Which Graphics Card GPU runs coolest on a laptop?

[TBABill]

I am trying to find out which graphics card brand runs coolest under PCLinuxOS? I currently have an ATI card in my laptop and with the proprietary driver it runs 50-75 degrees C. All ducts are clear, fan is clean and clear, scaling is enabled, fan works properly and changes on/off and speed correctly, etc. It's running properly but sometimes the exhaust vent gets pretty warm on my leg if I am in shorts (usually on sites with Flash).

If I were to replace the laptop which brand (Intel, nVidia or ATI) would run coolest with its proprietary driver enabled? I don't care which brand it is as I have had success with all of them. Right now it's all about heat because I tend to buy low to mid-grade laptops as far as price goes (usually $700 USD or less) so if anyone has anything definitive on the topic I'd appreciate reading it.

[T6]

in general it is not a good idea to put a laptop in your legs, many models take air from the lower part of the laptop(where your legs are) and then release hot air on the sides

flash is horrible in linux so this is normal, it eats too much cpu and gpu so no solution unless everybody abandons flash

ati/amd combination is usually the coolest combination

i have heard that intel/nvidia from multiple vendors had many problems with temperature and chips basically detached from the mainboard(nvidia and intel too hot)

recent models hopefully doesn't have this problem but in general nvidia runs hotter than ati

the one that runs cooler is intel integrated solution but this one usually makes the cpu run hotter and you are just changing the position of the heat source

ths is form the temperature point of view

from the support angle, drivers, everybody will tell you that nvidia has better support than intel or ati so this should be taken into consideration but to be honest, the temperatures you mention are basically normal for a big cpu/gpu laptop

lots of users just will tel you that you should one of these laptop coolers

[everge48]

If I were to replace the laptop which brand (Intel, nVidia or ATI) would run coolest with its proprietary driver enabled? I don't care which brand it is as I have had success with all of them. Right now it's all about heat because I tend to buy low to mid-grade laptops as far as price goes (usually $700 USD or less) so if anyone has anything definitive on the topic I'd appreciate reading it.

Definately not Nvidia. Nvidia laptop cards run hot. I've had many over the years and all run hot. From what I've researched and from what other linux users have told me Intel runs cooler than Nvidia generally speaking (and we are talking very generally). I'm sure there are Intel cards that run hotter and Nvidia cards that run cooler but aside from the exceptions Intels runs cooler and consume less power than Nvidia when you stack them all up. As far ATI goes I can't say because I don't know, never had one, never spent any time researching how their cards run on laptops with linux.
That said I love Nvidia and really dislike Intel so I put up with the extra heat and power consumption.

[menotu]

Another option (and somewhat less expensive  ) is to buy a laptop cooler.  I use one on an HP Pavillion P4 laptop and it works extremely well.

http://www.akasa.com.tw/update.php?tpl=product/product.detail.tpl&no=181&type=Notebook%20coolers&type_sub=NB%20Coolers&model=AK-NBCH-02

[T6]

hmmm...  just what i suggested previously  hmmm....

[menotu]

Double options - can't be bad!! 

[TBABill]

Thanks everybody. I played with a couple distros and PCLinuxOS the last week or so and it appears most of my heat was coming from my GPU. I tried one distro just for a few minutes and with the open source driver it was less than 5 minutes and I was up in the high 60s/low 70s (degrees C). But when I installed the proprietary ATi driver my machine cooled down to high 40s to high 50s under normal use. Scaling the CPU helped as well. As long as there is a driver for my ATi card (in a new machine) I should be fine and I believe the nVidia in my other runs quite cool as well.

These are issues a new person to Linux may not be aware of or may not be able to enable on their own. Video looks fine in 2D on open source drivers so a person may be inclined to worry about the heat from their machine when in appearance it works fine. But that heat level can degrade equipment over the long term.