ASUS EN9600 GT Silent

When you’re as big as ASUS, you can offer multiple cards for any given AMD or NVIDIA GPU. In our previous GeForce roundups, we’ve taken a look at ASUS’ highest-performing TOP cards, which are overclocked out-of-the-box to deliver performance that’s greater than NVIDIA’s stock specifications provide. In fact, ASUS’ TOP cards are typically among the highest OC’ed cards for each GPU release.

But it doesn’t stop with their TOP line of graphics cards. ASUS also offers cheaper cards based on the stock clock speeds and reference GeForce board design and cooling for consumers looking for the best bargains, and occasionally they’ll produce high-end cards with watercooling from Thermaltake, or other unique features such as their 3870 X2 TOP card with four DVI outputs.

For the HTPC crowd, ASUS’ Silent line of graphics cards have been serving the needs of enthusiasts looking for a silent graphics solution for nearly four years now. Their cards use heatpipe technology to accomplish this task. The EN9600 GT Silent is ASUS’ latest silent card offering, its V-Cool cooling unit is built around three heatpipes which work together to keep the GPU cool.


You would barely notice the heatpipes at first glance though. This is because they are covered by a massive dual-slot heatsink, which helps to keep the heatpipes cool. ASUS actually uses an array of different heatsinks with varying densities to accomplish this mission.

The heatpipes themselves are largely cooled by the thin gray aluminum heatsinks that you see from the top of the card. ASUS uses dozens of thin fins, cramming them in together in order to increase the overall surface area of the entire heatsink. A large black heatsink adorned with the ASUS logo sits directly above the GPU. This heatsink has much thicker fins than the other heatsink array. ASUS even places fins on the edges of the heatsink to further increase the surface area of the heatsink. ASUS refers to these fins as V-fins.


The entire system works passively – no fans are present on the graphics card, allowing it to run completely silent. There’s one caveat however – ASUS recommends that end users place a fan inside the system chassis in order to ensure good airflow running over the card. On their website, ASUS even goes so far as to suggest that the PC should be placed in an area with good ventilation for optimal results.


Now technically none of these steps are required in order for the card to run properly, but it is recommended by ASUS. We recommend you’ve got good airflow within your case as well, although we wouldn’t be concerned about where you place your PC within your room, as long as you’ve got good airflow within your case you should be okay. So why is all this important? This is because heatpipes do such a good job of drawing heat off the graphics processor, they end up getting quite hot themselves. You wouldn’t want to touch a heatpipe when in use, as it could literally burn your finger! This heat needs to go somewhere, or else the air surronding the graphics card can get quite toasty, you’ll essentially create one huge hotspot within your case. If your case is adequately ventilated with cool air running over the graphics card, heat can be dissipated off the heatpipes and surrounding heatsinks more effectively than if your case was filled with stagnant air. You should also setup your system with an exhaust vent to blow any hot air outside of the PC case. ASUS technically has an exhaust vent located on the back of the EN9600 GT Silent, but since the card itself doesn’t have a fan, this exhaust vent is technically nonfunctional unless you go the extra mile and place a fan on or near the graphics card itself.

ASUS also elects not to cool the memory modules on the graphics card.

In terms of clocks, ASUS sticks with the reference GeForce 9600 GT specifications for their EN9600 GT Silent board.