Hello all,
This is my 1st post btw, I hope I've got it right
. I am currently using a gigabyte maya2 radeon 9700 pro at stock speeds and considering trying the zalman heatpipe silent heatsink (not primarly to overclock more for sound reduction)
Have any of you tried this aluminium monster? . I have read many reviews and guides on this cooler ,impressive looking results too .
Now, I am a bit concerned about prising the heatsink from my expensive shiny card. I've tried modding cards before (rage fury maxx) and had average results by just polishing/lapping the stock heatsinks and applying a quality thermal compound
.The heatsink on this card gets really hot so maybe a larger sink would be a benifit ?........hence back to the ZM80A-HP
Any thoughts would be appreciated

Windows XP home
MSI KT4 Ultra
XP2100 with Zalman CU6000 flower sink 39 degrees idle & 49 full load
512Mg PC27

First post first mistake . Its not a KT4 its a KT3Ultra2 the KT4 is not compatable with Radeon 9700 .

A careful but firm twist of a nice blunt table knife should be enough to get the old 'sink off but it would wipe out your chances of a warranty claim.I would imagine youd have to watch clearance on the top side of the card as well as losing the pci slot underneath (but putting a card in there would obstruct the flow of the existng fan anyway...)
By the sound of it your machine is built with quietness given high importance ,much as my own,and I beleive Zalman products are tested with such machines in mind-go for it!

Apparently Hercules new 9700 card offers phenomenal overclocking potential.
It can easily o/c to match a 9700 Pro card, and has been pushed far enough to be benchmarked very close to what the 9800 is meant to be capable of.

At £200 its a brilliant buy, but if you're patient i'd expect the prices to drop in a month or 2 to about £170 or less, once the new Radeons surface.

If it were me looking for card around £200 i'd definitely get this one

Here is the link for the Hercules card.
I got my above statement wrong i'm afraid, its o/c speed is not close to the 9800 [Cry]

Its close to the 9800 PRO!!!

They got a 34% o/c on the GPU and 13% on the memory!!!

http://www.ukgamer.com/article.php4?id=222&page=1

Thanks for the info on the sink removal evdama a nice looking gaming card that hurc 9700 marky ,I believe the reason they managed to ramp the core clock up a massive 34% is hurcs inclusion of that copper orb, copper being more conductive that aliumimium results in a better more efficent removal of heat , however mass and surface area also contribute in this equation which is where the zalman wins with its tank sized twin heatsinks and fast removal via its heatpipe technology ( i wonder how long before someone makes a ramspider?, heatpipes from sinks on ram chips on a gfx card to a central heatsink/radiator?) also it looks nice that loverly all copper orb cooler but i wonder how loud it runs ?

also i do often wonder if these review sites get hand picked cards for their overclockability? or if they just got lucky as some o/clk better than others what do you think?

Hand picked cards at the very least.


Cinema tickets, holidays etc a definate possibility........