The Gigabyte ITX 2060 is an overall fine card but I found it to be loud near 70% and above. So after a failed attempt where I tried to mount a Noctua fan with wires as seen in some video (they were always in the way of the fans and it was not as sturdy as I wanted), I got myself a replacement fan of the previous gen which I took apart for it's tri-wing mounting. Unfortunately while it looked exactly the same, it was a bit too small for the 2060 and it's inner surface was not flat - so I finally ended up ordering two 3d prints of the thing after doing some measurements. Never thought I end up investing this much effort into the topic, but I finally managed to do it.
Part of the concept was to keep the shroud on, not do anything irreversible on the gpu's components and keep the original fan usable as a back-up. Print I received was a bit smaller, but not that much that I could not attach it to the shroud after carefully making the holes bigger with a small screwdriver.
Superglued it to the backside of a branchless cutout NF-A9x14 after peeling off the sticker for a better grip, then connected it to the gpu header with a PWN to VGA adapter from Phobya. Ended up routing the cable downwards as the heatpipes were in the way on the top - this made me use the extender too that came with the fan.
It of course got more silent - which I hoped, but what I did not expect was that besides having the noctua fan, it's probably due to some better temps as well as the card became cooler with about 5-7 degrees depending on the game. And it surely looks a lot nicer, with the colors matching
The build's 3d printed components are now include a fan duct on the other side for the L9a, 8mm feet extenders and now this. I know my Dan A4 can accommodate full sized graphics cards, but I grew fond of this fella during the time it spent within my care, especially now that I did some modding on it. I'll probably give my abandoned custom aio project another go sometime in the future to give more meaning to this little gpu within this case.
I would also like to ask opinions from the good people of this forum regarding a question:
Roughly when is the time to change thermal paste on a gpu? I bought this brand new in august 2020, but the model is of course about 2 years old now and who knows how long it was sitting on the shelves. Thinking about using Carbonaut on it instead of paste though (and of course thermal pads on other areas of the board where it is required) so that despite the few degrees higher temps, it won't ever be needed to be taken apart even when I end up giving it to someone else one time.
Part of the concept was to keep the shroud on, not do anything irreversible on the gpu's components and keep the original fan usable as a back-up. Print I received was a bit smaller, but not that much that I could not attach it to the shroud after carefully making the holes bigger with a small screwdriver.
Superglued it to the backside of a branchless cutout NF-A9x14 after peeling off the sticker for a better grip, then connected it to the gpu header with a PWN to VGA adapter from Phobya. Ended up routing the cable downwards as the heatpipes were in the way on the top - this made me use the extender too that came with the fan.
It of course got more silent - which I hoped, but what I did not expect was that besides having the noctua fan, it's probably due to some better temps as well as the card became cooler with about 5-7 degrees depending on the game. And it surely looks a lot nicer, with the colors matching
The build's 3d printed components are now include a fan duct on the other side for the L9a, 8mm feet extenders and now this. I know my Dan A4 can accommodate full sized graphics cards, but I grew fond of this fella during the time it spent within my care, especially now that I did some modding on it. I'll probably give my abandoned custom aio project another go sometime in the future to give more meaning to this little gpu within this case.
I would also like to ask opinions from the good people of this forum regarding a question:
Roughly when is the time to change thermal paste on a gpu? I bought this brand new in august 2020, but the model is of course about 2 years old now and who knows how long it was sitting on the shelves. Thinking about using Carbonaut on it instead of paste though (and of course thermal pads on other areas of the board where it is required) so that despite the few degrees higher temps, it won't ever be needed to be taken apart even when I end up giving it to someone else one time.
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