I have an old GeForce 6600 card in my computer, circa 2004. Recently the fan has started playing up and making loud irritating noises. I've tried oiling it with no luck. This is the second fan I've put on the card, the stock one broke ages ago.

Is a card this old really likely to need a cooling fan or can I remove it altogether? It has a decent heatsink on the chip but there's not a lot of airflow in that part of the box.

Edit: I should add that I seem to remember most mid range graphics cards at the time I bought that didn't have fans (pretty sure they had heatsinks only), which is why I'm wondering.