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Details of ABIT GF4 Ti 4200 OTES

When is a GeForce4 Ti 4200 not a GF4 Ti 4200? When ABIT gets their hands on it. Read inside for a quick look at how heatpipe technology should be done on video cards.

Where eVGA failed, it seems ABIT has picked up the ball and scored a touchdown. If you aren’t familiar with eVGA’s ACS² cooling technology I suggest you take a quick look at our eVGA review from a while back. Concentrate on page four of that review for the cooling issues that we encountered. eVGA implemented one of the first VGA cooling solutions that used heatpipe technologies to cool video card chipsets.

Their idea and goal was sound, their execution was not. That card was plagued with problems from the start. The heatsink itself didn’t even come into contact 100% with the chipset it was cooling and the temperature actually remained higher then that of some "stock" cooling options. While it did have some major problems the idea is still a worthy one.

Enter ABIT’s stab at premiere VGA cooling. First ABIT had to decide which chip to use. It would obviously be an NVIDIA chip since this is the product line they offer. The question was which one. They saw that the most potential would be in the GeForce4 Ti 4200. Even with the GF4 Ti 4600 or Radeon 9700 Pro out there offering top-of-the-line performance, the bulk of the video card sales come from mainstream and value cards. To gamers, finding the card that’s going to give you the most for your money is very important. The Ti 4200 offers a mix of performance with a low price now. It was a perfect chipset to build their cooling system around.

ABIT devised the OTES (Outside Thermal Exhaust System) in hopes of getting more from less. As the name implies, the exhaust from the fan is actually ported through to the rear of the PC case. One major component of this device is that the whole thing, heatsink and fins, are all copper. This definitely makes heat transfer better than aluminum. The OTES system uses heatpipe technology. A heatpipe is a hollow cylinder that contains liquid.

Heat is absorbed in the evaporating section causing the fluid to come to a boil, which turns into vapor. Heat is then released from the upper part of the cylinder and the vapor condenses to a liquid. The liquid then returns by gravity to the lower part of the cylinder. The heatpipe transfers this heat to the fins near the rear of the card. These fins are then cooled by a powerful 7,000 RPM fan, which blows over them and exhausts out the rear. The whole device is sealed in a plastic cover. The system is very remarkable when you think how much thought and engineering went into it.

As heatpipes are explained above, the use of gravity makes them work better if in an ideal environment. Still do not think that a heatpipe is rendered useless by changing its relation to the horizon.

Because of the great cooling achieved, ABIT was able to clock their OTES unit higher then a normal Ti 4200 is clocked at stock speeds. Normal Ti 4200 core clock is 250Mhz. ABIT has set their Siluro Ti 4200 OTES at 275Mhz core speed by default. This is the same core speed of the Ti 4400. The memory clock for a standard 64MB Ti 4200 is 500Mhz DDR. ABIT has set their Siluro Ti 4200 OTES at 550Mhz DDR memory clock. The same as a Ti 4400. So basically we have a Ti 4200 that is operating at Ti 4400 speeds right out of the box! And it is kept stable and cool thanks to the OTES system.

The OTES fan is a dual ball bearing 7,000 RPM blower. It is actually not as loud as a 7,000 RPM fan would be. I know that is a concern to some people. I can say that it is quieter than I expected, though it is still louder then a stock fan for sure. It is stable and does not seem to vibrate the card either. The RAM used is Hynix 3.6ns. Hynix is definitely good quality RAM that has proven itself in our overclocking tests.

Because of the exhaust system on this card and because they did want to include TV-Out and DVI they went with a two slot configuration. This card will take up two expansion slots on the back of your case. This means the first PCI slot on your motherboard may not be accessible with this video card installed. The TV-Out and VGA output are on a daughter card connected to the main video card.

Of course we had to take it all apart to find out what makes it tick! It is easily removable by unscrewing the four screws on the back of the card. The whole unit will then lift up off the card. When I removed it the first thing I noticed is that they did use the proper amount of thermal paste covering the whole GPU which does come into complete contact with the copper base. No part of the GPU is left un-cooled. The paste they used is indeed thick so that it won’t heat up and start running off the GPU.

The back plate itself has a large thermal pad on it, which comes into direct contact to the back of the GPU to further help with heat dissipation. It is also worth noting the screws did pull the whole unit down onto the GPU with sufficient pressure to allow proper heat transfer.