I agree that it would be nice if EVGA ventured away from the reference cooler and made something a little more exotic.  No one minds having an icon.

On the other hand, all the examples you posted would have a certain percentage of us EVGAers upset.  No one likes the idea of having that hot air circulating around in the computer case.  All the exaples you posted would allow hot air to blow back into the computer case and recirculate through the video card and through other components.  NVIDIA has done an awesome job overall at producing coolers which dump the heat outside the case, don't recirculate the heat back into the case, and have fans which are relatively quiet and more importantly don't fail very often.

There have been a few NVIDIA reference performance video cards which did recirculate some or all of the heat of the video card back into the computer case and there have been many up in arms over it.  It would be a back thing for EVGA to do likewise.

SLING-BLADE

i didnt say that EVGA had to copy ASUS's idea but to make somting along the lines of it. im sure eather EVGA or NVIDIA can make a design that dumps air out of the case and cools better and also looks great.

Why do cards need to look great?

Orici

SLING-BLADE

i didnt say that EVGA had to copy ASUS's idea but to make somting along the lines of it. im sure eather EVGA or NVIDIA can make a design that dumps air out of the case and cools better and also looks great.

Why do cards need to look great?

PSHHH!
 
Why do computers need to look great?  Yet we are fascinated with them and we do our best to make them look beautiful.
 
I am all for a great looking video card.  I like the idea.  I just would make sure that the manufacturer gets feedback from its customers before it makes a design change.

So far the only EVGA card that looks cool is this!!!

it really isnt about looking pretty, i can care less about extra fans and lights, who needs more fans in a already loud haf 932, especially with my custom fan profile to keep my godly 5970 cool, we need a enthusiast top of the line fermie that can be code named waterx were it used a custom water cooler built into the card, the waterblock could sit were the normal fan shroud is, it should be cooled by a onboard cooling unit that they should patent, this is not impossible.

I like the idea of having a design remodling on the cards but I think the Heatsink and fan style work very well and dont need revamped, no if you want to add some cool graphic stickers or different colors that would be sweet.

[HazMatt]

Orici

Why do cards need to look great?

+1.  If it performs, I'm happy.

Well unfortunately I have noticed that aftermarket sinks that even dump into the case will always perform at least 10C cooler than the stock shrouds.

Sure the stock shroud does its job. But think about the extra headroom for folding or overclocking if the card was better cooled.

Personally, I am driven by results, not looks.

I wish they would change it to where the GPU coolers were facing up rather than down so we could see some of the awesome designs that get put on these cards. Quick GIMP edit to show what I mean.

.

What if the fans were drawing air from within the case to fans that were blowing it out the back of the card that should increase the speed of all external fans.
If you have multiple Graphics cards this effect would be magnified it would be cooler (pardon the pun) if the fans worked together in some way increasing this effect due to some sort of card shielding attachment.

is there anyway to make sure EVGA reads this? cuz i think the ideas expressed here are great and could even get more people buying EVGA products. i thanks everyone for expressing there opions.

P.S. Darron the thing that comes to mind in your last post about the GPU fans some how working to gether, i think that is what Nvidia tryed to do the the Dual PCB version of the GTX 295, the 2x PCB 295 had a whole that went all the way through the video card for the fan to pull air.

warthorn

Although I too prefer cards that only expel out of the case, more non-reference cards would be great. Akimbo, ACS3-style.

A few ideas that may be desirable and practical, yet inexpensive:

• A small red Classified-style "E" on the side of EVGA cards. It lights up depending on temperature, i.e., at low temps it is very dull, if the core temp is high the light gets very bright. Eye-catching yet informative.
• Small prongs or clips on the back of the cooler (or even just small screw holes), so that you can easily attach a fitted 80mm (or even 60 or 120?) fan to the back of your card(s). Many members (see my Mods Rigs) did this ghetto for the 200-series using zipties and brackets.
• EVGA "E" vent grills on the PCI bracket... Why have random wavy bars when you could plaster some "E" vents in there?!
• More involved, but some "DIY" kits -- cards that come as bare PCBs, and you can order one of several EVGA-designed (or aftermarket) cooling solutions. Save a little money on labor/assembly costs, and customize.

Agreed, why not have a glowing and or temp=Brightness level "E" like the X58 Classified motherboards had on the Northbridge cooler??

i would love to see some different cooling solutions from evga.... heck if all they did was stick a gloing E on the side that could be seen through the side window of a case that would be mega awesome.


i mean how much extra would that cost for some plastic and leds?  or a nice fat glowing red EVGA on the side of the card...

I love the Idea of the L.E.D. EVGA on the side of thew card it makes it look flashy and yet suttle. And you should be able to controle what colors the L.E.D.'s light up and how it lights up ( like the ALIENWEAR case's ) I am glad that this topic went so well, with all these crative ideas EVGA would be fools to not put these to work.

I like the idea of the LED "E" logo. But I'd like to see another non-reference cooler from EVGA.

EVGA can do whatever to pimp their cards

but

they should always ask us for our piece of mind before releasing them. We're teh bomb.