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We have built a system inside a Lian Li chassis with no case fans and have used a fanless cooler on our CPU. The motherboard is also passively cooled. This gives us a build with almost completely passive cooling and it means we can measure noise of just the graphics card inside the system when we run looped 3dMark tests.
We measure from a distance of around 1 meter from the closed chassis and 4 foot from the ground to mirror a real world situation. Ambient noise in the room measures close to the limits of our sound meter at 28dBa.
Why do this? Well this means we can eliminate secondary noise pollution in the test room and concentrate on only the video card. It also brings us slightly closer to industry standards, such as DIN 45635.
KitGuru noise guide
10dBA – Normal Breathing/Rustling Leaves
20-25dBA – Whisper
30dBA – High Quality Computer fan
40dBA – A Bubbling Brook, or a Refrigerator
50dBA – Normal Conversation
60dBA – Laughter
70dBA – Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA – City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA – Motorcycle or Lawnmower
100dBA – MP3 player at maximum output
110dBA – Orchestra
120dBA – Front row rock concert/Jet Engine
130dBA – Threshold of Pain
140dBA – Military Jet takeoff/Gunshot (close range)
160dBA – Instant Perforation of eardrum
The Asus R9 290X Direct CU II OC isn't the quietest video card we have tested, emitting around 36 Dba of noise under normal gaming load. When we look at other AMD R9 290X custom solutions from Gigabyte and Sapphire, they have both adopted triple fan cooling solutions. The Asus card is the only dual fan custom 290x solution and we feel this is part of the issue.
I love the GPU reviews here, so much information and great buying advice. I like the ASUS cards, they are always built very well, although they tend to be more expensive, than even Sapphire, who aren’t cheap.
Very expensive, I want to see more 290 reviews, not the X versions, they are way out of most peoples price range.
I have always bought ASUS cards – although I must admit not at £500! Quite happy with my 670, still rocking well with modern games.
No stock again 🙁 AMD need to get their act together with their partners. by the time they get a lot of stock of 290’s and 290x’s Nvidia will have their next generation out !
Its an interesting point, triple fan coolers look to be the future for these high end boards. That Palit GTX780ti got me excited, but I just can’t justify £630 on a graphics card.
I agree though, why no 290 reviews, the X version is just way too expensive. more please.
Could you please update the review with VRM temps? Just scroll down on the sensor tab on GPU-Z. Thanks!
I test my asus 780 Gtx 3G SLI 2 video card and runs it predy good whit 5k ultra samsung TV 65inch and I test it whit my game BF4 125 fps my dream rate ……