Hi, I recently bought a new laptop. A dell inspiron 9400, to be exact. (intel core duo 1.83ghz x2, geforce 7800go, 2 gigs ram) Now, it runs fine, but i heard that dell underclocks their graphic cards BIG time. the stock clock for the 7800go is around.. 400 i believe? ive been told that dell UNDERCLOCKS this card to around 250, to keep things a little cool. thats no good for me! which is why i want to overclock it a bit, and therefore, i need sufficent cooling. so, that leads me to my question: can anyone reccomend a GOOD ,yet not too expensive (i dont need all the bells and whistles like extra usb ports and stuff) cooling device for a laptop (specifically a inspiroin 9400, if that matters)??? I want something that will, like i mentioned, cool this sucker down on the inside so i can overclock the gpu. doesnt matter if its a mat you lay the laptop on, or if its internal fans and heatsink that you gotta take apart to install. (by the way, if it comes to the latter, im not sure of my laptops dementions, but it is a 17 inch screen) please help! thanks andy
hey buddy, I'm in the middle of purchasing one myself. I just ordered a vantec cooling pad wich happens to have the extra usbs. I should be receiving it by thursday. I ordered if from zipzoomfly.com. you can check out what they have or you can go to newegg.com and read the reviews. http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductList.jsp?ThirdCategoryCode=010814 http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?N=2030260319+1276817102&Submit=ENE&SubCategory=319
Before you get in a tizzy about it, you might want to find out first. While you can also OC with it, you can find out your GPU and memory clock speeds with something like [google]RivaTuner[/google]. I know Antec and I believe CoolerMaster also have some sort of cooling pad for laptops that run around $30.
k, i downloaded rivatuner, to check the clock speeds.. this is what it says... $0100000100 Core clock domain 0 : 249.750MHz $0100000101 Core clock domain 1 : 249.750MHz $0100000102 Core clock domain 2 : 249.750MHz $0100000006 Memory clock : 329.063MHz (658.125MHz effective) $0100000007 Reference clock : 27.000MHz looks underclocked to me? then again.. i think i screwed up with the drivers and installed the drivers for the 7800GS, so maybe.,, those are the clock speeds for that gpu? bleh. lol
WOW! I went into the nvidia driver settings into the clock tab, and i clicked the "test optimal settings" button, or whatever... it brought the clock speed from 249 to 389! i brought the settings of f.e.a.r up alot higher, almost FULL, and there isnt that much of a heat difference.. maybe gets to about.. 75? and nvidia cards can aparently handle up to 90's, yay
I know for my 6600GT on my desktop (it's an eVGA brand, although I highly doubt this makes a difference) has a core slowdown threshold of 124*C or so, by default. I don't know if you see anything, but I would think that nVidia knows their hardware well enough not to pull that number out of thin air. If you game hard for awhile and get lockups, that may be a sign that things are getting too hot, but otherwise no.
Oh, also when looking for a laptop cooler, make sure it fits your laptop. If you have a widescreen, take a look at the bottom of your laptop to see where there are intake holes are; you may need to purchase a widescreen cooler depending on where these holes are. It just so happens my laptop works fine with a standard cooler.
