
completely at a certain low enough temp (and you can also try and 
underclock), and so that it turns on automatically and ramps linearly 
with temp.  Here's some credit to a source that has a PWM schematic that 
allowed me to add a cooling fan and reduce temps in my machine with zero 
increase in perceived noise.  Operate the PWM at 100Hz as the article 
suggests and you won't even hear the clicking noise associated with 
intel and ATI PWM (can't speak to nvidias). 
http://www.bit-tech.net/modding/2001/12/03/pwm_fan_controller/1.html
Raphael