KitGuru KitGuru.net – Tech News | Hardware News | Hardware Reviews | IOS | Mobile | Gaming | Graphics Cards
We take our noise measurements with the sound meter positioned 1 foot from the graphics card. I measured the noise floor to be 32 dBA, thus anything above this level can be attributed to the graphics cards. The power supply is passive for the entire power output range we tested all graphics cards in, while all CPU and system fans were disabled.
A reading under load comes from running the 3DMark Fire Strike Ultra stress test 20 times. An idle reading comes after leaving the system on the Windows desktop for 30 minutes.
Noise levels recorded on our sound meter came in just above what we recorded with the RTX 2080, but the difference wasn't noticeable to my ears – just the sound meter! In any case, it is far from a loud card. You will be able to hear the fans spinning, but compared to the 10-series Founders Edition cards, not to mention Vega 56/64, it is very easy on the ears. I would expect partner cards to be able to make effectively silent 2070 SUPER models, but we will have to see about that.
There is one more point to mention, however, and that is the fans don't switch off during idle or light loads. There's no doubt that Nvidia could do it – they are likely just being over-cautious – but it is a feature I, and many other enthusiasts, would like to see.
