The Gigabyte GV-NX86S256H uses a passive cooling system and is based on the 8600 GTS chip. This is another unique cooling solution, largely because it is completely silent. The card has a large heatsink that nearly covers the entire surface. Two heatpipes emerge from the GPU and lead to the radiator. Gigabyte has designed the cooling solution to move heat as far away as possible from the GPU and ensure that heat is properly dissipated. Since the cooling solution is completely passive, it can only be expected that the card comes clocked at reference speeds. The speeds are 675 MHz for the GPU and 2000 MHz for memory.

The card requires two free slots for proper installation since the thermal design is quite thick. Gigabyte calls the passive cooling solution on this card Silent-Pipe 3 because they claim it integrates three Gigabyte thermal designs.

The Gigabyte GV-NX86T256D is based on the GeForce 8600 GT. Since the 8600 GT generates less heat compared to the 8600 GTS, Gigabyte decided to use its slimmer Silent-Pipe II thermal design. Although it is hard to see, the heatpipes used in the heatsink are visible. The card comes clocked 600 MHz for the GPU and 1440 MHz memory.