To measure cooler performance we start up the system and let it idle for 30 minutes in Windows. We then load the cards with Metro 2033 and Crysis Warhead and record the maximum result.
With the help of our Silverstone Raven 02 both cards perform very well with our idle and load tests. The Sapphire solution has around a 4 degree benefit at idle and only 1 degree at load. This actually shows how good the reference cooler is, even though it is considerably louder than the Vapor unit.