help me pick a video card for my cube?

[Patnukem]

as some of you know I recently got a cube and I feel that it needs a more usable video card (it may also just be boredom who knows?) and I have recently posted in the trading post to buy one but I keep changing my mind so my first thought was O let me go over to cubeowner.com and register and ask there..... well that was on the 11th and I still have not been approved to post by the moderator. so I thought I would ask here (I trust you guys more anyway since ive had more help here then in any other forum even if it had nothing to do with macs) Anyway back to the subject I have a stock ati 128 pro with 16mb vram and was thinking about the radeon 7500 or the geforce 3 but then I saw that the geforce 3 might over heat even with a fan but most people with 7500's with an added fan get temps of only 100-110F for there video cards. ( much cooler then my macbook pro haha) but since there is a huge list of cards I thought I would ask I would prefer not to move the vrm and would like to keep the adc for my monitor and I do not want to have to buy a dvi to adc adapter. Thank you in advance for any insight or help.

 

[Quadraman]

In a cube you have two major constraints. Size and heat dissipation. As for size, anything physically larger than the stock video card won't fit. The killer GeForce 3Ti won't physically make it inside a cube. You can't get a card with a fan inside a cube. A very short heatsink might make it, but you need to know what you are buying before you get it as it still may not fit. Trying to run a card that requires a fan or big heatsink with insufficient cooling is only going to burn up the video card. Cards that require external power are also a problem with a cube as there aren't as many power connectors floating around in there like there would be in a tower.

Edit: I thought this topic looked familiar. I posted the list of tested video cards in another thread. You should look there for what fits and what doesn't.

 

[Patnukem]

i have already looked at the list of supported video cards for the cube, I guess I should have asked out of the ones that do fit without modification or vrm, the 7500 and the geforce 3 (apple OEM) both fit and without modifications. If I got a 7500 the one I am leaning toward I would put a small fan to help dissipate the air like here http://www.macmod.com/content/view/24/193/

the 7500 seems a lot cooler then the geforce and is a lot cheaper but the geforce performs a bit better and I would not have to cut a custom fence.

 

[Byrd]

You can't get a card with a fan inside a cube.

You can fit a low-profile heatsink + fan inside a Cube without any issues, and make a cardboard duct so the hot air is expelled upwards and out of the case.

The Apple OEM Radeon 7500 is a direct fit and a nice card, but you will of course need to modify the back bracket and add a heatsink to the card (I bodged up one from a Radeon 8500). Any card "better" than the Rage 128 will need a fan; you're pushing it with just a base fan installed. In mine I've a slow base fan and the graphics card fan runs @ 7V.

Just to note, the Apple OEM Geforce 3 will fit but it's very hot (that's with a fan!) and far too expensive to bother about.

The cream of the crop is a Mac flashed nVidia 6200, which if you can find the correct one on eBay will fit fine and supports Core Image and high resolutions/dual displays. This will cost you around $100, and is well worth the coin

So the main options are

- Apple OEM Radeon 7500 (cheap, decent speed, ADC monitor connector)

- Apple OEM Geforce 2 MX (hot running, needs a fan, decent performance)

- PC flashed Geforce 2 MX (cheap as)

- PC flashed nVidia 5200/5500 (cheap, hot, Quartz Extreme)

- PC flashed nVidia 6200

... there are other cards that will fit (Radeon 8500, Geforce 3 PC) but you either need to relocate the VRM or buy a Gigadesign VRM which cards can slide easier into, and I'm not a fan at all of the Gigadesign VRM

JB

 

[Patnukem]

more I look into im feeling good about the 7500 since I have an adc and it would be at least an extra 50 bucks for a dvi/adc adapter. and I can get one for about 30 bucks shipped if not cheaper. I plan on putting in a base fan and I like that you can solder on a fan to the 7500. I have a pc radeon 9000 I can take the fan off of. thanks for the advice. I thought the geforce 3 would get to hot despite some saying it has worked fine for them. and looking at speed and render tests it looks the the geforce3 performs only slightly better then the 7500.

 

[Byrd]

Go for it, the 7500 is a nice card. There are two solder pads on the 7500 where you're able to solder on your Radeon 9000 fan. I also put some cheap RAMsinks on the top and bottom of the card.

It's also able to be overclocked using ATIaccelerator a little bit

JB

 

[Patnukem]

how hard is it to remove the old heat sink I had seen stories of people breaking there cards getting old ones off. also do you think that I would need to add another fan on the ram above it to help push the air out the video card vent? Or should I just use a different fan just on the ram above to push it out? I could also use the radeon 9000's fan as the fan by the air vent.

 

[Byrd]

It's pretty easy on the 7500, it's only glued on a little. Seal it up in a few anti-stati bags, put it in the freezer for about 30 mins, and it should pop ff with a "twist".

The Mac Geforce 2 MX almost always dies when you remove the heatsink

JB

 

[Patnukem]

ok I knew I read it from somewhere probably when I thought the geforce 2 mx would be the best card. The only thing I will be disappointed in on the 7500 is the fence not lining up. but I should have my monitor back 100% tomorrow I get a working main board to fix the awful failing usb bus issue in the adc lcd, it just drives me nuts the brightness button just lights up when pressed and im out two usb's.

 

[Patnukem]

well I installed the new main board and it fixed the usb/brightness issue so now I only have one other issue to fix on my cube finding a single speaker is hard!