The tests were performed in a controlled air conditioned room with temperatures maintained at a constant 23c – a comfortable environment for the majority of people reading this.Idle temperatures were measured after sitting at the desktop for 30 minutes. Load measurements were acquired by playing Crysis Warhead for 30 minutes and measuring the peak temperature. We also have included Furmark results, recording maximum temperatures throughout a 30 minute stress test. All fan settings were left on automatic.
The dual fan cooler performs very well, holding gaming temperatures at 58c under extended load.
We install the graphics card into our system and measure temperatures on the back of the PCB with our Fluke Visual IR Thermometer/Infrared Thermal Camera. This is a real world running environment playing Tomb Raider for extended periods of time.
The backplate on the Powercolor card works exceptionally well, holding load temperatures well below 50c as shown above.
The biggest hotspot on the card is on the heatpipe which is exposed along the top of the GPU. These heatpipes hit around 66c under extended load – which is still a very good result indeed.