Gigabyte Brix Pro GB-BXi7-4770R System Review

Temperatures

Measuring temperatures is all about being consistent therefore we keep a steady eye on monitoring the ambient room temperature to make sure that it stays the same. While this is constantly being monitored, we measure the idle temperature of the card using HWMonitor over a 15 minute period. Once this has been recorded, we set FurMark into motion for 15 minutes and record the results again.

With the overall power draw of the system as a whole higher than the 65W TDP design of the processor, we can now see why the fan speeds are so high. At idle the 4770R idles at a whopping 56 Celsius and once put under full load the temperature rockets to around 90 Celsius. So why is this? When the heatsink and fan was designed, Gigabyte refer to the TDP of the CPU, in this case 65W and consequently they build a cooler to suit. With the Iris core also packing out heat as well as the chipset – all into the same heatsink, we soon find that it is working overtime to try to keep the system temperature down. At this point the processor will start to throttle itself to keep itself from reaching its temperature threshold before the system shuts down. Simply put, the heatsink is not man enough in my eyes for this system at all.