You should put the comparative results of the first sample and the retail sample somewhere (here maybe; you say you are going to replace the results in the review) so it can be easily seen if there is any difference.
From the news: Where is the bios for Sonic (non-Platinum) card? It's not here: http://www.palit.biz/main/faq_show.php?pc_cate=vga&id=161 And it's not in the downloads page for 460 Sonic: http://www.palit.biz/main/download.php?pc_cate=vga&id=1337 (only drivers, manual and vtune) Tomorrow I will receive my Palit Sonic card and I want to make sure that the noise level will be in check. I hope it will be possible to easily lower the noise using Afterburner.
I've seen ir thermometer pictures of a gtx 460 showing very high (90-100 C) temps in the vrm area. Has anyone seen similar images for the latest bios?
The new bios is mainly to adjust the fan profile so it doesn't spin up to 80% under load. If anything the temp in the VRM area is likely to be hotter as the fan is running slower.
bios doesn't update my card .. says no updateable device found wtf ... Also, using custom fan settings with MSI Afterburner, and temps stay under 75c, with 70% fan @ 30c ambient room temp. ... and it gets hotter here during the day ...
Perhaps you have Palit Sonic, not Palit Sonic Platinum? The bios is for Platinum, if your default core clock is 700mhz, then this is not platinum. What exact settings are you using?
I've also heard that the new bios might lower volts, which would mean lower temps and lower overclockability. Something worth checking in my opinion.
That would suck, if true. In that case it would be better to leave old BIOS and lower the noise using fan speed settings of MSI Afterburner.
I'm glad it's not true - however, to my knowledge there is no fixed bios for Sonic non platinum cards [turns out I was mistaken - see below]. Is there a way to manually lower the fan speed? I have 37 degrees in idle, which is very low, so the fan could be much slower, but the automatic setting is at 43% (which is borderline OK) but it goes up every time I play a movie (even a lores divx), then fan speed goes up to 47% and becomes audible (not loud, but I have a quiet PC and this card is now the loudest component). I tried fiddling with MSI Afterburner, but whenever I set lower fan speed and hit "Apply", the value resets back to 43%. Is there any way of setting lower 2D clock? Perhaps editing a BIOS would help? Or is there a fixed bios for non platinum version, similar to the platinum bios fix? EDIT: I have a temporary solution - I downloaded Vtune software and I can lower the fan to the fixed speed 40%, but there is no separate speed for 2d and 3d clock (which is uber dumb!) so I may overheat my card if I start playing a demanding game. EDIT2: I went to Palit website and downloaded the bios that was marked "Update Bios for GTX460 Sonic Platinum" - I don't have platinum but I figured I'd give it a shot... and it worked to some extent. After the update the automatic speed is 40% (not 43) and the speed does not go immediately up when I play a video. It stays on 40%, when before it would ramp up to around 50 immediately, and be loud. I still cannot go lower than 40%, but it's still improvement over the old bios.
Did you try using the custom fan profile in Afterburner, not just setting the fan to a fixed speed? I managed to get a decent profile that was nearly silent at idle, and only ramped up when the card was really under load. I don't have the card now, so I can't take a screenshot of the profile unfortunately.
I have bitten the bullit, declind my Rma and installed my sonic platinum card. Its idles at 5c higher than my room temps (25c atm) I have placed my antec spot cool to caress the vrm area. I'm loving this card, even at 70% fan speed it makes less noise than my 4870x2 at my prefered manual fan speed (45%). This card is a beauty.
No - do you mean the option where you have a chart on which you can move points to choose what fan speed you want for a given temperature? I just tried and it did not work. Has anyone managed to lower the fanspeed of sonic/sonic platinum card below 40%? I don't really need to go lower than 40% - at this speed it is quiet enough for me. The problem with this card is that it cannot stay quiet under load (perhaps due to lack of heatpipes). Whenever I launch a game the temperature quickly rises and the fan speed does too - when I force lower fan speed, then the reported temperature exceeds 90 degrees, which I assume is not healthy for this card. Perhaps platinum has better fan, but for me non platinum sonic becomes too loud over 45% fan (but I have a very quiet pc overall).
It's not so bad as everybody made it seem at first. I'm very happy with the card as well, I have the non plat version clocked at platinum levels and everything is staying cool. Not too noisy either.
I also have a non platinum version clocked at platinum levels and from my subjective point of view it is not perfect. This cooling solution is not beefy at "quiet" fan speed (which for me is between 40 and 45% fan speed). At such speed the temperature rises in 3dmark vantage. In order to keep lower temps under load, the fan speed has to be over 55%.. For comparison, this card under load is louder than reference GTX260 and non-reference HD5850. Of course, everyone has their own level of noise tolerance, I know that my tolerance for noise is really low, my PC is nearly silent.
If you read my post on page 6, you would know: http://forums.guru3d.com/showpost.php?p=3646648&postcount=150 Basically, the bios that is described "Platinum" also works on non platinum model. I'm back with my question - anyone knows how to set fan speed lower than 40% in 2d?
Having a fan blowing on the back of the card will actually heat it up as hot air will get trapped from the exhaust.
This may mean that the updated bios is already there, by default. What about blowing at the "bottom" of the card (from the lower position, towards the down facing part of the card) - could this be helpful? EDIT: I just made comparison to Sapphire HD5850 (non reference cooling with heatpipes). When set to auto, fan speed in idle is 20%, temperature is 40 degrees. Fan is completely silent. During 3dmark vantage the highest recorder temperature was 70 degrees and fan speed increased to 23-25%, still remaining completely silent (this fan becomes lout at 50% but such high speed is never achieved because the temps are too low). Under the same conditions palit's temperature reached over 80 degrees, and fan speed reached over 60% (and was very loud).
