Thermalright releases HR-03 Plus 8800 Series VGA Cooler

[Babrbarossa]

None too soon- This would be fun to try!!

Thermalright HR-03 Plus 8800 Series VGA Cooler

"Prior to the end of 2006, many Thermalright supporters and users got to feel the wrath of the awesome cooling power of our VGA cooler, the HR-03. It received nothing but accolades and praises from world-wide hardware sites to end-users. Near the end of 2006 NVidia released their 8800 series video cards and we immediately started receiving inquiries about the HR-03’s compatibility with it.
We tested the new 8800GTX in our own lab and found that performance does indeed rise up to expectation but so does the heat that it produces. Unfortunately, the HR-03 did not have what it takes to work with the 8800 series, so we busily went back to the drawing board, did research on 8800’s structures, heat dissipation pattern and amount. The results required morphing the HR-03 into something greater! It took us a little longer than we anticipated, but we can now proudly announce Thermalright’s HR-03 Plus!
During HR-03 Plus’s research stage, we found that the 7*** series produces as much as 180W, so basically, most of the current VGA coolers on the market have enough to handle these video cards, provided that these coolers have a good fundamental design and efficient heatpipes.
But with the 8*** series, the men are separated from the boys or put another way, the real serious VGA coolers get separated from the rest of the pack, and our HR-03 Plus will no doubt, lead that privileged pack. The 8*** series, can and does produce as much as an unbelievable 300W; more fins/radiator, more surface area, more heatpipes, and the best raw material are needed to provide good cooling solutions. HR-03 Plus has all of the above, and with 6 heatpipes and with Thermalright’s world class patented design, you will see how it utterly overshadows the stock cooler. Not only that, the HR-03 Plus can and will even compete head to head with some of best water-cooling VGA coolers!
Another key feature of the HR-03 Plus lies in its copper base. Noticeably, the Nvidia 8800 series has increased the size of their GPU to around 55mm. The original HR-03, of course did not have enough to cover the extra large GPU. In the HR-03 Plus, we increased the surface area in the copper base. Together, inheriting HR-03’s main original features: the flexibility to choose from two installation methods and having the largest surface area known to date among all VGA coolers, and the immense grueling power of cooling; you shall be awed by HR-03 Plus!
So are you still looking for a monstrous cooling solution for your monstrous VGA card? Have you gotten tired of being scared every time you see that temperature rising up to the 80’s (Celsius degree)? Look no more because HR-03 Plus will tame the beast in your VGA card! "

From Thermalright

[SKYMTL]

How in the world will the wieght of this thing not damage your card? Personally, I think it is ridiculous ot have a "silent" cooler that you will just have to install a 120MM fan onto in order to give you decent cooling performance. The stock 8800 cooler is whisper quiet and probably provides equal performance to this....

[SHaCK]

I doubt it equals the stock cooler, my HR-03 literally destroyed the stock cooler on my x1950xt. I rather see a good quality product like this one then a hyped tide water or any other fancy heatsink products. Thermalright is well, always right.

BTW: You don't need to use a fan on those.

[SKYMTL]

Hopefully whoever buys this has good case ventilation then. Without a fan all this thing will do is radiate heat upwards towards your CPU (with a single card) or towards your first graphics card in an SLI setup.

One way or another, these massive coolers don't do anything for me.

[Babrbarossa]

You think this ones big-- check out this x1950 pro that is coming out and will be shipped with the giant AC silent gpu cooler onboard.

[SKYMTL]

Ugn...no thanks. I wonder how close that heatsink gets to the second card when running Crossfire.

I like my fans loud and fast, it reminds me they are actually working.

[Babrbarossa]

People who use a computer for living room gaming and HD on large lcd screens will be interested in these.

Personally I don't mind noise- ig nothing else, It reminds me to turn the system off before bed. However, now that I'm going with water cooling, I figure I might as well try to make it as quiet as possible since I'm going that route, however, I don't see how it's going to be quiet at all with three 120mm fans stuck to the radblock on the outside of my case...I suppose getting rid of that little ripper of a chipset fan will help- and I do find the stock 8800 fan to be quite loud when it's turned up-- Mine is overclocked so I have it running at 90% instead of the standard 60% and you can really hear it.

[Deathspawner]

Ouch that thing is HUGE. It looks like it wouldn't be much fun to install, let alone mount inside your case. You wouldn't want something like this in a small case... my 8800 barely fits in my Apollo as is... it would be tedious making something like that fit.

[Babrbarossa]

Read the review HERE

They couldn't say enough good things about this cooler and gave it their performance award. It apparently works well in SLI too.

"It is amazing to think just how far graphics cards have come and what they have enabled in the world of 3D gaming. When I think back to the purchase of my first gaming graphics card, which was a 3Dfx Voodoo B anshee featuring 16MB of onboard memory, it is hard to believe how good I thought this graphics card was at the time. I still have my Creative Labs Banshee, which cost me a pretty penny back in late 1998, and impressively the card still works perfectly; not that it can play even the most basic games created over the past few years."


There is one comment I don't agree with:

"The standard Nvidia cooler actually pushes a lot of hot air into the case and the air that does get trapped in the case is extremely hot! However, the air coming off the HR-03 Plus was never that warm, so the case temperature remained much lower. Furthermore the HR-03 Plus does not create the heat spots caused by the standard cooler, as it evenly distributes the warm air throughout the case. This makes the HR-03 Plus far more efficient than the standard Nvidia cooler."

The card releases the same heat inside the case regardless of how well it's dispersed. The fact that the stock cooler is in fact mising it with outside air and blowing it away from the card would actually keep the case cooler and prevent hotspots.