discussion With EVGA closing, who makes the closest equivalent cards?

[Lysrin]

I said this already, but I'd really be more interested in the cooling performance in reviews than a particular fin design. If the performance is good, does it really matter how the fins are laid out? @crazyea mentioned the FE cards from NVIDIA. Both the 3000 and 4000 series looked like they were made more for looks than cooling but ended up performing well.

Unless you are actually going for a certain look coupled with performance, then of course the design matters more I suppose. I love my reference 6800 XT, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder!

 

[lowfat]

Nvidia really stepped it up cooling on the 4000 series founders cards. Gamers Nexus did a fantastic vid w/ an Nvidia engineer on how it was improved.

I've had a lot of 3000 series MSI cards and because the cheap Ventus 2X they all had sufficient coolers.

But TBH I think most modern cards have pretty great coolers these days.

 

[clshades]

ASUS is pretty good indeed. I will mention that they don't use top tier thermal pads and I generally replace them Gelid Solutions GP-Extreme ones for better performance. I have observed this on RX 5700's and RTX 3060 (Ti) 's/3070's .

Zotac has issues with fans, but overall design is pretty decent.

XFX is pretty solid as well, but they put too much plastic shrouding which can be blocking some of the air flow.

Gigabyte uses very thin thermal pads on memory chips, and I mean 0.5mm! That's just ridiculous...

I'd break the candidates out by pro's, quality of cooling, warranty duration and support.

1. Warranty and support (within Canada)!
a. MSI
b. ASUS
c. Gigabyte

2. Quality and cooling:
a. MSI
b. ASUS
c. XFX
d. Sapphire
d. Zotac

--

MSI and ASUS are pretty decent in terms of build and general support, quick turnarounds and it is within Canada - since you have to pay for the shipping.

I've. Noticed my 3080 running a little hotter lately after the last update. I don't know which pad sizes I need and where those sizes go on the card exactly?

Is there a link or video somewhere that explains it all? I'd be happy to have a go at new pads for even 4 or 5 C cooler.

 

[Sagath]

I've. Noticed my 3080 running a little hotter lately after the last update. I don't know which pad sizes I need and where those sizes go on the card exactly?

Is there a link or video somewhere that explains it all? I'd be happy to have a go at new pads for even 4 or 5 C cooler.

google it with your card, and someone might have the info out there already for you.

Else, you're gonna have to break out a caliper and measure them.

 

[lowfat]

I've. Noticed my 3080 running a little hotter lately after the last update. I don't know which pad sizes I need and where those sizes go on the card exactly?

Is there a link or video somewhere that explains it all? I'd be happy to have a go at new pads for even 4 or 5 C cooler.

I had a 30C drop in memory temps with better pads. But they definitely are all card specific.

 

[anabioz]

google it with your card, and someone might have the info out there already for you.

Else, you're gonna have to break out a caliper and measure them.

That's exactly what I do. I stack up on all sizes: 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 and 3.0mm thermal pads. Then i take the card apart and measure them.

NOTE: I recently had Dell replace a faulty card in one of my desktops - RX5700 and it was running a bit hot... So I took it apart to better understand why temperatures were so hot...

Several issues identified:

1. Wrong sized thermal pads were being used. (Notice how badly the thermal pads were pressed on memory)
2. Incorrectly placed thermal pads.

 

[CMetaphor]

Gotta reiterate: the reason I like EVGAs design so much is 1) the the sheer number of fins crammed everywhere possible and 2) (the part some forget) is total top/bottom exhaust with nothing exhausting out the back or all over the place. 2 is important because of how many cases nowadays have airflow traveling the same direction. So with one of those cases you're guaranteed not to have random hot air swirling around your case.

 

[Soultribunal]

Interestingly enough, I have yet to see one person (unless I missed it) mention PNY.
They are actually a really good card designer and even OEM for Dell. GN itself actually praised (the only component he praised) their GPU Choice in the AW Towers.
I think, but don't quote me, Dell has Diamond OEM their AMD stuff and its hot garbage as you can see from Anaboiz's post above.
Their cooler designs are solid and very much on par with what EVGA put out.

My two go-to's back in the day for nVidia were EVGA and PNY. Zotac was there at times too, but that was because they made the same card, but smaller which was good for SFF builds.

-ST